Songfacts®:

• "Out Of The Shadows" is the first song Sarah McLachlan wrote start-to-finish. Fittingly, it's the first track on her debut album, Touch, released in 1988 when she was 20. It was her record label, a Vancouver-based indie start-up called Nettwerk Records, that encouraged her to write her own songs, so she hunkered down and got to work.
  
  "I set up a little studio on a desk and started recording ideas," she said in an American Songwriter interview. "Eventually, I had a 12-string guitar that I was really in love with. I was raised as a classical guitar player, so I was noodling around all the time trying to come up with melodies. 'Out of the Shadows' was that first progression. The melody is very lilt-y along with the chord progression. I love that 6/8 time."
• The song is surprisingly dark, with McLachlan tormented in the darkness. We thought maybe she'd come out of the shadows and into the light at the end, but the song ends on an even lower note:
  
  The hours pass so slowly, the life's slipping out of me
  
  McLachlan hasn't talked about the lyrics, but she has been open about her struggles with depression, which seems to be what she's describing in the song.
• This is one of McLachlan's early songs that she admits was influenced by Kate Bush, who like Max on Stranger Things, made a huge impact on Sarah.