The collaboration between New Jersey-based Italians Do It Better co-founder Mike Simonetti and vocalist Elizabeth Wight of the L.A. duo Silver Hands, Pale Blue's music shifts from melodic techno to ambient productions while maintaining a dreamy, quietly cathartic mood. The duo made their debut with the 2015 full-length The Past We Leave Behind, then continued releasing singles into the following decade.

As he was writing the songs that appeared on his Capricorn Rising EP, Simonetti remixed some of Silver Hands' tracks; he was inspired by Wight's wide-ranging voice, and the pair's e-mails led to making music together. Taking their moniker from Carl Sagan's name for the 1990 photo of Earth taken by the Voyager 1 space probe, Pale Blue finished recording their debut album late in 2014, when it was announced that Simonetti was leaving Italians Do It Better. The album, The Past We Leave Behind, was released in April 2015 on 2MR ("Two Mikes Records"), a dance imprint co-owned by Simonetti and Captured Tracks' Mike Sniper. Lower Dens' Jana Hunter co-wrote and sang the album track "Dusk in Parts."

A remix EP based around the album's closing song, "One Last Thing," was released in 2016. "Have You Passed Through the Night" was issued by Me Me Me in 2017, and the EP You Stopped Dying arrived on tech-house label Crosstown Rebels in 2018. 2MR released the digital single "Just Like Christmas" near the end of 2018, and an extended digital EP of Have You Passed Through the Night with two previously unreleased songs was issued in 2019. Pale Blue's Breathe EP appeared in 2020. ~ Heather Phares, Rovi