Halsey told Popjustice that this was the first happy song she’d ever written.

The breaking point for me was when I wrote ‘Drive’ which is track four on the album. It’s the first happy song I’ve ever written which is really cool for me, because it’s an optimistic song. It’s a sweet song, it’s about being in a relationship, being in love with someone and not knowing how to tell them. The premise of the song is: all we do is drive, all we do is think about the feelings that we hide….it’s so ironic that it’s called ‘Drive’ because it symbolises this departure from the Badlands–this point where I drive away. I leave. After that come these pop songs—they’re bright, they’ve a different kind of energy, this coming-of-age, nostalgic sound to them.

The additional vocals are by Halsey’s ex-boyfriend, Norwegian producer Lido. He helped produce a large majority of her debut Badlands. Check out the bottom paragraph of this annotation for more details!

In June 2017 tweet, Halsey named “Drive” among her top 10 songs lyrically.