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During her highly anticipated set at Primavera Sound 2025, rising pop star Chappell Roan surprised the crowd with a performance of her unreleased song, The Subway on June 7, 2025. This emotional ballad earned strong praise from both the concert crowd and fans.
Through the song lyrics, Chappell Roan seemed to be recalling a time she saw her ex on the subway. As seen in the performance clips doing rounds on social media, she sang during the post-chorus:
“I’m still counting down all of the days/ ‘Til you’re just another girl on the subway.”
A fan expressed their excitement on X, writing:
“Need this song on stream platforms ASAP.”
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Netizens continued to share their reactions on social media, with one fan calling it the "song of the decade."
"This is the best performance of subway yet wow,"nan X user stated.
"Song of the decade chappell please release it im sick of my Spotify podcast,"nanother X user added.
"Her stage presence…LOVE to see a hungry artist. she gets it," a fan echoed.
As soon as the clip from Primavera Sound 2025 was released, fans mentioned that they are eager to listen to the track.
"Trust and believe this song is gonna be in my top 3 most replayed of 2025 as soon as it comes out!", another fan added.
"should be a year soon since this song was first played 💔💔💔", a netizen wrote.
"SOTY and she's keeping it in her drawer", another netizen mentioned.
The Subway: An unreleased fan favorite by Chappell Roan
Chappell Roan’s composition, The Subway, is a favorite amongst fans, even though it has never been produced into an official recording. As reported by NME, her emotional ballad, which debuted live at Governors Ball 2024, seemingly discusses heartbreak and the intense moment when she almost cried after encountering her ex on the subway.
Ever since, the track has been played at festivals like Lollapalooza, Bonnaroo, and most recently, Primavera Sound 2025, all of them causing people to keep asking for it to be available on streaming platforms.
During her appearance on iHeart Radio’s Las Culturistas podcast, released on April 16, 2025, Chappell Roan explained the delay by saying she finds it hard to get the song’s energy in live performances onto the record. The 27-year-old singer added that she dropped the phrase “demo-itis” to describe fans’ sentiment for unfinished or live versions.
She explained to the podcast listeners:
“I’ve been banging my head against the wall with ‘The Subway,’ because… some songs just work live — certain things work live — and they don’t work in the studio.”
The singer-songwriter added:
“For ‘The Subway’, it’s just going to feel different, and different doesn’t always mean worse…You just have to really take yourself out of it and be like, ‘This is different and that’s okay.’”
Chappell Roan further reflected on the fan's admiration for the track, stating:
“Because you have demo-itis, because you’ve attached so much to this – you attach memories, you attach all of these things – to this one version of the song, but it’s actually not as good as the actual recorded version, straight up. The song wasn’t done, there was pitchiness all over the map, sometimes that’s magic, but it’s not what I want in my life.”
Roan has not revealed the release date for The Subway, but has addressed the direction of her second album, which is yet to be announced.
