The song's title comes from an art compilation by Underworld's design company, Tomato.

[1] The title included an ellipsis between the first two words when it appeared on the 1993 single, but it is then written without an ellipsis on the Dubnobasswithmyheadman album[2] and on the band's compilation albums.

In an interview with Melody Maker Karl Hyde explained how he created the song's stream of consciousness lyrics: "I write lots of stuff when I'm travelling.

I remember flying over New York and looking down and thinking, 'It's a beautiful thing'.

Most of the rest of 'Skyscraper' came from stuff which I'd collected wandering round the New York streets over the course of a week.