The song was written by Colin Manley and Tony Ashton of the Remo Four and recorded in London in January 1968 during the sessions for George Harrison's Wonderwall Music soundtrack album.

Backed by a new mix of the song, carried out by Paul Hicks, the single was issued to help pay for the cancer treatment being undergone by Manley, who died three months after its release.

[1] They then toured as a support act to the Beatles in 1964[2] but, despite being managed by Brian Epstein, the group failed to achieve commercial success and were without a recording contract by 1966.

[24][25] The widespread popularity of Oasis' song encouraged Massot to revisit Wonderwall in November 1997 and prepare a director's cut of the film for general release.

[30] In 2014, as part of the Apple Years 1968–75 reissues of his father's solo albums,[31] Dhani Harrison included "In the First Place" as a bonus track on the remastered Wonderwall Music CD.

[32] Writing for Mojo in 2014, Mat Snow called "In the First Place" "amazing" and "a lysergic extra lap of the Magical Mystery Tour", referring to the Beatles' 1967 television film in which "Blue Jay Way" appeared.

[33] Richie Unterberger of AllMusic considers the song to be "decent minor-key psychedelic pop with prominent piano and heavy phasing effects",[9] while New Zealand Herald critic Graham Reid describes it as "very Blue Jay Way".

[34] Author Robert Rodriguez views "In the First Place" as both "a creature of its time and timeless", adding that its mood and atmosphere make the track "very much in the mold of 'Blue Jay Way'".

[12] In his article on the story behind "In the First Place", Martin Lewis also comments on the similarities with Harrison's 1967 song, and he describes the Remo Four track as "an extremely strong piece of psychedelic pop" that "perfectly matched the movie's mood".