You Ain't Woman Enough (To Take My Man)

Album: You Ain't Woman Enough (1966)
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Songfacts®:

  • The biggest hit of Loretta Lynn's career to this point, "You Ain't Woman Enough" went to #2 on the Country charts and the You Ain't Woman Enough album hit #1. Written by Lynn, it shows her strong side, as she confronts a woman who is going after her man. No wilting flower, Lynn makes it clear that she's not going to give up on her man - especially to this common floozy. She sings:

    Sometimes a man start lookin' at things that he don't need
    He took a second look at you but he's in love with me


    Lynn has explained that her husband Doolittle, who died in 1996, was an influence in all of her songs, including her next single "Don't Come Home A-Drinkin' (With Lovin' on Your Mind)," which shows the side of him that isn't worth fighting for.
  • Speaking at the TV Critics Association winter press tour in 2016, Lynn talked about what prompted her to write this song. Said Lynn: "When I wrote 'You Ain't Woman Enough (To Take My Man),' this little woman come backstage, and she said, 'Loretta, my husband didn't bring me to the show tonight.' She said, 'He's got a girlfriend, and he brought her. She's sitting out in that second row with my husband.' And we kind of pulled the curtain back and looked at him. I looked around at that lady that came backstage, and I said, 'Honey, she ain't woman enough to take your man.' I went in the dressing room right then and wrote that song before the show ever started."
  • Donna Jean Godchaux often performs this song and sang it on stage when she was a vocalist with The Grateful Dead. Another popular cover is by the husband-and-wife duo Joey + Rory, who released it as a download in 2010. When Songfacts spoke with Joey Feek of Joey + Rory, she said: "I didn't know a lot of Loretta's story until later in my young adult life, and then watching Coal Miner's Daughter and reading the book. Just the strength that she had - she just said what she thought, and she didn't have anything to hold back. There were parts of it that I just loved, because she was innocent. And on 'You Ain't Woman Enough,' Loretta was raising that flag about supporting her man and standing beside him and fighting for him and everything else. She held that flag way before any other female country artist did. And then we have a song like 'Cheater,' and there's some parallels there. I just love Loretta. You just can't help but love her, and you hear her talk and she's honest with every word that she says. She doesn't hide a thing."
  • Lynn says there was a time when a woman went after her husband and she had to put a stop to it. She took this woman to "Fist City."

Comments: 1

  • Barry from Sauquoit, NyOn this day in 1966 {August 7th} Loretta Lynn's "You Ain't Woman Enough (To Take My Man)"* peaked at #2* {for 2 weeks} on Billboard's Hot Country Singles chart, for the two weeks it was at #2, the #1 record for both those weeks was "Almost Persuaded" by David Houston...
    Between 1960 to 2010 Loretta Lynn, as a solo artist, had sixty-five records on the Hot Country Singles chart, forty made the Top 10 with eleven reaching #1...
    As a duo with Conway Twitty she charted twelve times, and all twelve records made the Top 10 with five peaking at #1...
    Loretta Lynn, born Loretta Webb, celebrated her 88th birthday four months ago on April 14th, 2020...
    * "You Ain't Woman Enough" was Loretta Lynn's first of three records to peak at #2 on the Hot Country Singles chart, the other two were "You're Just Stepped In (From Stepping Out On Me" in 1968 and "When The Tingle Becomes A Chill" in 1975...
    And from the 'For What It's Worth' department, the remainder of the Hot Country Singles Top 10 on August 7th, 1966:
    At #3. "Think of Me" by Buck Owens {Last week's #1 record}
    #4. "A Million and One" by {Billy Walker}
    #5. "Standing In The Shadows" by Hank Williams Jr.
    #6. "Ain't Had No Lovin'" by Connie Smith
    #7. "Swinging Doors" by Merle Haggard
    #8. "The Street of Baltimore" by Bobby Bare
    #9. "Don't Touch Me" by Jeannie Seely
    #10. "The Shoe Goes On The Other Foot Tonight" by Marty Robbins
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