The Summer of 2024 has been fabulous so far, it’s a great time for pop music with so many artists absolutely slaying. It’s been a Brat summer, but it’s also been the summer of Chappell Roan.
The singer pretty much became an overnight success earlier this year after videos from her energetic live performances at festivals and concerts started going viral. Don’t get me wrong, Chappell Roan was already big before 2024, but she’s been killing it this year and her music has been all over TikTok and Instagram reels.
Even if you’re not a fan (although let’s face it, who isn’t) you’ve probably heard a handful of her songs if you’ve spent any time online. Her most viral single has to be “Pink Pony Club” which has been practically inescapable these past couple of months – but to be fair it’s a great song. While many of us first heard the track in the last year or so, one OG fan has shown us all up. A viral TikTok shows an unknown man riding down the street on a bike belting out the chorus all the way back in 2020.
The clip was posted by “Big J” and the caption in the video reads, “I may have accidentally recorded the first time Pink Pony Club was ever sung while riding a bicycle back in 2020.” The video is dated April 27th, 2020 so it’s very likely Big J is right in his assumption here.
Hold up, “Pink Pony Club” is how old?
Despite the song receiving a tsunami of attention this year, the song has been around for a good long while now. As I said, it had even more listens thanks to Chappell Roan’s live performances, however, it also saw a spike in attention when the single was featured on Roan’s 2023 debut album, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess. But the song was actually released at the beginning of April 2020 as a single. I’m going to raise my hand and admit I thought this song was only a year old, clearly I’m a fake fan.
But this guy on the bike, clearly he’s been there since day one, considering the video was recorded the same month the song was released, which was way before Chappell Roan was a household name. The man’s high pitched, confident singing reminded many of Nicolas Cage’s character in the horror film, Longlegs, with one user commenting, “close enough, welcome back LongLegs.” Anyways, who even is this guy?
The man on the bike
While it initially seemed as though the identity of the Roan stan would remain a mystery, the video actually ended up being seen by the man himself. In a comment underneath the video, user @Negroni447 wrote, “Oh dear god it. Is. Me.”
@Negroni447 also stitched Big J’s video saying “four years later and only a few things have changed,” he then shows that he’s swapped his bicycle out for a cute, mustard-colored moped, shame it wasn’t pink but oh well. Regardless, his singing is still as beautiful as ever.