As a follow-up to A Billion Little Lights from 2021, this album was co-produced by frontman John Ross with Justin Pizzoferrato and the Antlers’ Peter Silberman. As Ross was beginning to write ILYSM, he was diagnosed with cancer. “Even though I’d already started working on the record, everything took on new meaning after my diagnosis,” the singer and guitarist, who is now recovering, said in a statement. “I started writing songs that tried to make sense of the whole experience, including the love and support I felt from the people in my life—particularly my wife, which is where the title came from.” “This song, like a few others on this record, takes place where I live and the field next to it,” he explained of the title track. “A full moon will light up all the rooms here in a way I’ve never really seen and I feel like this song wrote itself a little bit. This album is about love in its many forms and this song in particular is a metaphor for love and obsession.” John Ross and his bandmates (bassist Arden Yonkers and drummer Dan Keegan) recorded ILYSM primarily at Sonelab in Easthampton, Massachusetts. Additional contributors to the album include J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr., Julien Baker, Ryley Walker, Yasmin Williams, and Bing & Ruth’s David Moore and Jeremy Viner.