Don't Throw Out My Legos

"Don't Throw Out My Legos" was the second song written for Neotheater, preceded by "Karma" and followed by "Next Up Forever".[3] The song describes the emotional hardships of moving away from one's parents,[4] with the band struggling to conform to the social construct of adulthood.[5] Rolling Stone praised the track's personality as "a saccharine but strangely affecting ode to lost innocence".[6] "Don't Throw Out My Legos" was the first song showcased of Neotheater, receiving live performances during the AJR's The Click tour in 2018.[7] The lyric "People want shirts with the band name on it" would later inspire a shirt design with plain white color and "The Band Name" as lettering.[8]

During the Neotheater World Tour, AJR visualized the layers of the chorus for "Don't Throw Out My Legos".[9] The song's production began from sampling the sound of car keys being dropped,[10] being pitched up an octave and combined with a drum beat in ³
₄ time signature and at a tempo of 147 beats per minute. The song's snare drum takes inspiration from the snare of the Beatles' "Penny Lane". This composition was then shifted into ⁴
₄ time signature and included piano in the key of D major. Following the addition of bass and hi-hats, the band incorporated the Neotheater's theme of orchestral sampling by creating a melody out of viola and close harmony choirs to complete the chorus.[11] The pre-chorus and bridge of "Don't Throw Out My Legos" are piano-based with an ascending beat that leads into the chorus.[6] Riff Magazine compared these chord progressions to music from Mister Rogers' Neighborhood.[12]

A music video for "Don't Throw Out My Legos" was released on Vimeo and Spotify, with the former being a widescreen video and the latter being a vertical canvas of the same footage. It features the band and other studio personnel creating and performing the song, interspersed with clips of the band relaxing in-studio with their Bouvier dog Shay.

Credits adapted from Tidal.[13]