Songfacts®:

• Nothing More lead singer Jonny Hawkins drew inspiration for much of the Stories We Tell Ourselves album from a relationship that was crumbling as they were writing it. The acoustic, reflective "Just Say When" finds him taking it on with sensitivity and understanding, but "Go To War" attacks it with raw emotion.
  
  In a Songfacts interview with Hawkins, he said: "That one was written before 'Just Say When,' and that one was also a 'relational' song - it seems like things really turn toxic when love turns into politics. That's the metaphor we were going with, with the whole 'Go to War.'
  
  It really was a full-out switch and change in the state of mind towards someone, and towards the relationship, where everything becomes a threat, everything becomes an offense, everything is worth attacking. So, that song was really just about venting that feeling. If you've ever been with someone in the depths of the politics of love, it's that kind of thing."
• This was a breakthrough song for Nothing More, who went through a litany of lead singers before moving their drummer, Jonny Hawkins, into the role in 2007. They first got attention for their 2013 self-titled album, which was followed by The Stories We Tell Ourselves in 2017. "Go To War" went to #1 on the Mainstream Rock chart and earned Grammy Nominations for Best Rock Song and Best Rock Performance. The album was also nominated for Best Rock Album, losing to A Deeper Understanding by The War on Drugs.
• This song is a metaphor for a relationship, but its bellicose nature made it a good selection for the trailer of 2018 the video game Paladins, which features lots of battle scenes. This garnered lots of attention for the song.
• The band wrote this with the Los Angeles songwriter David Pramik, whose name is also on the Machine Gun Kelly track "Home." The song came together very quickly in the studio; Hawkins bashed out the lyric after a very frustrating call with his girlfriend near the end of their coupling.
• Wayne Isham directed the video, which shows the band playing in a bar where a massive, slow-motion brawl is going on. Isham's credits include Bon Jovi's "Wanted Dead Or Alive" and Muse's "Resistance."
• "Go to War" was used in July 2017 for TV commercials promoting the movie War for the Planet of the Apes.