Songfacts®:

• The lead single from Digital Vein, this song was released on July 31, 2015. "I wanted the first single to be the perfect door to open to the rest of the record and I think of 'Criminals' as that," Cook told Billboard magazine. "It's got the perfect tempo to it - the song had some energy right out of the gate."
  
  He added: "Sonically, I think every song has its own identity, but that song felt like a good introductory paragraph."
• Cook wrote the song with Blair Daly (Rascal Flatts' "Stand") shortly after he moved to Nashville. He told USA Today, "Lyrically, it's a modern-day Bonnie and Clyde, young love against the world."
• Cook told Billboard that for Digital Vein he wanted to take his "musical sensibilities and then push the envelope."
  
  Cook added that this song serves as a good synopsis for the record. "There's a lot of programming that really pushes the pulse of that song," he said. "Two records ago I wouldn't have felt comfortable enough to do that."