Review – Dolly Parton’s “Jolene” Slowed Down to 33 RPM
“Hey, have you heard that version of Dolly Parton’s “Jolene”?!? You know, the one that’s all slowed down and stuff?!?”
I don’t know if it’s a bigger commentary on the state of social networking, or the serious depravity of truly meaningful modern songs that the most talked-about country music composition in the last week has been a version of Dolly Parton’s legacy recording “Jolene” put on a record player at a slower speed setting than normal, making it sound like it is sung by a man, and striking a deep 70’s era half-time groove.
It’s not that the slowed down song isn’t cool. But hell, I remember at some point when I was a little kid, I figured out how I could make all those boring family Christmas albums sound like they were sung by the bad asses of Christmas music known as The Chipmunks by kicking the speed up to 45 RPM on a 33 platter. It changed the perspective of my entire little music world.
I later graduated to tinkering with Top 40 music, and when I put a 45 of Joan Jett’s “I Love Rock n’ Roll” on the slower speed to sludge it out, I figured myself a damned genius. I was convinced I was the very first human to ever discover this wonderful vinyl speed-switching phenomenon, and since the internet didn’t exist, there was no proof I wasn’t (though later I’d learn on the internet that the The Chipmunks’ perfected their high pitched voices through speeding up the playback of normal-toned vocals).
But there’s something just a little alarming about a slowed-down song that first surfaced on YouTube over a year ago all of a sudden going viral. There’s actually an older version of slowed-down “Jolene” that was uploaded over 2 years ago too. Many songs sung by females and set in a mid-tempo work with this trick. It almost reminds me of the conundrum involving Caitlin Rose’s video for her song “Own Side Now.” Her well-produced, professionally-made video has half as many hits as does a little girl singing the song standing in front of the kitchen table. Why? Has our boredom or busyness and cultural depravity made us more susceptible to bits?
The reason that Dolly Parton’s “Jolene” became a timeless composition is because it told an original story from an original perspective that almost any human could relate to on a personal level. Feelings of vulnerability and fear about who we are and how we stack up when compared with other people is universal, and no other song encapsulates that like “Jolene.” There is nothing really original, or even novel about taking “Jolene” and slowing it down. But that doesn’t mean that just like The Chipmunks, it isn’t bad ass.
1 1/2 of 2 guns up.
August 20, 2013 @ 11:22 am
When I was 19 or so, I bought Jimi Hendrix’s Are You Experienced album. There was some extemely slowed down speech on the beginning of Third Stone From the Sun. I set the speed to 45 rpm and it was still too slow to understand. Then, I set the speed to 78 rpm and could hear regular human voices. All I remember is it sounded like a space fight communication. Wonder of wonders, there’s a 78 rpm version of the song on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THTSer7vsv8
August 20, 2013 @ 11:38 am
Sounds similar to the White Stripes cover of Jolene.
August 20, 2013 @ 11:54 am
If for nothing else, I liked it because it led me back to listen to the original again.
August 20, 2013 @ 2:40 pm
man, that really kinda sounds like Cher…i like it
August 20, 2013 @ 5:00 pm
What will they do next speed up Waylon?
August 20, 2013 @ 7:28 pm
OH my freaking goodness…I love it!!!
August 20, 2013 @ 10:46 pm
It just proves that good music prevails at any speed.
August 21, 2013 @ 5:18 am
Soon to be played at gay clubs world wide. Gender bending the vocals adds a new, wierd angle to the song.
August 21, 2013 @ 8:22 am
Reminds me of Larry Gatlin!
August 21, 2013 @ 3:47 pm
Vocals completely aside, that is a killer groove
August 22, 2013 @ 3:34 pm
Lindi Ortega just put up a pretty kick ass slow version of this song too:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHiNwOb1aSA
August 22, 2013 @ 5:53 pm
Great find!
August 22, 2013 @ 5:40 pm
Very seldom do you find a another singer that dose a better job at singing it, Than they did. Well the same holds true here. Still gotta be Dolly, YOU KEEP TELLIN US LIKE IT IS WOMAN!!!!
August 23, 2013 @ 4:52 am
Was there something wrong with the original version?
August 23, 2013 @ 4:56 am
How about this, if you want something a little slower and funkier, AND, it still has Dolly on it!
http://youtu.be/tcDBgXbGskc
August 28, 2013 @ 1:04 pm
Lindi Orega, my favourite female voice right now.
October 5, 2013 @ 1:49 pm
Who in the world can stack up to Dolly? Not me.
I was jealous of Dolly because of my old boyfriend…. he loved, loved, loved her.
Everyime I went over to his house, we had to play her music. We would sit on the couch and listen to Dolly.
Reliving this song brings back those ‘fold my arms over my chest’ memories. He did find a girl from Tennessee with a beautiful voice like Dolly’s. I went to their wedding.
I was not jealous of her, but I’m still jealous of Dolly.
June 19, 2015 @ 10:41 am
Dolly Parton is an American treasure and Jolene is one of her best songs. The slowed down version was interesting except that you missed Dolly’s lovely voice – someone did a version slowed down but keeping her voice pure – found that and it was great – than one of our favorite “local” bands heard the slowed down version and the singer was inspired – so they now do a slow version of Jolene and I think its Killer – if you want to check it out here it is on You Tube: https://youtu.be/BT1F63__maM