Songfacts®:

• Miley Cyrus first met Australian actor Liam Hemsworth on the set of the Nicholas Sparks film The Last Song in 2009. They began an on-again, off-again relationship that culminated in them getting married on December 23, 2018. Cyrus left fans shocked when she announced on August 10, 2019, that they were calling it quits after eight months of marriage. The singer released this raw and honest track a week later as a response to their breakup.
  
  Once upon a time it was paradise
  Once upon a time I was paralyzed
  Think I'm gonna miss these harbor lights
  But it's time to let it go
  
  The pair were both teenagers when they first met and fell in love. Now having grown up and changed, Cyrus feels it's time to "slide away" from their relationship and move on.
• The song appears to reference reports that Hemsworth's partying ways was a major factor in their split.
  
  I want my house in the hills
  Don't want the whiskey and pills
  
  Sources told TMZ that Hemsworth was drinking a lot and indulging in drugs towards the end of their marriage.
• Cyrus and Hemsworth broke up for a time in 2013 and several of the singer's Bangerz tracks were about their deteriorating relationship; these included "Maybe You're Right" and "Drive."
• Cyrus wrote the ambient, atmospheric track alongside Finnish singer-songwriter Alma and producers Mike WiLL Made-It ("Wrecking Ball") and Andrew Wyatt ("Mother's Daughter").
• Cyrus penned "Slide Away" 18 months before her split from Liam Hemsworth, well before they became husband and wife.
  
  "I wrote 'Slide Away' before my breakup," she told Apple Music host Zane Lowe. "I wrote 'Slide Away' in February of the year before, and I just keep speaking these things into existence."
  
  Because the song's end of a relationship subject matter later became real, it caused Cyrus to change her lyrical content.
  
  "That's why I've decided to use my language to love myself, and to really create what I want to be my reality," she said in the August 2020 interview. "Because otherwise, I keep doing the opposite. I burned my house down with my words."