From Dreams to Reality: The Journey of Chappell Roan and Daniel Nigro
When Daniel Nigro and Chappell Roan collaborated on the song “Pink Pony Club” back in 2019, Nigro sensed they had created something extraordinary. However, the challenge lay in convincing others of its potential. This track was only their second joint effort, yet it encapsulated Roan’s transformative journey from Kayleigh Rose Amstutz, a girl from Missouri, to the vibrant queer artist known as Chappell Roan. The song draws inspiration from her experiences at a beloved Los Angeles gay bar, a sanctuary where “boys and girls can all be queens every single day.”
At that time, Roan was under the wing of Atlantic Records, which had released her melancholic debut EP to minimal fanfare. Similarly, Nigro was navigating his own struggles; having left a somewhat unremarkable emo band from Long Island, he was exploring songwriting in Los Angeles. He had seen modest success with contributions to tracks by artists like Sky Ferreira and Carly Rae Jepsen, but in his mid-30s, he still relied on income from commercial jingles to make ends meet.
When the executives at Atlantic first heard “Pink Pony Club,” their reaction was far from enthusiastic. “I was absolutely convinced the song was phenomenal,” Nigro recalled, “but then they told me it wasn’t.” The label proposed removing the song’s lively guitar solos—an integral part that Roan had championed and that Nigro had helped craft. “And I was like, nope,” he stated firmly. Subsequently, Atlantic dropped Roan from their roster. In response, Nigro took matters into his own hands and established his own label, Amusement Records, specifically to release her music.
Fast forward to August, when Roan’s debut album, “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess,” soared to No. 2 on the Billboard 200. “Dan has always believed in me,” Roan expressed in an email. “He has been there from the very beginning, guiding me to discover what truly makes me feel alive on stage, what inspires me to sing, and what I want to write about. Because he believed in bringing that part of myself to life, I began to believe in it as well.”
Reflecting on his early days, Nigro performed in 2010 with As Tall as Lions, the emo band he formed with high school friends back in Long Island.
