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"listen before i go" is the twelfth track by Billie Eilish featured on her debut album "WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?"
It is a song centered around suicide, with Eilish warning her lover to hurry up and listen to her before she kills herself.
After it was premiered at a show in Melbourne, the song was speculated to be titled “l i s t e n,” but Eilish later shared in a comment on Instagram that the song is titled “listen before i go”, and would be included on her debut album.
Although Eilish has made public her struggles with depression, the song isn’t necessarily about her life experience, but could be an artifact of her songwriting process. Eilish shared with Genius' own Rob Markman that when writing, she often impersonates other people and other people’s thought and problems:
"You don’t have to go through anything to write about it, or you can go through everything and write about something else. It’s literally like telling a story, you can write about something you’ve done, you can write about something your friend’s done, or you want to do, or you used to do, or your mom’s done."
At her first show in Toronto during the 1by1 tour, she talked about what the song is
“Basically it’s like, um it’s about, it’s just about depression, and what can come out of depression, which is not pretty good. When this comes out, I don’t want it to break you down, I want it to bring you to me and I don’t know, be like a mental hug, I guess. What I’m really trying to do is let my words be your words and stay ours.” (She continues to talk about how her fans are the reason she is here and how much she loves them).
In an interview with Radio Energy, Eilish listed “listen before i go” as “—one of my favorite songs I’ve ever written in my life”.
In an interview with PopBuzz, Eilish confirmed that the final three song titles on the album were intended to form a sentence, beginning with “listen before i go”, then “i love you”, ending on “goodbye”.
In an interview with Radio Energy, Eilish listed “listen before i go” as “—one of my favorite songs I’ve ever written in my life".
At the end of the track, police sirens and screams can be heard. Since “listen before i go” plays as a suicide note, with Eilish about to jump off a building— many believe it to show that she’s committed the act at that point within the song’s storyline.
The song’s Spotify artwork was done by @_italiyana on Instagram.
In an Instagram story, Billie revealed that “listen before i go” was inspired by “Smother” and “I don’t wanna do this anymore."
During the week ending April 13, 2019, “listen before i go” debuted and peaked at #63 on the Hot 100.
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