In this song, laundry that has been hung on a clothesline is used as a metaphor for getting caught in a one-sided relationship. The girl keeps leading him on just to disappoint him, which is "hanging him out to dry." The clicking at the end of the song simulates the clothesline.
Bassist Matt Maust told Spin magazine about the reason for the band's name: "I had the name six or seven years before the band started - so probably since 1997. I was traveling in Eastern Europe with my brother. There's this big park in Budapest where they dumped all these statues that had been removed after Communism fell. Now it's just a place where people can go and have picnics. There's a playground there. So being in that environment just made the phrase 'Cold War Kids' pop into my head. I may have heard it before. I'm a cold war kid, too - I was born in 1979. Originally, I used the name for a website I had where I posted art and poems. Then when I started playing music with the guys, they thought it would be a good name for the band, too."
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