© Reese Strickland/For the Register / USA TODAY NETWORK / © Dan MacMedan
The best cover songs are versions that breathe new life into the original. They must have great source material to begin with but then transform it into something special.
That is exactly what has happened with GWAR‘s cover of ‘Pink Pony Club‘ by Chappell Roan, a Synth/Disco-Pop track about a woman moving from Tennessee to Southern California where she dances at a midnight cabaret against the wishes of her family. You know the song. It’s been everywhere for years. But now we have GWAR‘s version and it goes hard.
GWAR’s Cover Of ‘Pink Pony Club’ By Chappell Roan
Chappell Roan has had multiple hits to be sure but it is also fair to say that virtually all of her success has been built on the back of ‘Pink Pony Club.’ It took some time for the music industry to catch on.
She first released the track in 2020 and it wasn’t until five years later at the 2025 Grammy Awards that she’d win ‘Best New Artist’ after ‘Pink Pony Club’ went multi-platinum around the globe. Her other hits include but are not limited to ‘Good Luck, Babe!’ and ‘Hot to Go!’ but it is ‘Pink Pony Club’ that seemed to take her career to the next level virtually overnight.
Meanwhile, there’s GWAR. The Thrash Metal / Shock Rock band from Richmond, Virginia who has quietly been making awesome music since the 80s while donning the most outrageous costumes of any band in in the industry.
About a year and a half ago, GWAR swing by the A.V. Club studio for the first A.V. Club Undercover session in 7 years to put their spin on ‘I’m Just Ken’ from the Barbie movie. And now GWAR are back with this glorious cover of ‘Pink Pony Club’ by Chappell Roan.
The lyrics “just having fun on stage in my heels” hit different when it’s coming from GWAR dressed as Sci-Fi mythical warrior beasts:
I hope someone in the production studio landed the joke ‘I hope they play Pink Pony Club’ before GWAR took the stage. That emerged as one of the more popular TikTok trends in the past year or so with people at concerts saying “I hope they play…’ only to reveal they are at what is a virtual opposite concert, exactly like this scenario.
Someone in the YouTube comments wrote “what an excellent use of free will” which is another popular copy/pasta comment on social media. It really is apt here though. They could have came out and played anything but GWAR crushed ‘Pink Pony Club’ from start to finish.
We need more of this. GWAR should release a covers album in 2026. Who says no?