After a year of anticipation (and countless replays of the live clip where she first performed it), it’s finally here — “The Subway,” the third single from Chappell Roan’s second studio album. Channeling the atmosphere of 1990s dream pop icons like Cocteau Twins, the track sounds more like a 1990s classic than a new hit song. And Chappell, for a moment, sounds less like a rising star and more like a voice already etched into the genre’s lineage.
The subway has long been a favored setting for artists — a space where movement meets stillness, anonymity meets intimacy. In its confined, fluorescent-lit corridors, artists have found a metaphor for urban isolation, fleeting connection, or emotional transition. Chappell leans into this tradition, but with her own, clever twist: a distinctly sapphic perspective. Sure, she sketches the moment of encountering a former lover on the subway — “I saw your green hair, / beauty mark next to your mouth, / there, on the subway, / I nearly had a breakdown.” There’s no metaphor to soften the blow — just raw memory, arriving uninvited in confined space. The ex becomes a specter, returning in smells, in shadows, in unshakable habits. Chappell doesn’t just describe longing — she traces the frustrating persistence of it, the rituals of trying to let go: not saying her name during foreplay, counting down the days until she’s “just another girl on the subway.” Even the promise to leave the town — “Fuck this city, I’m moving to Saskatchewan” — feels less like a plan than a clever punchline masking desperation. It’s this unvarnished emotional honesty, set against the track’s soft pulse and synths, that gives “The Subway” its quiet power, and makes the track so relatable.