This sultry jam embodies Selena Gomez' journey of discovery as she turns into a young woman. Speaking during an interview with Elvis Duran on Z100's morning show she said: "I think that this song represents the confidence that I truly have inside of me, and I think it's the vulnerable side that I've expressed, but it's also the combination of just feeling myself."
The song finds Selena Gomez teaming up with songwriter Julia Michaels (who wrote Fifth Harmony's "
Miss Movin' On" and Kelly Clarkson's "
War Paint") plus Semi Precious Weapons frontman Justin Tranter. Michaels and Tranter also worked on "
Sorry" for Selena's ex, Justin Bieber.
"'Good For You' is actually one of the first songs I recorded for the record," Gomez said. "It was stunning - it was a piece that was just everything I feel a woman should embody, but not in the obvious way. I vibed with it. The track only took about 45 minutes because I just did it all the way through. I didn't want to stop in between. I wanted to feel the whole song as a whole, and they were there, and it was just a beautiful start to the album."
This features a guest appearance from A$AP Rocky late on in the song, marking the first time that Gomez has worked with a rapper on one of her tracks. Rocky's innuendo-laced rhymes find him affirming the former Disney star's intentions to please her lover.
Gomez told Elvis Duran that putting a feature artist collaboration on the track was an organic process: "When I recorded the song, there was no feature. I don't even think there was a plan for a feature," she said. "I recorded the track, I responded to it so much that I had the entire team who wrote the song come to Mexico and finish the album with me because it was the perfect way and the perfect tone that's set for this next chapter for me. And then once it was done, I could not help but want somebody on it. And I'm obsessed with A$SAP Rocky's new album. So I slipped it to him and next thing you know he responded really well."
Selena Gomez explained how the track came to be to
Radio.com: "When I got 'Good For You,' it was just the melody," she recalled. "We didn't know what we wanted the sound to be like. Some of the melodies are very soft, so it could have been a little more pop but I didn't want the production to take away from the vocal."
"I'm a huge fan of hip-hop, urban - that's just my taste," Gomez continued "I think that's my natural direction. When I was recording the whole album, everything I was writing or recording was all mid-tempo. I was drawn to that, I guess. I think now more than ever I'm comfortable and confident going into the studio knowing what my vision is."
Rocky told MTV News how he changed the song after Gomez' people reached out to him. "Me and my boy Hector [Delgado], we added to the beat," he said. "We added instruments and s--t - more bass, snares. I started singing on it. Produced it. Wrote it."
Rocky added that despite this being a pop song, he still used his normal methods to attack the track. "I don't think it's a different approach," he explained. "You just go in. Go for the kill. I mean, it wasn't the type of song you try to go into... It was just like me telling her, you sure you wanna go here with me? I gotta change the beat. I gotta talk my s--t. My jiggy s--t."
Speaking during an On Air with Ryan Seacrest interview, Gomez claimed the song's lyrical content was deeper than merely being about a woman wanting to look good for her lover. "There's nothing wrong with a woman being comfortable, confident, [or] whatever it is that you feel," she said. "I love that, I love feeling like I'm in love and want to look good for someone. At the same time, there's no guy in the [music] video, I'm saying I am a diamond, and I like the way that women feel when they're in that state."
The song's music video was shot by Sophie Muller. The British filmmaker has directed numerous clips including ones for The Killers ("
Mr. Brightside"), Rihanna ("
Stay") and Pink ("
True Love").
Gomez wanted the clip to use the initial, stripped-down version of the song, which omits Rocky's verse, and is in a slower tempo with string instrumentation. Speaking of the visual's theme, Gomez stated to MTV News, "It's very jeans and a T-shirt, moments where a woman is deep in thought, or in a moment where she's in this crazy little rage. It just captures real things that women do. There are a lot of things that women do that are sexy that aren't just the typical, cheap way of being sexy."
Speaking to Flare in an interview for the magazine's November 2015 issue, Gomez said: "I have my own definition of what I think is beautiful and sexy. That's why, in the video [for Good For You], I didn't wear lingerie and I didn't have a guy in it. It's a woman in one of those raw, bare moments; she's vulnerable, and that's sexy."
The producer Benny Blanco was paying attention to this song when he prepared to ask Gomez to marry him. The ring he chose has a marquise diamond, just like she sings about on the track:
I'm a marquise diamond
Could even make that Tiffany jealous
He delivered it when he popped the question on December 11, 2024 over a picnic with Taco Bell, a Gomez favorite. Of course she said yes. What girl could resist a big diamond ring served with a chalupa?
