The record was the first written following the bands relocation from their hometown Reno, Nevada to Los Angeles, California.

[4] During the summer of 2019, the band held three movie screenings of films that had inspired the record.

[5] According to the band, some of the movies and shows they were inspired by include Eraserhead, The Last Days of Disco, Twin Peaks, Hour of the Wolf, Through a Glass Darkly, Maps to the Stars, and Dead Ringers.

They stated that the album fell short whenever things got "too plain", calling tracks such as "Labyrinth" and "Dead Ringers" mostly forgettable due to the "dull melody" as well as "Midnight Cowboys" relying on a classic cinema reference to "conjure what Rattigan’s uninspired lyricism can’t".

[10] Mike Lesuer of Flood stated that the record, to spite being in a new location, still sounds like "the West Coast garage rock longingly written two hundred miles from the Pacific and illuminated by the neons of downtown Reno", furthermore, called the album both their most romantic record to date and their uneasiest, "capturing the sounds of Rubeck and Rattigan falling in love with—and recoiling from—the surreality of their new home.