Conan Gray's Superache: a review in vignettes.

Movies

A waltz under fairy lights. Broken cassette tape wound around joined hands. Having a crush on a fictional character at thirteen. Feeling like the world will end if you don’t fall in love. Wind rushing through your hands out the open car window. Shouting at the top of your lungs when things go wrong. Sour smiles and laughs around company; tears and bitter kisses in private. Tripping over your own feet while running into their arms. Pasting ripped up polaroid’s into an album.

People Watching

Hands wrapped around a warm mug. Rolling your eyes when your parents kiss. Sighing happily when your grandparents hold hands. Running to catch your train and silently hoping you’ll bump into your one true love. Standing in a crowd full of strangers. Romanticising the local coffee shop. The surface of the pool breaking when you hit it from a great height. Surfacing and seeing your friends laughing and loving from a distance.

Disaster

Neon lights flashing in the dark. The excited anxiety from a roller coaster ride. Running on a treadmill and imagining you’re in a 90s music video. Gossiping with your friend at three AM. That slip of middle-school paper that says do you love me? Y or N?

Best Friend

Beach days and mountain hikes. Baking cookies in the early hours. Solving puzzles with a glass of wine. The looks you get when you walk down the street holding hands. Telling your darkest secrets and getting a 'same' in return. Feeling incomplete when you’re apart. Feeling satiated with happiness when they’re near. Dropping everything in a heartbeat for them.

Astronomy

Orange lights blinking on as the sun sets. The rumbling of a car engine in stereo with the radio. Childhood friends unfriending each other on Facebook. The steady thump of your heart in your chest. Shoes hitting the pavement as you run from the doorbell giggling. Family friends falling out of touch. The ache of muscle after a long day. The fear that comes with unresolved falling-outs. The one regret you can never solve. The calm acceptance of a friendship ending.

Yours

A cold pillow on the other side of the bed. Tear-stained pages in a diary. Broken hearts doodled in the margins. Telling a story and realising that nobody is listening. Asking someone to a show and them thinking you were giving them the tickets to take somebody else. Spilling your heart out and getting nothing in response. Begging someone to see you for who you are. Watching your crush dance with someone else. Slow dancing in your room alone in the dark. Playing piano in an empty ballroom. Deep breaths that lead to more crying. Regret for your non-action. Forgiving your past self for loving them. Hating your current self for loving them. Watering a plant and realising months later that it’s fake.

Jigsaw

Heavy eyeliner and stompy boots. Sobbing on the kitchen floor when you realise they will never love you back. Not recognising yourself when you’re around them. Not knowing who you are when you’re alone. Anger. So much anger. Retrospective thoughts consuming every moment. Trying to aggressively love yourself to get back to a place of stability. Tying your worth to everyone else. Loud music that the neighbours can hear through the walls. The quick screech of a guitar being pulled from the amp.

Family Line

Empty crisp packets and drink cans across the kitchen counter. Cringing when people say you look like your parents. Pulling at your face in the mirror to try and rid yourself of the inherited features. The look in your brother’s eyes when he realises your parents no longer love each other. Hearing your mum’s voice in your own when the recording plays back. Generational expectations in all aspects of life. Accepting that blood is forever. Realising that blood doesn’t mean family. Cold bedsheets in deep winter. The suffocating heat of a summer day without a breeze.

Summer Child

That friend you wish you could make happier with the flick of a switch. The buzzing of a bee by your ear. The fear that it’s actually a wasp. Curtains dancing in the wind by the back door. The sound of the dog’s nails clacking on the hardwood floors. Seeing your friend’s family holiday pictures and feeling sick at the surge of jealousy. Dropping your smile as you turn the corner.

Footnote

Picking at the skin around your nails until they bleed. Sucking on your thumb and feeling like you’ve aged backwards. Stacks of books by your bed full of romance you don’t believe you’ll ever get. Willing to die for someone who wouldn’t even endure a papercut for you. Telling yourself that you’re happy for their happiness. Taking all you can get from the nothing they give. Spinning around a room with your dress swishing around your ankles and them in your arms. Blinking and they disappear. Lights flickering on with a buzz then shattering from the heat.

Memories

The twitching furrow of your brow when you’re trying to hide how you feel. Banging your fist against a wall out of frustration. Screaming at the top of your lungs with a thousand other people at a concert. Lying flat on your face while the world spins around you. Accepting anger. Admitting fault. Realising that the feelings can coexist. The iconic clothes-on-the-lawn scene from the romcoms. Running into the ocean waves with maniacal laughter. Finally letting them go.

The Exit

The world turning on its side in the blink of an eye. A year going past in just a second. Thinking you’ve seen a friend but then a car passes and they’re a stranger. Finishing a good book at three AM. The tunnel scene from Perks of Being a Wallflower. Wind in your hair and a scared sort of happiness in your chest. City lights twinkling on a TV screen. A knife to the chest and rose petals for blood. The hurt of someone moving on while you’re stuck in one place. The uncomfortable misery of pathetic fallacy. A green exit sign taunting you and asking for a fire. The crescendo of a heartbreak anthem. Superache.

Superache by Conan Gray is available now on all music streaming platforms.