Janis Joplin has the ain't-got-no-man blues in this psychedelic rock tune she co-wrote with Big Brother & The Holding Company's lead guitarist, Sam Andrew. He recalled to Goldmine in 1998: "'I Need A Man To Love' we wrote in about five minutes, backstage on a tuning amplifier. And that was a real sort of 'mission statement' from Janis, lyrically. And for me, it just popped out - it was a real kind of common riff, except for the bridge. We played it in A minor, and then it goes to the bridge, which is in F sharp minor. And there's a lot of chromaticism in there, so for me it was a departure that way. In a 1998 Gadfly interview, Andrew said the intro was based on Albert King's guitar riff from the blues song "Born Under A Bad Sign."
Joplin found it difficult to put her pain on display for an indifferent crowd, especially in her early days. She explained: "I had a couple of shows where I played the whole show really into it, completely giving all I had, and I was doing a freeform thing, talking, bring it all out, let it all go. Just talked about Janis and all the men that hurt her, and all the men that maybe she let down, and everything that you got to say; all of a sudden it starts coming out of your mouth, and you didn't even intend it to, and all of a sudden I heard them speak, I heard them talkin' in the middle of my fuckin' shit, man, and I stopped and I waited to see if they'd quit. They didn't quit, and I grabbed the microphone and said, I ain't cryin' my ass off for you! I put the microphone down and walked off the stage. I blew my contract and all that shit, but fuck that, man, I ain't gonna get out there and cry my soul out for people that are talking about 'How's your brother, did you get laid on Thursday, that's a cute dress.' I'm up there talking about my pain, fuck you!” (source: International Times, 1972)
This was possibly inspired by Joplin's breakup with singer Country Joe McDonald, her live-in boyfriend who left her the year before to marry another woman. McDonald wrote the song "Janis" for her. Joplin found love with both men and women. Aside from McDonald, she was romantically linked to Kris Kristofferson, and Peggy Caserta (author of the 1975 book Going Down With Janis, which she has since disowned), among others. At the time of her death in 1970, she was engaged to novelist Seth Morgan. From: https://www.songfacts.com/facts/big-brother-the-holding-company/i-need-a-man-to-love
