Ottawa Art-Pop Collective Pony Girl Announce New LP With Lead Single “Age of Anxious”

Ottawa-Hull based art pop collective, Pony Girl have shared news of a new LP alongside a single and music video for the first single, “Age of Anxious.” Enny One Wil Love You is set for release on October 14th. With the single kicking off the announcement, the five piece explored themes of isolation in a digital age through both the lyrics and the accompanying video, directed by Brittany Delgaty. 

“Age of Anxious” has a haunting, melancholic tone that matches with the desolate thoughts found within the lyrics. A slow burn track, you can almost zone out into the melody, while the phrase “I want you back / I want you by my side” repeats and lulls you into the song. 

Speaking on their new track, lyricist Pascal Huot shares that ““Age of Anxious” is a breakup song, but not for a lover. It’s about longing for an idealized past without questioning the truth about our own recollection. Technology is partly to blame, such as the constant listener of our phones. We’re living with a double-edged sword of innovation and misinformation at our fingertips. Both tech and the song feel deceptively romantic, a musical illusion aided greatly by Joseph Shabason’s nostalgic sax. Even though the past was never better, we think it was. How can we want something back that we’ve never had?

The song is inspired by farsickness and selective memory. The rise of populist movements has shown that we long for idealized versions of the past. Re-writings of history that omit the truth and conveniently support their ideologies. Through this lens we explore the breakup song.”

Borderline mesmerizing in its dark theme, the accompanying music video features startling absurdities that will bring you back into the present. A dollhouse, rats, faces in spaghetti – the comic vignettes feel surreal, which was exactly the goal. 

Delgaty says that “the video was shot with limited camera movement, using zooms and symmetrical framing to give it a slightly retro and claustrophobic feel. Most scenes were shot against flat coloured backgrounds with pops of complementing colour integrated either through the lighting or in the set design. Off-speed frame rates were also used for lip syncing scenes to increase the surreal feeling for the viewer.” 

As it takes the viewer through a fabricated dollhouse we might all feel trapped inside, scrolling through our phones, searching for love and struggling to free ourselves from technology, the video reflects elements of recent years in visualizing the song’s theme. “The last three years have felt as though we live more of our lives on the internet than we do outside of it. Especially in the peak of the quarantine, our perception of reality became confused and warped. We’ve seen riots, wars, political controversies all scroll past in our Instagram feeds…and sometimes it feels difficult to care about any of it,” says Delgaty.

Pony Girl unveiled their first album, Show Me Your Fears, in 2013 and their sophomore effort, Foreign Life, in 2015 through their own label So Sorry Records. Enny One Wil Love You will be the collective’s first release through Paper Bag Records. 

Watch “Age of Anxious” below:

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