During the hiatus, most of the band members continued performing music and pursued other interests, which included moving to other cities or states with their new families.

After reuniting and performing sporadic festival dates in 2015, Thrice announced the band's intention to release a new album the following year.

Because of the distance between the members' new homes, the demos for To Be Everywhere Is to Be Nowhere were written, recorded, shared and worked on digitally using software programs that were not as prevalent before they went on hiatus.

"[1] Released months after the hiatus officially began in 2012, the 24-song live album Anthology captured Thrice's final tour.

Kensrue carried on as a worship director at Mars Hill Church until 2014, when he left amid controversies surrounding evangelical Christian Mark Driscoll.

[1][5] He continued his solo music career and released studio albums The Water & the Blood (2013) and Carry the Fire (2015) in his own name.

"[6] The band has said that with their reunion, Thrice would take a more structured approach to writing and touring so they would not be away from their families and other responsibilities for extended periods of time.

Riley Breckenridge, who previously composed music virtually with Puig Destroyer,[8] said he found the situation to be challenging and would have preferred to jam together in person as a band.

"[14] Kensrue said he felt the extra time and distance allowed each member to act more creatively and ultimately greatly benefited the finished album.

[18] The members of Thrice also had to write around their families schedules—at the time of recording, Kensrue and Teranishi both had three children and Riley Breckenridge's first child had just been born.

[18] Eddie Breckenridge hoped the comeback album would be significantly heavier, feature more energy and "smash people's faces" musically.

"[21] Lars Gotrich of NPR noted that the promotional track "Black Honey" musically resembles "late-period Cave In" and compared Kensrue's vocals to the "soulful rasp of Soundgarden's Chris Cornell".

Riley Breckenridge said he appreciated instances in which more aggressive sounds were incorporated in an emotionally impacting and dynamic way, drawing inspiration from bands he felt achieved this, including Cave In, Torche, Cult of Luna and O'Brother.

[18] Speaking about the album's lyrics, Kensrue said, "I would definitely say that we've drawn a lot of our influence from the current state of politics, but I also like to personalize things when I write, and I've always written that way".

[18] "Blood On the Sand", whose the opening line is "We wave our flags, we swallow fear like medicine / We kiss the hands of profiteers and their congressmen",[21] was described as having "much more hard-hitting political dialogue".

[26] Kensrue said about half the tracks on To Be Everywhere Is to Be Nowhere follow this explicitly political theme while the rest were described as more broadly focused and touching on social or cultural concepts.

"[27] Riley Breckenridge said that in today's society with smartphones, Google, the Internet and easy access to a massive wealth of knowledge, it is hard to focus on the present.

[8] In the text from which the album's title was quoted, Seneca gives advice to Lucilius Junior and suggests it is better for one to sharpen one's focus on what is important than to divide one's attention between many things.

[21] The release of "Blood on the Sand" was followed by that of "Black Honey" a month later on April 27; it was one of the first tracks Thrice wrote after reuniting.

The car pulls over by an orchard and a flash of light emanates from the boy, leaving the trees covered in a dark, liquid-like substance.

[36] Chorus.fm reviewer Aaron Mook complimented the fluidity in stylistic shifts throughout the album, concluding, "Simply put, To Be Everywhere is To Be Nowhere is one of the best 'rock' records of 2016 and an ambitious entry into Thrice’s already stunning catalog".

Complaining that the album lacked energy, he wrote, "Vheissu may not have had the snarl or speed-freak time signatures of The Illusion of Safety, but it more than made up for that with its epic scope and genre experimentation.

[38] Although DIY's Ali Shutler called the album "weird and slanted", she also noted "a ridiculous wonder to the whole thing", citing "Black Honey" as an example.

[40] Punknews.org praised the album's instrumentation, likening the sounds of "Hurricane" to "a heavier Kings of Leon" and "The Window" to the work of Radiohead, while making lyrical comparisons to Rage Against the Machine on "Wake Up" and "Black Honey".

Doyle also appreciated the heaviness of "Whistleblower", which he described as "hammering instrumental brilliance with Dustin Kensrue’s glass-on-asphalt voice to mesmeric effect".

While he was particularly impressed by the lyrical themes throughout the album, he also commented, "Everybody sounds great here, with a particularly forceful energy from Riley Breckenridge’s drums every bit as critical to the dynamic ups and downs as Kensrue’s vocal delivery".