The song was the last one to be completed for their 2014 album Going to Hell, originally being written on an acoustic guitar.

[2] A music video for the song, directed by frontwoman Taylor Momsen,[3][4] was filmed in Miami on April 30,[5][6] and released in June 2014.

[7] The video starts off as a light-hearted day at the beach, initially as an ironic counter-point to the song's lyrical material, but eventually begins to allude to various provocative situations that the song lyrically covers.

[9][10] "Messed Up World", along with "Heaven Knows" and Halestorm's 2013 single "Freak Like Me", are the only female front bands to top the chart since Alannah Myles' "Black Velvet".

[9] Additionally, no female-fronted group, or female musician, have had two back-to-back topping songs since the 1980s.