Bad Wolves will newly issue their take on Dolly Parton‘s 1974 hit “Jolene” on August 31st. That news comes as the aforementioned country icon passed away earlier this week at the age of 80 following a brief battle with cancer. In light of her passing, the alternative metal band’s rendition of this track will now benefit Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library book gifting program in her honor.
According to the band, Parton herself had been planning to record vocals for this cover several weeks ago. Bad Wolves founder/drummer John Boecklin stated of the matter:
“Our new singer is a big fan of Dolly and had posted a bunch of videos of her covering ‘Jolene.’ So, we decided to make a heavy metal cover version for our next album. On hearing our version, our label CEO Dan Waite sent the finished demo to Dolly‘s manager Danny Nozell with a request for Dolly to guest feature on our version.
We heard back that Danny had played the track to Dolly, and that Dolly loved our version, and that Dolly was going to go into the studio and add her vocals very soon. We then sent over the stems for Dolly’s studio engineers to work with. Like everyone, we were devastated of this week’s news of Dolly’s passing.We will honor Dolly’s incredible legacy by donating proceeds from ‘Jolene’ to the Dolly Parton Imagination Library.”
Boecklin added:
“With ‘Jolene,’ being able to use our platform to help deliver critical funding to the Dolly Parton Imagination Library, we know that we can contribute to Dolly‘s vision of giving access to books and improving literacy.
Our thoughts are with Dolly‘s extended family, manager Danny Nozell, and all of the many thousands of people she touched in her extraordinary life who are grieving her passing.”
Eerily, this situation mirrors the circumstances behind Bad Wolves hit cover of The Cranberries‘ “Zombie“. The band had been in talks with the latter’s frontwoman Dolores O’Riordan to lay down vocals on their cover, though she ultimtely passed away just before she was scheduled to record her parts for it.
That rendition would go on to attain 3x platinum status in the United States, with Bad Wolves donating some $250,000 in profits to her family.
