"Pink Pony Club" received a positive critical reception amidst the rise of Roan's popularity after the release of the song's parent album, receiving praise for its musical composition and story. It drew commercial success five years after its initial release following a performance at the 2025 Grammy Awards, at which Roan won Best New Artist. The track topped the national chart of the United Kingdom and charted within the top ten in Australia, Canada, Ireland, and the United States. It received multi-platinum certifications in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. A music video for "Pink Pony Club" accompanied its release in April 2020, featuring cameo appearances from drag queens Victoria "Porkchop" Parker and Meatball.
Background and composition
Chappell Roan was inspired to write "Pink Pony Club" after visiting the Abbey, a gay bar in West Hollywood, California, in 2018. Roan, who had recently moved from her hometown of Springfield, Missouri, stated that visiting the bar was "the first time I could truly be myself and not be judged".[1] At the bar, she became enthralled with the performing go-go dancers, stating that seeing them "sparked [something] in me... I want[ed] to be a go-go dancer. So I just wrote a song about it."[2] According to Roan, she had previously struggled with accepting herself in Springfield, stating in Headliner, "I always had such a hard time being myself and felt like I'd be judged for being different or being creative", adding that the bar was "something that I couldn't really have experienced here in Missouri... It was completely eye opening and changed my direction from that point on."[3]
"Pink Pony Club" has been described as a pop,[4]synth-pop,[5]dance-pop,[6]power pop,[7]disco-pop[8] and disco[9][10] song. It follows the story of a woman from a small town in Tennessee who moves to Southern California, and experiences freedom dancing in a gay club for the first time[11][12][13] inspired by a local strip club in Roan's former hometown of Springfield, Missouri, that was in "all hot pink".[14] The woman's mother disapproves upon hearing the news, saying to her daughter, "God, what have you done?"[13] Despite her mother's opinions, the woman opts to continue, stating that "I'm just having fun", having found in what was described in a Capital Buzz analysis as a "safe space where you feel free to be exactly who you are".[15]
Roan wrote "Pink Pony Club" with Dan Nigro within two days in February 2019,[16][17] and recorded it in the same year.[18] Initially, the label tried to dissuade her from releasing the song as they thought it deviated too much from Roan's past songs, leaving Roan "devastated" and making her "second-guess herself".[19] According to Roan, Atlantic Records refused to release the song for a year before they relented.[11] "Pink Pony Club" was officially released on April 3, 2020, marketed as the lead single to an upcoming debut album with Atlantic Records.[1][20] Roan claimed that in the aftermath of her leaving Atlantic, she was granted majority of the ownership of the master recordings for several songs, including "Pink Pony Club".[20] "Pink Pony Club" was later included on Roan's debut studio album, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, released on September 22, 2023, through Amusement and Island Records.[‡ 1]
Music video
The song's music video, directed by Griffin Stoddard with cinematography by Oren Soffer, was released on April 3, 2020.[1] It features cameo appearances from drag queens Victoria "Porkchop" Parker and Meatball.[21][22] Roan, who was visibly nervous in the video, stated that she was "absolutely terrified" of her performance during production.[3] The video takes place in "a Midwest dive bar", with Roan, Porkchop, and Meatball performing on the bar's stage[23] to a few leather-clad bikers, eventually turning the bikers into "leather daddies".[13]The Conversation's Jonathan Graffam–O'Meara thought that the music video represented "the utopic potentiality of performance" for queer people from "the stultifying and oppressive real world that awaits performers and audiences outside of venues."[23]
Critical reception
Although "Pink Pony Club" did not receive much critical attention upon release, it has received consistent positive reception in the following years. Vulture's Rebecca Alter praised the song in 2021, describing it as a "synthy infectious bangarang... It's a stripper anthem that squeezes itself in perfectly with the likes of 'WAP' and 'Twerkulator,' just with a little bit more of a drama-kid kick."[13] In a review of the song's parent album, Pitchfork's Olivia Horn proclaimed "Pink Pony Club" to be a "bold and uproarious pop project stitched with stories about discovering love, sex, and oneself in a new place."[24] Both Kitty Empire of The Guardian and Mark Savage of BBC News credited the song as Roan's first career hit, with both describing it as a liberating queer party anthem.[25][10]Paste's Eric Bennett deemed "Pink Pony Club" an "immediately memorable artistic statement" and praised its chorus.[26] Reflecting on the song's later success, after the label's initial negative response and the song's commercial underperformance, Roan remarked, "it's like damn bitch, were you wrong? It was the worst time ever to release a gay club song [around the pandemic]. And it still had such an impact."[15]
"Pink Pony Club" achieved commercial success five years after its initial release following the Grammy performance.[40] It reached number 16 on the Billboard Global 200 chart dated February 22, 2025.[41] In the United States, the track debuted at number 90 on the Billboard Hot 100 for the week ending June 29, 2024,[42] before peaking at number four on the chart dated April 26, 2025.[43] It also reached number one on the Pop Airplay and Adult Pop Airplay charts,[44][45] number 11 on the Adult Contemporary chart,[46] and number 20 on the Dance/Mix Show Airplay chart.[47]
In the United Kingdom, "Pink Pony Club" debuted at number 21 on the UK Singles Chart for the week ending date September 26, 2024.[48] The song entered the top ten at number four during its 13th non-consecutive week on the chart for the week ending February 20, 2025.[49] Three weeks later, after Roan won two awards at the 2025 Brit Awards,[50] "Pink Pony Club" reached number one on the UK Singles Chart for the week ending date March 13, 2025, becoming her first chart-topping song in the United Kingdom.[51][52] "Pink Pony Club" also reached the top 30 in Australia (2),[53] Canada (2),[54] Ireland (2),[55] New Zealand (11),[56] Lebanon (12),[57] Slovakia (19),[58] Austria (26),[59] Iceland (26),[60] and the Philippines (26).[61]
"Pink Pony Club" was certified four-times platinum in Australia[62] and the United States,[63] double platinum in New Zealand[64] and the United Kingdom,[65] platinum in Canada,[66] and gold in France, although the song failed to enter in the top 100 there.[67]
↑ Salles, Vanessa (May 11, 2020). "Chappell Roan". The Daily Shuffle. Archived from the original on November 1, 2024. Retrieved October 29, 2024– via Issuu.
1 2 "ČNS IFPI" (in Slovak). Hitparáda – Radio Top 100 Oficiálna. IFPI Czech Republic. Note: Select 25. týden 2025 in the date selector. Retrieved June 26, 2025.
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