“How Can I Breathe The Same?” | “After You” by Stray Kids
I am a firm believer that the ways we talk about romantic relationships also apply to platonic relationships.
It was only in rewatching the This & That album intro video that I caught that “After You” was in the running to be the pre-release song instead of “Run It.” And oh my gosh, can you imagine who much different everything would have been? That’s so wild.
Anyway, this is easily one of my favorite songs on the album. Let’s take a look at the lyrics.
Couple disclaimers: I don’t speak Korean. I am using my limited SKZ knowledge and the English translations from Genius. These are my own thoughts based on those translations and not meant to be a definitive interpretation.
Here is the music video to listen to while you read the lyrics.
Song Background
“After You” was also one of the songs made at the song camp in the States, along with “This & That” and “Run It.” We first heard it before the album dropped when they performed it for the Run It Seoul shows. And like I said, it was in the running to be the pre-release single. And I just want to take a moment to picture what that would’ve been like.
The After You Tour. The concept. The marketing.
Because “Run It” and “After You” are VERY different songs. Different genres. Different feels. Different content. Different themes. And I would be so fascinated to see what an After You Tour concept would’ve looked like. In the end, I think “Run It” was the better choice. It’s on a much larger scale and works better for a whole tour concept. “After You” has very specific and narrow content. But it is really interesting to consider.
A lot of the conversation in the album intro video and comments in the music video behind the scenes were about how fun it was – to write, to record, to listen to – and how it feels like summer. Felix specifically said it feels like a song you’d listen to on a road trip with friends and/or right as the sun is setting. And they obviously had fun performing it at the Seoul shows. Even without choreography, they were bouncing around and really enjoying themselves.
Lyrics & Themes
It’s a very straightforward song in themes and content and lyrics. Chan put it very simply in the album intro video as having a passing moment with someone, clicking with them, and thinking “Who was the person? Why do I keep thinking of them?” Love at first sight. And how love changes you.
I especially love the references to breath and breathing. In the very first line, Felix sings:
I had to catch my breath, saw you walking past
And then in the choruses, we have:
But I’m up all night, and I don’t know what to do How can I breathe the same after you?
It’s a small thing, but it conveys the physical feeling of falling love or having a crush really well. Really simply. Someone comes into your life or you pass them on the street and it feels like even the way you breathe feels different.
And there’s also this sort of awkward, anxious energy that they capture really well in verse 2:
[Verse 2: Changbin, Han] I hope the direction you’re walking is the same as minе My clumsy first words came out awkwardly, without any charm No matter what happens, this is diffеrent, this is a love affair Oh, yeah, for real, even just like this These perfect feelings are a metaphor Let’s write our own anecdote Make my heart race a little more Like when I was nineteen Our eyes meet, eye to eye Sparks fly like in a comic A fiery battle of trying to read each other We’re just fidgeting in place, yeah
Does this person like me back? Do they feel this same crazy way about me as I do about them? Where will this go? Will we date? Will we get married? Are our goals the same? I can’t stop thinking about them…
I especially like the line “sparks fly like in a comic.” It’s a very visual metaphor that I can picture so clearly. When the love interest is introduced for the first time in a romance comic, it’s usually pretty obvious. There’s a whole panel dedicated to this beautiful, perfect portrait shot of them surrounded by flowers or hearts or sparkles (or a combination of all of them). And in big moments like their first kiss, those same visual representations show up. Bringing in that comparison really hammers home this sort of all-encompassing, obvious (at least for this person) moment of falling for someone.
I pointed out in my annotations, too, that Han used a similar metaphor in “Want So Bad” with his “pink chroma key background.” In a Bubble Q&A he did about the song, he explained that that line references when animes have hearts flying in the background when a character falls in love. I adore that Han brings in these aspects from the media he loves and not just in the way of actual stories or dialogue. But he also uses the visual components and imagery that are used to tell a story.
Verse 3 takes a slightly different approach by doing a before and after comparison:
[Verse 3: Changbin, Felix] Before you, I was lost inside the dark Nowhere to move The same scene everyday, the same routine I had no clue After you, I’m addicted to In my mind, déjà vu Every road I’m running through, you changed my view Got me chasing after you
More metaphors of how they’ve changed after meeting or having a moment with this person.
And lastly, I really love the line: “Oh, I’ll swim through ocean eyes tryna get to you.” At first, it felt like it didn’t quite fit. “Eyes” felt like a filler word trying to make the syllables fit to the song. But a visual finally clicked as I was listening through for this post.
You’re walking down the street, you make eye contact with someone, and you have a moment. You’re changed. You can’t stop thinking about them. And now, every time you’re walking down the street, you’re looking for those eyes again. You’re “swimming” through ocean eyes (or oceans of eyes) to find that person again.
I don’t know if I’m really explaining it well, and I don’t know if that’s what they meant when writing that line. But it finally made sense to me. Of course, right after that epiphany, I remembered that the song “Ocean Eyes” by Billie Eilish exists, which is also about falling in love and being lost in someone’s eyes. So, that could also be related.
Overall, it’s just a really beautiful expression of how your life is changed by love, or even by a crush. Those feelings can feel really big, and there’s a lot of uncertainty at the beginning of a new relationship or even just when you feel new feelings for someone. But it’s also very hopeful and fun and exciting.
The tempo changes and even just the genre of EDM really suit that feeling. And all put together, it really does give the feeling of someone seeing or meeting someone, being enthralled by them, and then frantically trying to put into words how they feel. All the metaphors. All the anxiety. All the excitement. All put into lyrics and beats and a melody that is so catchy.
Music Video
And the music video continues that storytelling into a visual format. Interestingly, they don’t “tell a story” if that makes sense. They don’t show the someone having a meet cute moment and the after effects of it. But you still have that feeling with flashbacks and flashforwards with the members individually or in pairs – Chan busking on the street, Felix and Changbin in a bar, Lee Know at a bus stop, Hyunjin swimming, and Han and I.N in the recording booth.
It gives that before and after feel…without being super clear on what the catalyst is. We can infer. And most of the takes and interpretations I’ve seen online are very plausible. I think it’s supposed to be up to interpretation. And really, what matters is the feeling. There’s a contrast between melancholy and hope, sadness and joy. A before and after. An anxiety and an excitement. (This AND that. Ha!)
And of course, I would be remiss not to point out the elephant in the room with the music video: Sadly, Seungmin was not physically in it. He sat out of the filming with his ankle injury. But! He was not forgotten. Nearly every scene had Seungmin in it. Chan has Seungmin stickers on his guitar and guitar case. Felix and Changbin end up singing karaoke with a cardboard cutout of Seungmin in one of his This & That concept outfits. There’s a poster of Seungmin on the bus stop Lee Know is sitting at. Hyunjin’s locker at the swimming pool has Seungmin’s name on it. And the lyric sheet Han is working from at the recording booth has Seungmin as part of the part allocations.
I mentioned it in my “Run It” post, too, that it’s lovely to see them making sure Seungmin is included. During the “Run It” M/V filming, some of the members were playing catch with him, he was in as much of the filming as possible, and he still recorded his own shorts content with easier or no choreography. So sweet to see that they included him in as many ways as they possibly could in this video, too, even though he couldn’t physically be there.
One of the theories I saw is that Seungmin is the person the members are thinking of/changed by in the music video – the catalyst I talked about earlier. That he’s off as some famous singer and they have these reminders of him everywhere. I like this interpretation, personally, mostly because I have a soft spot for Seungmin.
But also, I am a firm believer that the ways we talk about romantic relationships also apply to platonic relationships. I absolutely have friends who changed me and my life completely. And I think Stray Kids would say – and have said – that the other members are like that for them.
And on a larger scale, Stray Kids is that for a lot of us. Their music and them as people have changed our lives. I could list a dozen posts off the top of my head where people talked about what Stray Kids helped or inspired them to do, how their lives were changed once they became a STAY.
I hope that, even on the smallest level, Stray Kids knows that they have this effect on people. That it feels like we breathe differently after finding them. They deserve to know that.
You can find posts on the other songs in this album here:
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