Songfacts®:

• This was the one AM track that wasn't recorded in California. Alex Turner was asked by Q magazine if the LP will serve as the group's "big LA record." He replied: "It's funny you should ask, because our label boss heard the song 'Fireside' and told me it's the most Californian song I'd written."
  
  "And of course, that was the one I'd written in London. What I realize now is that, whatever we try, it always sounds like the Arctic Monkeys."
• Former Coral member Bill Ryder-Jones contributed additional guitar to this tune. Alex Turner said to Q magazine of the guitarist. "He got us out of a corner there with 'Fireside.' I kept spoiling it with my sheddery and he came in with his guitar. He's a melancholy solo specialist!"
• Q magazine told Alex Turner that the song sounds quite romantic. Turner replied: "'Fireside' is the same song as 'Do I Wanna Know?' in terms of what it's saying,. They've both got a sort of 'Are You Lonesome Tonight' quality. It's just how you tell 'em."