Must Get Out

Did You Know?

• It was the band's last single to feature founding drummer Ryan Dusick.
• The song was included on Maroon 5's live album Live – Friday the 13th (2005).
• In the Netherlands, "Must Get Out" reached number 8, becoming the band's third top-10 hit there, behind only "This Love" and "She Will Be Loved."
• The commercial single includes an acoustic version of "This Love" as a B-side.

Composition and lyrics

"Must Get Out" is a soft rock ballad written by Adam Levine and Jesse Carmichael, with production and mixing by Matt Wallace. The song is in the key of G major, set in common time, with a tempo of 96 beats per minute. Levine's vocals range from the low note of G3 to the high note of B4. Guitarist James Valentine explained that the downtempo song emulates Andy Summers and The Police. Lyrically, it expresses a tough period of a relationship with a dreamy story, offering "clever imagery" such as "I've been the needle and thread/Weaving figures eights and circles ‘round your head" and frank confessions like "The city's made us crazy and we must get out."

Release and reception

"Must Get Out" was released as the album's fifth and final single in Europe on April 5, 2005. Its promotional single features the radio edit, while the commercial single includes the song and an acoustic version of the band's breakout hit "This Love." A United Kingdom release followed on April 11, 2005. The song received mostly positive reviews.

MacKenzie Wilson from Allmusic picked it as a highlight, writing that it "slows things down" and noting that "Levine is a vocal dead ringer for Men at Work's Colin Hay." Wayne Hoffman of Billboard called it "gentler." Robert Christgau highlighted the track, citing it as an example of how "broken heart often spurs killer hooks." Jason Thompson of PopMatters noted that Jesse Carmichael "manages to conjure The New Radicals" on the song.

Christian Hoard of Rolling Stone called it a "pretty, down-tempo" song. Commercially, it reached number 8 in the Netherlands, becoming the band's third top-10 hit there. In Ireland and the United Kingdom, it reached numbers 34 and 39 respectively, becoming the band's fifth consecutive top-40 single in the UK. In New Zealand, it was their fifth top-40 single.