“Bright” is the second-to-last song on Kehlani’s You Should Be Here mixtape from 2015, the project she released shortly before announcing that she had signed with Atlantic Records. “Bright” is a bluesy, piano- and electric guitar-driven track about self-love. The verses follow two characters from childhood into their teen years as they struggle with confidence in the face of media images and peer pressure. Kehlani said on Skee TV that the song is one of her favorites from the mixtape and that she liked the idea of giving her listeners something unexpected.

It’s a blues song, and I feel like people weren’t expecting this, they weren’t expecting this sound…. It means a lot to me, the song. It’s not a love song, well, it’s a love song. It’s about self-love…. I go from talking to younger kids to adults just about kind of like loving yourself. You can’t love anybody if you don’t love yourself.