"Get Him Back" is about Fiona Apple's relationships with men, and how awfully wrong many of them went. When she ruminated on them, she realized they went wrong in many different way with many different guys, and she came to a conclusion. "It became so apparent to me that the only common denominator in all of this awfulness is me," she said in an iTunes Originals session. "I'm not saying it's all my fault, but I have to take a look at myself and what I seek out in men. This song is a kind of bird's-eye view of all my relationships starting from the very first thing that went wrong, then me trying to re-live that first wrong thing and make it right. It's a little tour. It's very literal and autobiographical, except for the last part - I made up the part about wanting the guy back because I wanted to end it nice."
This is the second track on Apple's third album, Extraordinary Machine, which she completed with producer Jon Brion in 2003 but decided not to release. She ended up going back in the studio with producers Brian Kehew and Mike Elizondo to record new versions of most of the songs, including this one. The long-delayed album finally appeared in October 2005; her next album, The Idler Wheel..., didn't show up until 2012.
Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson of The Roots played drums on this track. Typical of Apple, there is no guitar, with her piano acting as lead instrument.
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