It was released as the lead single for Gallagher's second solo studio album, Why Me?

Gallagher co-wrote the song with Andrew Wyatt and producer Greg Kurstin.

The music video to "Shockwave" was uploaded onto Gallagher's YouTube channel on 13 June 2019.

The video, directed by François Rousselet[2] is mostly set in America’s Deep South, though much of it was actually filmed in Budapest.

Scenes show Gallagher walking away from a burning building, standing in a train carriage and walking through a crowd of protesters, some of whom are holding signs with the song's lyrics on them as well as the name of the album the song comes from.