In a nutshell: Life's not going the way he'd hoped, but everything will be perfect once he gets to NY (Park Slope)! And then he gets there and it turns out the problem wasn't with Seattle (Pike St.) after all.
And meanwhile, the same character flaws that are keeping his career from taking off are destroying his relationship. Ie., his arrogance--later mentioned in the bridge--and the sense of entitlement that manifests in the opinion that he should have made it already, damnit! I LOVE the irony about that towards the beginning, the refusal to "blame it on the fundamental fact that no one owes you something;" and the claim that he wants to pay his dues while asking who to make the check out to--if it were easy, it wouldn't be dues-paying!
So now he's in New York and still having trouble getting the career going, plus he can't make friends because he's surrounded by backstabbing hipsters and superficial socialites. And the girlfriend who's starting to lose patience suggests--ironically--moving to LA. Because the geographic cure worked out so well last time.
And through all this he's refusing to take any responsibility for his career failures. It all falls apart at the end, when she suggests the movie house (notice, it's her who says that in the last verse) and he takes it as an indictment ("...assigning blame"), even though he'd been jokingly saying the same thing all along.
In a nutshell: Life's not going the way he'd hoped, but everything will be perfect once he gets to NY (Park Slope)! And then he gets there and it turns out the problem wasn't with Seattle (Pike St.) after all.
And meanwhile, the same character flaws that are keeping his career from taking off are destroying his relationship. Ie., his arrogance--later mentioned in the bridge--and the sense of entitlement that manifests in the opinion that he should have made it already, damnit! I LOVE the irony about that towards the beginning, the refusal to "blame it on the fundamental fact that no one owes you something;" and the claim that he wants to pay his dues while asking who to make the check out to--if it were easy, it wouldn't be dues-paying!
So now he's in New York and still having trouble getting the career going, plus he can't make friends because he's surrounded by backstabbing hipsters and superficial socialites. And the girlfriend who's starting to lose patience suggests--ironically--moving to LA. Because the geographic cure worked out so well last time.
And through all this he's refusing to take any responsibility for his career failures. It all falls apart at the end, when she suggests the movie house (notice, it's her who says that in the last verse) and he takes it as an indictment ("...assigning blame"), even though he'd been jokingly saying the same thing all along.