The song contains elements from "Smalltown Boy" (1984) by Bronski Beat. Brandon Flowers wrote "I Can Change" upon request from Swedish house duo Axwell and Ingrosso, who asked if Flowers would collaborate with them for their upcoming album. Because Axwell and Ingrosso were unable to finish the song, Flowers decided to record it himself. He noticed similarities between the song he had been given by Axwell and Ingrosso and Bronski Beat's "Smalltown Boy" and thus decided to sample the melody from it. Coincidentally, Flowers later learned that Axwell and Ingrosso previously sampled "Smalltown Boy" for their 2006 single "Tell Me Why".

"I Can Change" features a vocal recording of Neil Tennant (of the Pet Shop Boys) taken via a cell phone answering machine. Flowers has said of the recording: "We just talked about it, and we just had this gap in a verse and we needed to stick something in there. We were talking about it being a speaking part, and the greatest musical 'speaker' is Neil Tennant! His voice is like no other. I texted him if he would -- he didn't even hear the song or the tempo or anything, I just texted him this line. I asked, will you send us a voicemail of yourself saying, 'When you're looking for a change'? And that was it. He sent us a voice memo, and we stuck it onto the track, from the phone. It was done within 20 seconds."

Billboard listed it as one of "20 Summer Pop Songs You Need for Your Summer Playlist".

Flowers performed this track on The Graham Norton Show and at the Royal Variety Performance (2015) at Royal Albert Hall.

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