Songfacts®:

• In January 1991 Manics bassist Nicky Wire proclaimed on a BBC 2 show Snub TV with the certainly of youth. "We will never write a love song, ever. Full stop."
  
  Two and a half years later, Wire married his wife Rachel. He wrote the lyrics to this song in late 1994 when the Manics were touring Europe and he was missing her like mad.
  
  Vocalist James Dean Bradfield recalled to Q magazine: "I remember Nick giving me that lyric, and me going, 'Wow, I'm going to have to chase down that footage. Because you've gone and f--ked yourself over, man: you've written a love song.'"
  
  In fact Wire and Bradfield have never exchanged words about this about turn.
• Bradfield's vocal for the song was done after an endless session in the French bar Le Happy Hour. However his inebriated state helped rather than hindered his performance. He told Q how his recording earned praise from producer Mike Hedges: "Bizarrely, because I was so drunk, I was so free, and my voice was so clear… I don't know why. I was numb. And Mike pressed the playback and said, 'That was very sensitive - well done."