By: Jenna Lizasuain
To start, I feel it is important to note that Conan Gray released the song, Winner, the day I left home for college, which should be a criminal offense and is something I have yet to forgive them for. However, putting that aside, this song was an absolutely incredible experience to listen to and just like all of his other songs, the lyricism is absolutely unreal. Conan perfectly executed the complex feelings of leaving a house that doesn’t feel like a home anymore, with the childlike admiration that sits heavy in the back of your mind, no matter how much anger and resentment is held for your parents. Maybe his parents are simply proud of how they had a hand in shaping him, no matter the cost, no matter the cost; maybe that ghost of a feeling is still something he’s holding onto.
My favorite part about this song is how free Conan sounds in it. His freedom is conveyed in the music video that perfectly emulates the tunnel scene from The Perks of Being a Wallflower. In addition, the smile in his voice when he sings the line, “Well look at how it’s paid off,” it feels like he’s acknowledging what he came from while still letting everyone know that he is the most significant reason he got this far.
Many fans of Conan Gray will remember the controversy around the use of his song, Family Line, last year, in trends about relationships or friendships. Many fans were angry, claiming it was disrespectful when the song was written about Gray’s own family trauma. With the release of Winner, came similar controversy, that different people interpret music in different ways, but somehow those interpretations were wrong. Conan Gray spoke about this on his own TikTok, saying “I don’t care if my song means something different to you, than it does to me when I wrote it. If you relate to it and it provides you comfort, that’s all that matters to me.” While this might not be true for all artists, I think that Conan has perfectly explained what music is meant to be: an outlet for people to feel and process their emotions and experiences however they feel comfortable doing that.
