Pop Star Criticised For Singing Impossibly Bad National Anthem At Baseball Game

Fans of American singer-songwriter Conan Gray spoke up in support of him after his performance of America's national anthem was widely criticized.

Gray, 23, walked onto the field at Dodgers Stadium in Los Angeles on 18 July 2022 before Major League Baseball's Home Run Derby, where he proceeded to perform his rendition of 'The Star-Spangled Banner'.

Instagram

Gray is famous among his fans for his songs like 'The Other Side', 'Crush Culture' and 'Heather', which reached the top 20 in the Official Charts in 2020.

The singer has more than 85k subscribers on Youtube and around 7.5m followers on Instagram but it seems like it was not only his friends who are now talking about his performance on the national anthem.

Following Gray's rendition of the song, social media users began to criticize the choice of singer, with some slamming his efforts as being among the 'worst national anthem renditions [they've] ever heard'.

One post read: "'1.) Who is Conan Gray? 2.) He may very well be the worst national anthem singer of all time. Good lord."

Sports business analyst Darren Rovell implied Gray had defied what was possible in his singing as he wrote: "There are so many great singers in this country, it's nearly impossible to have that bad of a national anthem."

Even though the internet is not happy with this performance, Gray's fans came to his defense and many made it a point that the singer has a good voice it is just not suited for singing the national anthem.

'He’s actually a great performer/singer,' one person wrote on YouTube. '[I don't know] what happened here but seeing people bash him sucks.'

Another said: 'Go listen to his album or literally any other live performance before you try to tell me this man can’t sing.'

Responding to one critic, a third fan wrote: "It’s not in his range. I’ve seen him live in concert and he’s incredibly talented. If you listened to any of his music you’d see that his songwriting skills are insane as well. You’re [sic] opinion was unnecessary and misinformed. Sit down please and thank you."

One fan commented: "conan gray is a very talented singer, the national anthem did not do his vocal style and range justice."

Another supportive Twitter user commented: "Honestly don’t think Conan Gray did a bad job singing the national anthem. Young kid, more than likely getting the hate for his appearance rather than his talents. Wasn’t incredible, def dont [sic] deserve the beating he taking online."

Gray did not address the backlash but soon after the incident, he took to the social media platform Instagram to share several images of himself enjoying the baseball game. 

Instagram

The post showed the singer wearing an embellished Dodgers shirt - which had the name of his latest album, Superache, on the back, while holding a bag of Cracker Jacks, while another sees him posing with his back up against a giant baseball.