Michael Stipe explained: "I was in New York, putting together a book of haikus that I worked on with several dear friends of mine over the course of a year, and I was walking down the steps of this building. It was probably four o'clock in the afternoon, and I come to a door—it's apartment 3-D or something—and there's a sign on it that says "Daysleeper," and I walked a lot more carefully, quietly down the steps, thinking about that poor person who's trying to sleep, and me and my big old boots interrupting her sleep. So I wrote this song about a daysleeper that's working an 11–7 shift and how furious the balance is between the life that you live and the work that you have to do in order to support the life that you live."
The song "The Lifting" from R.E.M.'s 2001 album Reveal is a prequel to "Daysleeper" and features the same character.
