What Kind of Love

Album: Life Is Messy (1992)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • Lyricist Will Jennings started writing this with Roy Orbison, who he became friends with when they worked with on the song "Wild Hearts Run Out Of Time" for the movie Insignificance. Jennings told us:
    "I started this song in 1985 when I was staying in Nashville finishing the writing of The Last Mango In Paris album with Jimmy Buffett. When I had time I would drive out to Orbison's house on Old Hickory Lake in Hendersonville and work on songs with him for his upcoming album. I had an apartment with a portable studio and a keyboard/rhythm machine and I came up with the chorus melody and lyric. Roy and I did not get the song finished and I put it away. Sometime after Roy died I was again in Nashville and thought Rodney would be the perfect one to finish the song with, since he came out of that working-class Texas background Roy and I came out of. Rodney and I had written several songs starting in the 1970s and I admire his writing skills. And I had taken him out to meet Roy and the 3 of us wrote a song called 'When The Blue Hour Comes,' so there was that connection. I also wrote a chorus in Spanish which I sing after the end of Rodney's album version of 'What Kind of Love.'"
  • Jennings: "As far as 'What kind of love runs through your heart with a pleasure so close to pain' the answer to that question is 'Only this love that I have' emphasizing the pain and pleasure that often coexist in a passionate relationship." (Check out our interview with Will Jennings.)

Comments: 1

  • Racer X from Bemidji MnAll time favorite
see more comments

Editor's Picks

Stand By Me: The Perfect Song-Movie Combination

Stand By Me: The Perfect Song-Movie CombinationSong Writing

In 1986, a Stephen King novella was made into a movie, with a classic song serving as title, soundtrack and tone.

Modern A Cappella with Peder Karlsson of The Real Group

Modern A Cappella with Peder Karlsson of The Real GroupSong Writing

The leader of the Modern A Cappella movement talks about the genre.

Jeff Trott

Jeff TrottSongwriter Interviews

Sheryl Crow's longtime songwriting partner/guitarist Jeff Trott reveals the stories behind many of the singer's hits, and what its like to be a producer for Leighton Meester and Max Gomez.

Michael Schenker

Michael SchenkerSongwriter Interviews

The Scorpions and UFO guitarist is also a very prolific songwriter - he explains how he writes with his various groups, and why he was so keen to get out of Germany and into England.

Loudon Wainwright III

Loudon Wainwright IIISongwriter Interviews

"Dead Skunk" became a stinker for Loudon when he felt pressure to make another hit - his latest songs deal with mortality, his son Rufus, and picking up poop.

Little Big Town

Little Big TownSongwriter Interviews

"When seeds that you sow grow by the wicked moon/Be sure your sins will find you out/Your past will hunt you down and turn to tell on you."