Jolie Laide is a collaboration between singer-songwriter Nina Nastasia and Florida BC and The Cape May musician Jeff MacLeod.

[4] Many of the lyrics on the album were inspired by Nastasia's childhood growing up near North Vine Street in Hollywood, Los Angeles.

The album was written concurrently with Riderless Horse, with Nastasia writing lyrics to the instrumental tracks MacLeod created.

After years of living in New York City, Nastasia said MacLeod's music reminded her of her childhood, and said "pretty much the whole record to me sounded like the West Coast."

She also said a running theme of the album lyrically was feeling "trapped in misery", and said this was inspired by her 26-year relationship with manager Kennan Gudjonsson, whom she accused of coercive control.

"[1] Billboard described the song as possessing a "stormy foundation, with a cracked guitar-and-drums arrangement that threatens to explode, although Nastasia also communicates a calmness while extolling the peace and freedom of her subject.

"[5] She said the song "captures the moments of blissful freedom before the dust inevitably settles and what was once excitement and ease turns to dullness, resentment and hard work.

Madden found that it "has a clear narrative and novelistic form" and "by the album's middle, romantic disequilibrium gives way to the volatility of alcohol.