The second in a series of singles for 2020, fuzz-fuelled garage act Pit Pony’s new single ‘Opportunity Went’ finds them in seriously intent-filled voice.
Damian Robinson caught up with frontwomen Jackie to find out more about the track.
What a rollicking punk/grunge track ‘Opportunity Went’ is. What are the core ideas within the track?
The track is about missed opportunities. Actually, the first lines are about playing gigs when there’s hardly anyone there and remembering to still go for it even if only one person is listening. It’s about sometimes losing hope in your choices and then remembering it’s not all about what other people think so you have to carry on. It’s about frustration and reflection I suppose but hey, we all have to live and make decisions and that’s what we do. Hopefully, most people can relate to it a bit.
It sounds also like part 2 to Dutch Courage’s part 1. Was there a deliberate decision behind the two releases and the order of their release dates?
I see what you mean about ‘Dutch Courage’! But no, that was a happy accident funnily enough. ‘Opportunity Went’ is one of the first songs we wrote together so it came before ‘Dutch Courage’ – we just recorded the other one first. ‘Dutch Courage’ is about mistakes you make as a teenager and is quite specific to my experience so probably makes no sense to anyone else! ‘Opportunity Went’ is more of a broad topic but still about reflection. Maybe I need to stop reminiscing.
Production-wise, the sound on ‘Opportunity…’ is immense. What techniques did you use to create the wall of guitars that we can hear?
It’s really important to us that we capture our live sound, so when recording, we usually mic up a room and play the song through with no breaks. Afterwards, we add some extra layers of guitar using different amps to fatten the sound but we try not to do too much as, like I say, it’s important that it’s something we can replicate live. We’ve done all our recordings with Chris MacManus at Blank Studios in Newcastle and he does a great job at capturing our sound.
Are there any plans to celebrate ‘Opportunities Went’’s release date?
We’ve released a video for the track which we’re really pleased with. We’ve worked with our friend Sel Maclean and Yakamoz Film for our last three releases and we work well together – he gets what we’re about. Obviously, we’d normally be playing shows to promote the release but that’s out of the window at the minute. We’ve thought about some socially distanced gigs but, to be honest, we’re not sure it would work for us. We do, however, have some new merch ready to go on sale so keep an eye on our bandcamp for that.
‘Opportunity Went’ is available to stream now on all major online streaming platforms.
