Hi!! I hope I'm not bothering you with my question but do you mind explaining what coney island is about? It's the only song i don't get, not even the big picture
hi!! not a bother AT ALL!! i was listening to coney island on break and got such a vivid picture in my head about the song so i’m so glad you asked! this is gonna be rather long so keep reading if you’re interested in my interpretation :)
the lyrics that set the visual scene in my brain for me are “i’m sitting on a bench in coney island, wondering where did my baby go? the fast time, the bright lights, the merry go”
so. i picture taylor, sitting on a bench (obviously) and she’s absolutely captivated by the sight of this merry-go-round spinning in front of her. the lyrics that follow are “sorry for not making you my centerfold, over and over, lost again with no surprises, disappointments, close your eyes, and it gets colder and colder when the sun goes down.”
time moves quickly in this universe and taylor is watching a merry-go-round of her past. she sees all the men who have hurt her, and the men she has hurt, one at a time. all these relationships “lost again with no surprises”. she closes her eyes, the sun sets, the sun rises and she must revisit another relationship.
i noticed a ton of lyric parallels in the song that linked to iconic songs in taylor’s past albums, commonly linked to certain relationships. (i normally don’t post about this sort of stuff, but those songs were pretty clear, and this is more about the parallels than the men, to me). someone on twitter also made many of these connections, but i’m not sure who, so if you are that person please let me know, because a few of these i connected because of you.
“did i close my fist around something delicate? did i shatter you?” — “you gave me all your love and all i gave you was goodbye” (back to december)
“what’s a lifetime of achievement if i pushed you to the edge” — “was i out of line? did i say something way too honest, made you run and hide?” (forever and always)
“who coaxed you into paradise and left you there?” — “the great escape, the prison break, the light of freedom on my face... ...i’m in a getaway car, i left you in a motel bar” (getaway car)
“were you standing in the hallway with a big cake, happy birthday?” — this to me could be connected to “theyre all standing around me singing ‘happy birthday to you’ but there was one thing missing” (the moment i knew) as well as “when your birthday passed and i didn’t call” (back to december)
“did i paint your bluest skies the darkest gray?” — “you paint me a blue sky, then go back and turn it to rain” (dear john - this is especially notable to me because matt sings the lyric, so it’s a POV switch)
“and when i got into the accident, the sight that flashed before me was your face” — “remember when you hit the brakes too soon? twenty stitches in the hospital room” (ootw, and here again we have a POV switch with matt singing the lyric)
“but when i walked up to the podium i think that i forgot to say your name” the person on twitter linked this to taylor’s moment in miss americana where she talks about winning AOTY and having nobody to high-five. a genius connection.
all told, i like to think that taylor came up with the idea for this song as she was working on the re-recording. inevitably re-recording her old albums has caused her to have a lot of reflection on her past as well as just being reminded of what an amazing songwriter she is. i hope this helps!
When you’re singing you can hear the echo of people in the audience singing every single word with you, and that was that big dream that I had for myself. It’s happening.
I think a lot of people see it as a breakup song, but if you’ve ever had someone you love die, this is me trying resonates in a different way.
If you think of it that way, the lyrics hit different. Feelings of regret for hurtful things you said once, flashbacks of memories, feeling like an open wound around your friends, the feeling of just watching the world go on without you...
Those are pieces of the kind of loss we all eventually experience, and she words them in such a heartbreakingly poignant way.
titsay
prguitarman
gracieabrams
baratheonpilled
turnnoffyourmind
theartofmadeline
