Beyoncé sets tone with ‘Jolene’ cover
Women today, living in a newly fierce misogynist era, need to toughen up. Conservative men are ganging up on us, controlling our bodies, policing our language and erasing our presence. Let popular music be our teacher. Learn from Beyoncé.
Dolly Parton’s famously heartripping ballad, “Jolene,” is very different from Beyoncé’s version in her newly released country album “Cowboy Carter.” In 1973, the song was a solid quiver of grief. Parton sang, “I’m beggin’ of you, please don’t take my man.”
In 2024 Beyoncé has changed the lyrics, threat-singing, “I’m warnin’ you, don’t come for my man.”
The song is transformed. Parton was purely solo, singing Jolene’s praises: “Your smile is like a breath of spring, your voice is soft like summer rain, and I cannot compete with you, Jolene.” (Why not, you’re Dolly Parton. You’re a knockout.)
Standard love ballads in that era were all about weather and blossoms, i.e. “Summer breeze makes me feel fine, blowing with the jasmine in my mind.” Women wore country florals and shoved flowers in their hair willy-nilly. How irritating. Clearly, it was allergenic idiocy but perhaps made sense when you were high, which you were then.
In current times, Beyoncé has a battalion behind her. You can hear her words echo, a menacing male chorus firmly agreeing with her. You hear howls, chants, “you heard me,” twangs, claps and a scary knocking noise. Is Jolene’s head being nutted hard against a wall or hit with a plank? Or is it cowboy boots walking away on an oak floor, the hallmark of American country songs about love gone bad.
“You don’t want no heat with me, Jolene,” Beyoncé declares, by no means in the curling songstress voice that white Nashville prefers. “You don’t want this smoke, so shoot your shot with someone else (you heard me).”
Now I’m scared. Parton, who always hoped Beyoncé would cover her song, is grovelling before her dumb, good ol’ boy. Beyoncé sounds like she’s going to shoot him.
Women still have some choices. As much as I want Beyoncé’s 20year marriage to a useless man — we’ll call him Buster-Z — to stay solid, if only because kids need a firm base, why isn’t she threatening Buster-Z instead of Jolene?
Sure, she had to stay true to Parton’s lyrics, but it puzzles me. Women have become so timid in their own diminishment. Admit it, Buster-Z is a hollow man. Maybe both Dolly and Beyoncé should take up with Jolene instead. She sounds hot.
Here’s the backdrop: the world does not like women. Since the backlash against women’s rights worldwide, there are now whole countries and American states that a smart woman won’t enter for fear of her life.
Many politicians, doctors, cops and judges in most countries are gunning for women. We have no pregnancy rights or safe spaces. We daily fear physical assault on the subway. How did this happen?
Well, women are just too nice. Let’s be practical instead. What should two women do when a Jolene appears on the scene? Cheer? Consult the kids? An accountant?
I do accept that Jolene is endangering a westernized two-parent, two-career family structure that generally works for women and children until it absolutely doesn’t. Will Buster-Z pay child support? Does Jolene have her own kids via a rodeo rider named Scrub Dent? Will these families blend?
I bet Dolly didn’t have a pension plan. I bet Jolene’s life plan involves selling Ruggables on Instagram. No wonder they need a second income.
But nobody wants a man who could be lured away by a Jolene. That’s a hard fact. We want good men whose love is strong, whose word is true, whose lips are as soft as the morning dew, oh wait, I’m writing a country song.
I’ll call it “Lauren.” “Lauren, Lauren, Lauren, Lauren, won’t you take my man away if I say please.” As you suggest, I’ll keep working on it.