“Change” is the final single shared by The War On Drugs, on October 26, ahead of their album release.

Like previous singles “Living Proof” and “I Don’t Live Here Anymore”, this track finds Granduciel confronting emotional growth. But where “Living Proof” felt like an optimistic song, excitedly savouring the prospect of a new home and fatherhood, determined to be present in the challenges ahead, here Adam is more reluctant about the difficulties of moving forward. He would rather “rise above” then change.

Grooving in a Tom Petty-ish rush of acoustics, jangly electrics and Lee Pardini fantastic grand piano work, Adam provides the line “But it’s so damn hard to make the change”, which may be the key to understanding the whole album. He said in a Vanity Fair interview that the album is all about:

growing up, getting older, but also growing out of yourself and into something new. The end of something, the beginning of something else.

Ahead of the single’s release, Adam spoke with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe:

I think this song in the record is kind of like about move into a new chapter gracefully […] and accept that everyone makes mistakes or has a difficult time with certain things or wish they could have done this or that. But when it’s time to commit and to just move forward to do so knowing that you live by a certain code or that you kind of have been through enough to where you want to understand what it is you’re looking for in your new chapter.