Jolene is one of Dolly Parton’s best known and most popular songs. It was released on 15 October 1973 as the first single and title track from her thirteenth album, which appeared on 4 February 1974.
The track is an iconic country lament about ‘the other woman’. It tells the tale of a housewife confronting a beautiful seductress who she believes is having an affair with her husband. Throughout the song, Parton implores Jolene “please don’t take him just because you can.”
Two things inspired the song: a young fan, and a lady who worked at her local bank.
The name came from an encounter with a 10-year-old fan who came on stage for her autograph. “She had this beautiful red hair, this beautiful skin, these beautiful green eyes, and she was looking up at me, holding out for an autograph,” Parton recalled to NPR in 2008. “I said, ‘Well, you’re the prettiest little thing I ever saw. So what is your name?’ And she said, ‘Jolene.’ And I said, ‘Jolene. Jolene. Jolene. Jolene. That is pretty. That sounds like a song. I’m going to write a song about that.'”
Dolly Parton has also disclosed in several interviews that the intrigue that is playing out in the song was inspired by a red-headed bank clerk at their local bank branch. Apparently, she flirted a bit too much with her husband Carl Dean around the time they were newly married. Speaking with Ray Martin of 60 Minutes Australia, she said: “There was a girl who worked at the bank when my husband and I first got married. She had a big crush on him, and I think he kind of had a crush on her. I know he spent more time at the band than we had money. So I called him on it. And so I just kind of took that bit of, you know, ‘the other woman’ kind of thing.”
Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, Jolene
I’m begging of you please don’t take my man
Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, Jolene
Please don’t take him just because you can
Your beauty is beyond compare with flaming locks of auburn hair
With ivory skin and eyes of emerald green
Your smile is like a breath of spring, your voice is soft like summer rain
And I cannot compete with you, Jolene
He talks about you in his sleep, there’s nothing I can do to keep
From crying when he calls your name, Jolene
And I can easily understand how you could easily take my man
But you don’t know what he means to me, Jolene
Parton has also often told more or less the whole story as part of her introduction of the song when playing it live. The full introduction of the song at the Glastonbury festival in 2014 was: “Now, some of you may or may not know that that song was loosely based on a little bit of truth. I wrote that years ago when my husband was spending a little more time with Jolene than I thought he should be. I put a stop to that. I got rid of that redhead woman in a hurry. I want you folks to know, though, that something good can come from anything. Had it not been for that woman I would never have written ‘Jolene’ and I wouldn’t have made all that money, so thank you, Jolene.”
Parton was on a roll when she wrote Jolene, revealing during an interview on The Bobby Bones Show in 2018 that she wrote I Will Always Love You on the same day. That song was written as a farewell to her former manager, business partner and mentor of seven years, Porter Wagoner, as Parton had decided to leave his organization and The Porter Wagoner Show (which had been her safe haven since 1967) to pursue a future on her own terms. Writing from the heart usually works, and both of those songs became megahits. Most importantly, Wagoner and Parton would remain on good terms.
Jolene features an amazing thumb-picked guitar line, heard right at the opening of the song and running throughout. This is played by legendary country session guitarist Chip Young. Trying to imagine the song without that guitar hook is impossible, and it adds a lot to it, making the song all that more special. When he passed in 2014, his work on Jolene was the most highlighted example of his work in all the tributes, along with his thumb-picking chops on Elvis Presley’s Guitar Man.
Jolene was produced by Bob Ferguson and recorded at RCA Studio B in Nashville, Tennessee on 22 May 1973.
The song struck a nerve amongst listeners of every gender, giving Parton her second #1 country single to date. It was also the start of a very successful period, as it was the first of five consecutive #1 Country hits. It created some serious momentum as Parton, although it was the only song out of the five to cross over to become a moderate pop hit in America as well as charting well worldwide, giving her a Top 10 hit in both UK and Ireland.
The song itself is unclear about whether or not Jolene actually intends to steal Parton’s lover or whether this is an unfounded fear. Parton has however on several occasions, such as onstage in 1988, told the audience that Jolene was a real situation and the reason she did not like to sing it too often.
The years seem to have left her feeling better about it. In an interview on Norwegian TV in 2008, she revealed “I love to sing it! It’s one of my favourite ones. And what I love about it now is that everybody responds so positively to the song. I always say, my songs are my children and I expect them to support me when I’m old. Haha!”
The song was added to the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2014. It was Parton’s second tune to receive the prestigious honour, as I Will Always Love You had been included in 2007.
Jolene has gone on to become one of Parton’s most loved songs, if not the most loved song. She thinks the explanation is simple: “Every woman can relate to it, and every man, really,” she said on 60 Minutes Australia. “I’d think women love it, because I think we all know that there’s somebody out there that could turn the head of the person that you love. I think everybody has that fear, and it happens all the time. But every now and then, I look at him sleeping in that lazy board chair, and I think ‘Where’s Jolene when I need her?’ You can have him now, come get him! Haha!”
Facebook Comments