Songfacts®:

• In "Rather Be Alone," Leon Thomas and Halle Bailey take us into the slow collapse of a relationship. The central idea of the stripped-back, acoustic soul ballad is that sometimes being on your own is better than staying in a love that's broken beyond repair.
• While Thomas is emotionally checked out and prefers being alone rather than living in a "broken home," Halle conveys the fear and sadness associated with the potential loss.
• Thomas co-wrote and co-produced "Rather Be Alone" with his regular creative crew - Freaky Rob and D. Phelps - alongside Halle. The track is part of the deluxe edition of Leon Thomas's album MUTT.
• The collaboration between Thomas and Halle wasn't planned. "D. Phelps was in the studio with us, and I actually stole him from Halle's session - I'm real selfish with my guy!" Thomas chortled to Billboard. "We had no plans of doing a record that day. So, Halle pulls up to the studio, telling everybody to put the blunts out, and we started listening to records."
  
  Thomas, Phelps and Freaky Rob had hit a bit of a creative wall, and because Thomas' label wanted him to include some features on the album, he had an idea. Thomas turned to Halle and asked her to jump on the mic.
  
  "She really liked the song, but I had to kinda pressure her to get in the booth," he recalled. "She got in there, felt comfortable, wrote her verse very quickly, and really did her thing. You can hear that she came from the Beyoncé school of vocal production in the way she attacks things and enunciates and emotes. That put me in a great headspace as a producer as well."