Following the departure of Mikael "Micke" Höglund in 1996, Giving the Game Away is the first studio album by Thunder to feature bassist Chris Childs.

[6] After a short tour of Japan, a number of festival appearances and some dates supporting Status Quo, the band released "Just Another Suicide" as the second single from the album on 8 March 1999.

[1] The single was renamed "You Wanna Know" upon its release in the UK, because the band's label Eagle Records warned the group that the song would receive less radio airplay if it had the word 'suicide' in the title.

[11] Reviewing the album for AllMusic, Eduardo Rivadavia described Giving the Game Away as "an unexpectedly mellow affair, trading in most of the hard rock bombast that characterised the British band's prior releases for slower tempos, unusual restraint, and lots of acoustic guitars".

[12] He concluded by noting that "amid this wholesale change of musical tact, however, one can still hear Thunder's natural songwriting instincts and versatile musicianship shining through".