“High Hopes” is about seeking your dreams without hesitancy and seeing those dreams come to fruition beyond your wildest imagination. Having high hopes is a phrase that means to have:

a strong feeling that something good will happen or be true

Throughout Panic! At The Disco’s and Brendon Urie’s career, the band has faced challenges and changes. The beginning of Panic!’s journey was fraught with financial challenges. Brendon Urie, trying to make ends meet, worked in a Smoothie King to support his music career. While creating their iconic “I Write Sins Not Tragedies”, the band could not afford to pay professional string musicians, leaving them to record a middle school band member playing the part one note at a time.

Even with commercial success, the trials of the music industry still plagued the band. From band members leaving and attempting to adapt to a turbulent music scene, Brendon Urie has seen his dream of maintaining success in the music industry fade in and out of view. Despite these difficulties, Urie, now the last remaining member of the band, has continued to strive for his goals and has earned a Grammy nomination, a stint on the Broadway show Kinky Boots, and numerous other accolades.

Upon the song’s release, Brendon revealed his inspiration behind “High Hopes” on Twitter and Instagram, and in the video description on YouTube

I spent too long not setting my expectations high enough, worried about how it felt to fail. I hit a point when I realized I had to aim high and fail, fail, fail in order to keep growing. This one is for all of you who helped me go for it all. I thank you.
- B

The song was released half an hour prior to the due time – 2pm EST – on the official Panic! At The Disco YouTube Channel, racking up just over 1k views, before being officially released via a separate video, and on Spotify.

“High Hopes” is the third single released from Pray For The Wicked. It was preceded by “Say Amen (Saturday Night)” and “(Fuck a) Silver Lining” which were released two months earlier.

“High Hopes” is the highest charting song in Panic! At the Disco history, peaking at number 4 on the Billboard Hot 100, surpassing “I Write Sins Not Tragedies” at number 7 in 2006.