About The Song
Patty Loveless released “I’m That Kind of Girl” as a single on January 12, 1991. It came from her album *On Down the Line*, which MCA Nashville had put out the previous May. The track was the third single from that record, following the title song and a cover of Lucinda Williams’s “The Night’s Too Long.”
Matraca Berg and Ronnie Samoset wrote it. Loveless has said she found the song during a week-long break when she sat down with a stack of demos sent to her office. After listening to roughly 150 songs, this one stopped her. She liked the sound and the words enough to call it her “risky song” for the album—the one that felt a little different from the rest of the material she was cutting at the time. Tony Brown produced the sessions.
The story is straightforward. A man in a Stetson is outside her window, howling for her to meet him in the parking lot. She has heard that kind of invitation before and is tired of it. She is not looking for another one-night stand. What she wants is real romance, the kind that comes with a little sensitivity. She is a sucker for the love-sick fool who would have carried her books in school. She is not the woman in red and she is not the girl next door. Somewhere in the middle is where she lives, and that is the kind of girl she is.
The song spent 20 weeks on the Billboard Hot Country Singles and Tracks chart and peaked at number 5 the week of March 30, 1991. It also reached number 48 on the Canadian RPM Country Tracks chart and finished the year at number 62 on Billboard’s year-end country list. The album itself went gold.
John Lloyd Miller directed the video. Loveless appears against a plain white background in a series of outfits, sometimes in black-and-white with only the clothes in color. In one scene a young girl stands beside her wearing the same purple dress. Near the end a boy and an older man tip their hats to the two of them. The clip stays simple and focused on the singer and the idea of choosing carefully.
Berg and Samoset would write together for Loveless again more than a decade later. Their 2003 song “On Your Way Home” became another single for her. That later credit is a small thread connecting the two periods of her recording career.
“I’m That Kind of Girl” sits in the middle of the *On Down the Line* run, after two stronger charting singles and before “Blue Memories.” It is the track that lets her state her terms without apology. The man outside the window can keep howling. She has already decided what she will and will not accept.
Video
Lyric
… There’s a man in a Stetson hat howlin’ like an alley cat
Outside my window tonight
Sayin’, “Baby, put on something hot, meet me in the parking lot
About a quarter to nine”
… I get the feelin’ that he’s never read Romeo and Juliet
I’m gettin’ tired of these one-night stands
But if you wanna make a real romance
… I’m that kind of girl, I’m that kind of girl
I ain’t the woman in red, I ain’t the girl next door
But if somewhere in the middle’s what you’re lookin’ for
I’m that kind of girl, yes, I’m that kind of girl
… Let me tell you that I like my lovin’ just as much as any woman
But I’m drawin’ the line
A little sensitivity always seems to get to me every time
… I’m a sucker for a love-sick fool
The kind that carries all your books in school
I’m gettin’ tired of these one-night stands
But if you’re lookin’ for a real romance
… I’m that kind of girl, I’m that kind of girl
I ain’t the woman in red, I ain’t the girl next door
But if somewhere in the middle’s what you’re lookin’ for
I’m that kind of girl, yeah, I’m that kind of girl
… Yeah, I’m that kind of girl, I’m that kind of girl
I ain’t the woman in red, I ain’t the girl next door
But if somewhere in the middle’s what you’re lookin’ for
I’m that kind of girl, yeah, I’m that kind of girl
… I’m that kind of girl, oh-oh
Oh, I’m that kind of girl, oh-oh