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After the compilation B-Sides and Rarities (30 June 2017), which the band said let them clean out the closet, Beach House parted with Chris Coady and brought in Peter Kember, known as Sonic Boom. Recording took over eleven months in 2017: at Apple Orchard in Baltimore, at Carriage House in Stamford, Connecticut, and at Palmetto in Los Angeles, where Lose Your Smile and Woo were made. Drums for Dive were recorded at Crown Lanes in Denver and Alan Moulder mixed in London. James Barone, who had toured with them since 2016, played live drums, and Sonic Boom added accordion on one song and drill on another. Dive was the last track finished, in October 2017.

The band said the societal insanity of 2016 and 2017 influenced the record, along with ruminations on the roles and pressures that society places on women, and that Edie Sedgwick inspired its black-and-white pop art visuals. Singles came in 2018: Lemon Glow and Dive on 15 February, Dark Spring on 2 April, Black Car on 2 May and Drunk in LA in September, with a 7-inch of Lose Your Smile and the outtake Alien that October. Jayson Greene of Pitchfork called it their heaviest and most immersive-sounding album and heard the drums on Dark Spring carrying the resounding weight of My Bloody Valentine's Only Shallow. The tour ran from 30 April in Chattanooga to 20 October in Dublin.