Songfacts®:

• This was originally a soul-pop song slated for U2's abandoned project Songs of Ascent. Bono told Rolling Stone at the time that its bright synth sounds were influenced by OMD and "early electronica." "You don't hear indie bands doing blue-eyed soul [like this]," he added. A more stripped-down version was performed live by the group a few times in 2010.
  
  The version that finally appears on Songs of Innocence has been completely fleshed out with a re-written chorus and some alterations to the verses.
  
  "We had early versions of that song with other sections, and it was much more complicated and big with musical motifs," explained The Edge to American Songwriter. "In simplifying that song, just a few little changes in the chords, suddenly it comes into focus. If a song sounds writerly, you're never going to love playing it live. It's got to feel like it always was there, in its natural state. And that's what I was trying for, this timeless quality, where you're not thinking "Oh, this is clever." It's "Wow, this is reaching me."
• Songs Of Innocence was released to all iTunes Store customers free of charge. However, a number of account holders were unhappy that the record appeared in their music libraries without the option to opting-out. Defending uploading the record for free to all iTunes users, Bono said at the Web Summit in Dublin. "We got people who were uninterested in U2 to be mad with U2. I would call that an improvement."
• U2 released eleven videos directed by politically minded street artists to accompany the album under the title Films of Innocence. The clip for this song was filmed by South African-born Berlin based artist Robin Rhode. The filmmaker told Complex magazine that he was inspired by the social issues in his home country and by U2's close connection. "It was an inspirational project especially as I fell in love with the song," Rhodes said. "I believed whole-heartedly in the lyrics and the intentions of the band to explore new avenues of music video creation that could have a more educative and contributive effect on global viewers and listeners around the world. Music, like art, becomes the mechanism to spread consciousness."
• Belfast-born filmmaker Aoife McCardle directed a short film titled Every Breaking Wave based on this song and Songs of Innocence's final track "The Troubles." The mini-movie tells a love story between a Catholic and a Protestant youngster. McCardle explained: "I wanted to make a film about what it was like to be a teenager in the early '80s in Northern Ireland. All the different pressures on you, the pressures of friendship, of falling in love for the first time, and all that in the face of huge troubles."
  
  "Violence was inescapable on your doorstep. I remember very vividly what it was like to grow up when there were bombs going off and army everywhere, so I did draw on a lot of memories."
  
  "I hope people see that it's a story. A story that's based on real stories. It's like capturing a time. And I hope people feel inspired by how resilient teenagers at that time were in Northern Ireland, and moved by their ability to live life in as full a way as possible, despite the circumstances."
  
  The song's official music video is a condensed, four-and-a-half-minute version of the 13-minute short film.