 " A Year Without Rain " is a dance ballad , written by Toby Gad and Lindy Robbins , with a length of three minutes and twenty @-@ nine seconds . It was also produced by Gad . Musically , the track uses a standard pop structure and derives from the genre of Eurodance , backed with a techno beat . According to sheet music published at Musicnotes.com by EMI Music Publishing , " A Year Without Rain " is set in common time and has a tempo of 120 beats per minute . It is written in the key of C major and follows the chord progression of C – Gm – Dm – F. Gomez 's vocals in the song span from F3 to E5 . Lyrically , the song sees Gomez longing for the object of her affection and compares it to a year without rain : " I need you by my side / Don 't know how I 'll survive / A day without you is like a year without rain . " According to Megan Vick of Billboard , the sound of the song contrasts with its " tender " lyrics . 
