[1] In 2017, Orindal Records reissued Mountain Rock and Davidson embarked on a new Dear Nora tour, recruiting musicians Zach Burba, Gregory Campanile, and Stephen Steinbrink.

[1]Dear Nora debuted the songs "Sunset on Humanity",[5] "White Fur",[1] and "Simulation Feels"[6] as streaming singles in the month prior to the album's release.

Davidson favors surprising juxtapositions, images of transformation, and snapshots that highlight the absurdity of scenes, places, and contemporary existence in general, often considering the ancient and timeless within the same songs that capture the technology-driven frenzy of 2018.

According to Dolan, Skulls Example is less similar to the "straightforward indie folk" of Mountain Rock than it is to the band's followup There Is No Home, only with "tighter melodies and more focused themes"; she concluded that the album's high points "prove Davidson's songwriting hasn't lost the gentle power of Dear Nora's earlier releases—the scope is just broader now, the view a little clearer.

"[14] Andrew Sacher at indie music blog BrooklynVegan noted Skulls Example was released just as Dear Nora was gaining "increased acclaim" and "acknowledge[ment] as an artist ahead of their time," yet the album is "not just a victory lap to remind people of their classic material," but "a clear shift in direction.

"[17] Naming "Sunset on Humanity" as a highlight of the album, Douglas wrote that the song "brilliantly encompasses the themes of Skulls Example and the merits of Dear Nora as a whole — critical but warm, poetically observant, simultaneously hilarious, discouraging, and hopeful in a long shot sort of way.