Songfacts®:

• "Getaway Car" is The Shires' upbeat country song about having someone who can steer you through life's rough patches. Its central line, "Your heart is my getaway car," turns a loved one into an escape route, preferably one with a full tank and no traffic.
  
  Vocalist Crissie Rhodes described it as being about "that one person who can take the wheel when life gets hard to navigate." She also called it "a foot stompin', hand clappin' festival sing-along song," which gives a clear idea of what to do when the chorus arrives.
• Ben Earle came up with the hook in an unlikely songwriting location: an airplane. He was looking forward to returning to Nashville but was equally pleased at the prospect of 10 hours spent switching off and watching movies. Then the in-flight entertainment system stopped working. "It was just me and my thoughts. All these lyrics just flooded in," he told The Sun. Sometimes inspiration arrives in a Nashville writing room; other times it arrives at 35,000 feet when the only available entertainment is your own brain.
• "Getaway Car" was released as the lead single from Bonfire, The Shires' first album in four years. During the break, Earle and Rhodes concentrated on family life, including Rhodes becoming a mother.
• Earle co-wrote the song with:
  
  Alyssa Bonagura, whose credits include Jana Kramer's "Circles" and Steven Tyler's "I Make My Own Sunshine."
  
  Eric Paslay, who co-wrote Jake Owen's "Barefoot Blue Jean Night," Eli Young Band's "Even If It Breaks Your Heart" and Love and Theft's "Angel Eyes."
  
  Phil Barton, whose resumé includes Lee Brice's "A Woman Like You" and Jana Kramer's "Dance In the Rain."
• Bonagura was especially confident about what they had created. Earle told Country Music UK she kept declaring, "It's going #1," before they had even recorded the song. He admitted he didn't anticipate the success that followed.
• The single became the first UK country track to reach the Top 10 of the UK Country Radio Airplay chart, entering at #7. It subsequently fulfilled Bonagura's prophecy climbing to #1 and spending 15 weeks in the Top 40.