"Don't Wait" is a song recorded by American

YouTube personality A YouTuber is a content creator and social media influencer who uploads or creates videos on the online video-sharing website YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 200 ...

Joey Graceffa Joseph Michael Graceffa Jr. (; born May 16, 1991) is an American YouTuber, vlogger, actor, author, and producer. He runs four active YouTube channels, all named after him. His main channel is dedicated to vlogging, while the second features video ...

. Written by Eric Leva,

Brett McLaughlin Brett Leland McLaughlin (born July 22, 1987), known professionally as Leland, is an American singer and songwriter. Based in Los Angeles, California, he has worked closely with a range of popular artists, including Selena Gomez, Troye Sivan, Day ...

, Matt Parad, it is the third original composition released by Graceffa. It was released independently as a single on May 12, 2015.

Chart performance

"Don't Wait" debuted at number 64 on the official

UK Singles Downloads Chart The UK Singles Downloads Chart is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC) on behalf of the music industry. Since July 2015, the chart week runs from Friday to Thursday, with the chart date given as the following Thursday. The main chart con ...

, a component of the UK Singles Chart for the week of May 24, 2015, becoming his first charting single. It also entered the UK Independent Singles chart at number 7 and the UK Independent Singles Breakers component chart at number 1.

Music video

An accompanying

music video A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...

for the song was directed by Doug Potts and was uploaded to Graceffa's

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

channel on May 16, 2015. The video uses

fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction that involves supernatural or Magic (supernatural), magical elements, often including Fictional universe, imaginary places and Legendary creature, creatures. The genre's roots lie in oral traditions, ...

elements to dramatize the struggles Graceffa faced growing up, including

goblin A goblin is a small, grotesque, monster, monstrous humanoid creature that appears in the folklore of multiple European cultures. First attested in stories from the Middle Ages, they are ascribed conflicting abilities, temperaments, and appearan ...

s depicting bullies and a

witch Witchcraft is the use of magic by a person called a witch. Traditionally, "witchcraft" means the use of magic to inflict supernatural harm or misfortune on others, and this remains the most common and widespread meaning. According to ''Enc ...

representing his

alcoholic Alcoholism is the continued drinking of alcohol despite it causing problems. Some definitions require evidence of dependence and withdrawal. Problematic use of alcohol has been mentioned in the earliest historical records. The World Hea ...

mother. Graceffa's character spends the video attempting to rescue a prince, played by blogger Daniel Preda, from a dark shadow version of himself. In the end, he succeeds, and the two share a kiss on a rocky edge near the river. This kiss between Graceffa and Preda, who confirmed in February 2016 that they had been dating since before the video shoot, served as Graceffa's first public acknowledgement of his

homosexuality Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or Human sexual activity, sexual behavior between people of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexu ...

. He formally

came out Coming out of the closet, often shortened to coming out, is a metaphor used to describe LGBTQ people's self-disclosure of their sexual orientation, romantic orientation, or gender identity. This is often framed and debated as a privacy issue, ...

two days later, in another video titled "Yes I'm Gay" and in his memoir, ''In Real Life: My Journey Through a Pixelated World'', which was published May 19, 2015.

Reception

Emma Lord of lifestyle blog Bustle described the video as "one of the most groundbreaking and adorable videos of the year." She praised the production for "depicting the very real struggles he faced growing up," and " omingto a satisfying end" with the kiss. Following the video's release, Graceffa received many supportive comments from fans and fellow "YouTubers." By April 2023, the video had been viewed over 42.7 million times.

Track listing

Charts

Notes

External links

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Don't Wait 2015 songs 2015 singles Songs written by Leland (musician) LGBTQ-related songs