Songfacts®:

• This is Joel Compass' attempt to pen a song from a girl's perspective. He explained to MTV UK: "It's kind of like a call and response. I'm calling to say that I'm here and that they're going to have as much fun with me as they do with their girlfriends."
• The song is Compass' most upbeat tune to date. He explained to Digital Spy why he moved away from his usual dark matter for the track. "I'd been putting out a lot of vibes and I love them, but people were asking 'Why is your stuff so dark? Does this sum you up?,'" Compass said. "When I started putting music out, I realised that some people just assume that your music is you, and that's right for them to do - but it's only when you put music out there that you realize. I was like, 'I can't have people thinking I'm this guy that's really dark and only had bad stuff happen to him in his life', so I was like, 'Let me make my lyrics catch up with where I am now.'"
  
  "Things are a lot better now," he added, "so I wanted to write a song in a more upbeat way, and 'Girlfriends' is what I came up with."
• The original song title was "Dolphins," which was inspired by a David Attenborough television program in which he said female dolphins all stick together. Then Compass realized no one would understand why he called it 'Dolphins' unless he made the video about dolphins, which he didn't want to do.
• The song's music video was directed by Rankin (Miley Cyrus' "Adore You") and filmed at the fashion photographer's studio in Kentish Town, London. Compass explained to MTV UK: "I met him at a party a while back and he loved one of the songs – 'Vanilla' - from my mixtape I had out at the time. He wanted to do a video for it, which I was so up for, but we pushed the boat out a little and got him to do the single instead."
  
  "I really wanted a fashion photographer to do it all along, and I never thought I could get Rankin, but I did. Their thing, for me, is that they just make an image look so beautiful."