“Wasn’t That a Woman” is John Fogerty letting a little sunshine through the cracks—an R&B-leaning burst of awe where desire hits fast, loud, and wonderfully unplanned.
First, the essentials—because this song lives inside a very specific chapter of Fogerty’s story. “Wasn’t That a Woman” is an original John Fogerty composition from his 1986 studio album Eye of the Zombie, released on September 29, 1986. On the original LP running order, it sits on Side Two (track 2), clocking in around 4:13. The album itself reached No. 26 on the U.S. Billboard 200 and was certified Gold by the RIAA—solid commercial footing even as critical response proved uneven. And stylistically, Eye of the Zombie was notable as Fogerty’s first solo album recorded with a backing band, with “Wasn’t That a Woman” singled out (alongside “Soda Pop”) as one of his early Motown-sounding funk/R&B explorations.
That last detail matters, because “Wasn’t That a Woman” doesn’t behave like the Fogerty many people keep filed in the mind—swamp grit, river silt, Americana shadows. Instead, it walks in with a snap in its step and a grin it can’t quite hide. It’s a song built on that unmistakable, universal moment: you’re minding your business, thinking the day is under control, and then someone appears—someone so striking it feels almost unfair—and suddenly the world tilts a few degrees off its axis.
The lyric tells you right away what kind of “story” this is: not a slow romance, not an epic. It’s a collision—“took me by surprise… right between the eyes,” the kind of line that lands like a punchline and a confession at once. And Fogerty, always a master of plainspoken imagery, paints attraction in the language of motion and horsepower: chasing, running, “pure Cadillac.” That’s classic American pop vocabulary—cars, speed, sudden appetite—yet in his mouth it becomes something warmer than swagger. It’s not so much boasting as marveling: Can you believe what just happened to me?
What’s quietly beautiful here is how the song frames desire as a kind of youth that returns unexpectedly. The narrator becomes “a schoolboy,” not because he’s naïve, but because infatuation has the power to reset the emotional clock. No matter how seasoned a person becomes, a single glance at the wrong (or right) moment can bring back that old, helpless sincerity—the one we pretend we outgrew. In that sense, “Wasn’t That a Woman” isn’t only about her. It’s about him, too: the sudden rediscovery of his own capacity to be undone.
Placed within Eye of the Zombie, the track also works like a needed breath. This album carries darker imagery and social unease in its very title; it’s a record that often sounds like it’s watching the world with wary eyes. Then “Wasn’t That a Woman” arrives like a streetlight flicking on—proof that even in anxious times, the human heart can still be hijacked by something as simple as beauty walking into a room.
And maybe that’s the lasting meaning, “for what it’s worth”: Fogerty reminds us that a life isn’t only made of headlines and hard weather. Sometimes it’s made of these smaller, shining interruptions—moments that don’t solve anything, but somehow make you feel alive enough to face everything again. “Wasn’t That a Woman” is that interruption set to a groove: a flash of wonder, a little foolishness, and the sweet relief of feeling your pulse outrun your plans.