How do we count the ways in which we will always love her — do we go from 9 to 5,000? Here’s a compromise: We’ve selected 30 of Dolly Parton’s greatest songs, from among hundreds. This task is taken on knowing that among the omissions will be cuts that are most meaningful to different fans because they were sung at a wedding, a funeral or sobbing in the car after signing divorce papers.
Parton was among the very best of American singer-songwriters, but know that we’re fully aware here that we’re including a handful of tracks she didn’t write (who’s going to leave out the Mann/Weil composition “Here You Come Again”?), and one she gave to someone else and never did a proper studio recording of herself (“To Daddy,” a big hit in the hands of Emmylou Harris). We also had to go one over 30 just to offer a goofy bonus track: “I’ll Oilwells Love You” — which, by the way, preceded “I Will Always Love You,” so yes, we like to think of the blockbuster ballad as a somber spinoff from her early novelty song. We’ve got ’em, and do go investigate the catalog yourself — there are so many more diamonds where these came from.
Imagine the most popular song of the ’90s as it was first conceived and released in the ’70s, without an octave change or any due or undue drama. It’s easy when you try, and easier when you actually listen to Dolly’s seminal take on the song, before it was turned into something very different — valid, but different — for a movie kicker. As most people know by now, Parton wrote it as a platonic farewell, not the romantic one it is nearly always taken as, when it was time to spread her wings and fly away from professional partner Porter Wagoner.
It’s the goodbye that any of us who’ve been left behind by a lover, comrade or the dearly departed wish we could get from them, or the one we’ve been too ungracious to give when it was us heading for the exit. It’s one of the most beautiful folk songs ever and the breakup song we’ll never be able to quit. Just the insinuating opening riff is as good as a couple cups of coffee to get your day started.
By the time Parton sings the proletariat-poetry line “Pour another cup of ambition,” we are well into the realm of another great American folk song, except of course that this is as pop as Parton ever got, and the world was all the better for her having brought country to town. One of Parton’s earliest singles, “Just Because I’m a Woman” was also one of her boldest. It’s sung from the perspective of a woman who has let down her boyfriend or prospective husband by letting him know that she is not a virgin, either.
Implicit in the understanding of the song is that neither he nor society see any problem with him being likewise tarnished by the stain of having a previous lover or lovers, but for a young woman in the 1960s, that could still mark a deep strain of scarlet. She acknowledged that it was inspired by just such a discussion with her husband, Carl Dean. This would hardly be the last time Parton would write about male chauvinism or hypocrisy, but it may have been the most personal.
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