Songfacts®:

• The life of vocalist and bandleader Adam Granduciel changed when his son, Bruce (named after his hero Bruce Springsteen) was born on July 29, 2019. Bruce's arrival sparked a change in Granduciel's songwriting. The lyrics on the first War On Drugs album after he became a father, I Don't Live Here Anymore, are more direct and personal. This song, for instance, finds him navigating the difficulties of changing as a person.
  
  "Nothing will put your life into perspective like having a kid," he told The Independent. "I think it helped me understand what it means to grow up. It puts your place in your own life into a little bit of focus, and there were things that I wanted to write about as I entered fatherhood. It was a ripe opportunity to understand new facets of life."
• Granduciel wrote the song with War On Drugs bassist Dave Hartley and guitarist Anthony LaMarca. The frontman told Apple Music he started it near the end of writing 2017's Deeper Understanding. At that stage it was a "piano ballad in half time."
  
  Years later, in upstate New York, Granduciel played it to Hartley and LaMarca. "I'm on piano and they're on bass and drums and it's not really gelling," he recalled. "At some point Anthony just picks up the drumsticks and he shifts it to the backbeat, this straight-ahead pop-rock, four-on-the-floor thing. It immediately had this really cool 'I'm On Fire' vibe."
• Adam Granduciel co-produced the song with Canadian producer Shawn Everett (Alabama Shakes, Kacey Musgraves, The Killers).
• The War on Drugs played the song live for the first time during an appearance on the October 30, 2021 episode of CBS' This Morning. The band also debuted two other I Don't Live Here Anymore tracks live during the performance: "Occasional Rain," and "Old Skin."