"Ocean Avenue" shares writing credits between the band's singer Ryan Key, guitarist Ben Harper, bassist Pete Mosely, drummer Longineu W. Parsons III, and violinist Sean Mackin.

"Ocean Avenue" was one of many songs the band wrote for their major-label debut, but primary lyricist Key had difficulty completing its chorus.

"Ocean Avenue" received heavy radio airplay and was the band's biggest hit, peaking within the top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100.

The band added vocalist and guitarist Ryan Key as their primary lyricist, and moved back west, in the L.A. suburb Thousand Oaks, in 2001.

[5] The band rented a cabin near Lake Arrowhead in the autumn of that year to write and develop new material, and they began pre-production with producer Neal Avron soon afterward at his Swing House space.

Capitol booked the band five weeks at Hollywood's famed Sunset Sound studio between February and March 2003 to record the album—but "Ocean Avenue", the namesake of the album, was not yet finished.

The song is based around three chords, building towards a big, catchy refrain;[2] this was a conscious choice, to challenge the band with making each section interesting independent of its limited structure.

"[9] Its opening lyrics date to a journal of Key's, who wrote the song primarily about growing up and leaving his hometown of Jacksonville, Florida.

"[10] The song opens with the narrator setting the scene: a place off the titular street, "we were both 16 and it felt so right / sleeping all day staying up all night."

The lyrics specifically refer to Key's memories of being in high school and meeting friends who lived closer to the beach, where they would be rambunctious late into the evening.

[15] The song's chorus and bridge were based on a memory of the night Key's family and friends gathered around and said goodbye before the group boarded their van for California for the last time.

In the high-concept clip,[17] frontman Ryan Key faces his fate in different ways before starting over again using a time loop device (similar to that of the film Run Lola Run), each scenario beginning with Key waking face down on the sidewalk surrounded by broken glass, and ending with his fateful encounter with a 1969 Ford Mustang Mach 1.

Kelefa Sanneh of The New York Times observed that the tune "follows a simple but appealing formula,"[13] while Rashod Ollison at the Baltimore Sun criticized its "Disney-friendly teen angst and derivative punk riffs.

"[7] Jeremy Gordon at Spin dubbed it the band's greatest moment, and an "eternal" song,[25] while Danielle Chelosky from the same magazine called it "an instant classic [...] an anthem of youth, recklessness and pop-punk.

"[16] The song's ubiquity, coupled with the band's brief moment in the spotlight, have made some equate the group to a one-hit wonder: "To a lot of people, Yellowcard are 'Ocean Avenue'," Entertainment Weekly reviewer Ariana Bacle wrote in 2016.