Here’s something that Chappell Roan fans and New Yorkers have in common: They’ve all spent a long time waiting for “The Subway.” Roan first debuted the track during the summer of her ascendancy at New York’s Governors Ball 2024. Having transitioned from full Statue of Liberty drag into a (still green-skinned) taxi cab costume, she delighted the crowd with a new ballad that The A.V. Clubdescribed at the time as “early 2000s pop by way of Michelle Branch.” Now, over a year and many festival performances later, the Grammy winner has finally dropped the studio version of “The Subway,” completely with a new music video.
In the video, Roan plays a melancholy Rapunzel roaming NYC and seeing the ghost (or, well, hair monster) of a former lover everywhere she goes. The song once again showcases Roan’s incredible vocals, particularly on the outro as she belts “She’s got a way/And she got away.” She also continues to prove herself a nimble songwriter, taking simple concepts and infusing them with epic emotion. The production leaves a little something to be desired, not quite capturing the sparkle that Michelle Branch-style 2000s pop or the immediacy of the live version. But earlier this year, Roan said she’s struggled with fans falling in love with demos or live versions and feeling disappointed by the studio release. “You fall in love with what you hear first, because you hear a different version and you’re just gonna hate it because it’s different,” she acknowledged during an appearance on Las Culturistas.
In an Instagram post, producer and co-writer Dan Nigro revealed that “The Subway” was actually the first song they wrote after The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess album, but they ultimately ended up getting further along with “Good Luck Babe” and decided to release that for Roan’s first post-album single. Though they got a version of “The Subway” together in time for Gov Ball, neither felt it was quite finished for an official release. “I’ve been banging my head against the wall with ‘The Subway,’ because songs can work live, certain things can work live, and they do not work in the studio,” Roan said during her Las Culturistas episode in April.
Though fans have eagerly anticipated new music from Chappell Roan in the wake of her 2023 debut album and being crowned Best New Artist at the most recent Grammy Awards, “The Subway” doesn’t necessarily herald a full-length project. In March, she admitted that she was “so beyond far away” from a new album, though she has hinted at some work she’s done with Nigro on it. Roan recently announced a series of pop-up shows scheduled for later in the year, saying she wanted “to do something special before going away to write the next album.”
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