Songfacts®:

• An overriding theme running through Imploding The Mirage is frontman Brandon Flowers' marriage to Tana Mundkowsky and whether two can become one. This song features what Flowers describes as "the prettiest or most romantic lyric" he's ever written.
  
  I'll be there when water's rising
  I'll be your lifeguard
  
  Flowers told NME: "I feel thankful for that. I want her to know that no matter what, I'm going to stay by her side and keep the promise."
• Tana suffers from PTSD because of traumas experienced in her childhood. Her struggles with depression inspired many of Flowers' lyrics on The Killers' 2017 album, Wonderful Wonderful.
• Flowers told Q magazine that musically, this song pulls together different Killers influences from across the years. "It's somehow captures Manchester and Bruce Springsteen," he said. "I think that's when we're at our best, when we're able to take these different elements and make them work."
• Brandon Flowers wrote the song with:
  
  Jonathan Rado, better known as the multi-instrumentalist of rock duo Foxygen.
  
  Canadian engineer and producer Shawn Everett, who won Grammys for his work on albums by Alabama Shakes, War On Drugs, and Kacey Musgraves.
  
  Australian singer-songwriter Alex Cameron, who helped pen five tracks on their previous album, Wonderful Wonderful.
  
  British songwriter and producer Mike Crossey, who has also worked with the likes of The 1975 and Lany.
• Jonathan Rado and Shawn Everett produced the song. It was Everett who came up with the idea of sampling a couple of early '70s tracks by German rock outfits: "Hallogallo" by NEU!, and "Moonshake" by Can. Flowers recalled to Apple Music:
  
  "This song was already good, and then Shawn disappeared to a B room for an hour and came back all excited, and played us that [Can and Neu!] loop over the song. And I was like 'Yeah!' It's frustrating that it wasn't our loop in the beginning, but then we just embraced it and got permission."