Songfacts®:

• Are We There is about Van Etten's extant relationship with a DJ named Christian, which has been on and off since the mid 2000s. She told The 405: "That song is relentless! I call that one the beast. It's really intense about loving someone so much that in a way it's creating a monster."
  
  "It's a masochistic song of 'yeah we're in this together but see what you're doing to me?' Reflecting on meeting somebody, knowing somebody and loving somebody," she added. "It's them seeing me at my weakest, at my most broken and asking if it's worth it."
• Van Etten (from Mojo magazine): "I based the title (Are We There) on this photograph that I took years ago of a friend of mine when we were driving in her car in Tennessee. We would take turns screaming out the window and I took a photo of her as she was driving on a country road, screaming. It really was a huge transitional point in my life, because it's right before I decided to move to New York."
• The song's music video was directed by Sean Durkin, who also helmed the 2011 movie Martha Marcy May Marlene and UK miniseries Southcliffe. The clip features Wetlands star Carla Juri walking gloomily through Manhattan with bloodied wrists.