Songfacts®:

• Nate Ruess told Rolling Stone the background to this song. "[When I wrote it] I might have just been upset about people writing songs about being wronged," he said. "I think it was about myself being upset."
  
  "I started writing that song with my bass player. I started writing that chorus, and at the time I was also listening to a s--t ton of [Mott the Hoople's] 'All The Young Dudes,'" he continued. "I always had wanted to do my own version of 'All the Young Dudes,' and I don't know what compelled me to sing, 'We've all got scars,' but I might have just been singing to myself like, 'Get over it, dude. We've all been wronged before.'"
• The song follows "Grand Romantic" on the track listing. Ruess explained: "If you look at 'Grand Romantic' and it ends like an ending to a relationship, then you go over to 'Harsh Light,' and you're just hell-bent on getting over it, even if it just means drinking the night away."