Dolly Parton is Dropping a Sequel to One of Her Most Famous Hits 53 Years After Its Original Release

For 53 years, Jolene has been pleaded with, covered, reimagined, and remixed by some of the biggest names in music. Olivia Newton-John made her a hit in 1976. The White Stripes made her raw and electric in the early 2000s. Miley Cyrus made her ache. Beyoncé, on Cowboy Carter, flipped the whole script — turning the narrator's desperate plea into a steely warning. And through all of it, Dolly Parton watched and cheered, always generous with her song and the artists who came to it.

But nobody — in five decades — had ever thought to ask: what about Jolene's son?

Until Belles did.

How the Sequel Came to Life

The story of "Son of Jolene" begins, fittingly, on the road. Belles, a 26-year-old country artist, was on her headlining tour last year when her opening act's mother came to a show. Her name happened to be Jolene. Something clicked.

"I was in the van the next day driving to the next show, and I just turned to him and I was like, 'You should write a song about being the son of Jolene,'" she told PEOPLE. Her opening act passed, but she didn't. By the time the van rolled into the next city, the idea had already taken hold: a young woman falling for a man who is every bit as charming and as much trouble as his mother — the flaming-haired woman who almost took somebody's man half a century ago.

She wrote the song, interpolating the original's iconic chorus, and built a new story around it. Then, carefully, she made sure the right people heard it.

"My No. 1 priority was making sure that it was even okay to do something with this topic," Belles explained. Her publisher got it to Kent Wells, Parton's producer. Wells loved it. He played it for Dolly. And then came the call that changed everything.

"She did in fact love it and she wanted to sing on it, and that was such a surreal moment," Belles said. "I could die happy now."

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do you think @Dolly Parton would approve? #countrymusic #newmusic #jolene #dollyparton #songwriter

♬ original sound - BELLES

The Story Behind the Most Iconic Woman in Country Music History

To understand why Parton said yes so quickly, it helps to understand just how much "Jolene" means and where it came from.

The song was released as a single in October 1973 and reached number one on the country charts in February 1974. It became Parton's second solo number-one single and the first of five consecutive chart-toppers. It was written and recorded at a pivotal moment — Parton was stepping away from her longtime collaborator Porter Wagoner and striking out on her own. "Jolene" was the song that announced she had arrived.

The inspiration, characteristically, came from two very different places at once. The name came from a young fan — a red-headed girl of about eight years old who came up for an autograph. "I said, 'Well, you're the prettiest little thing I ever saw. So what is your name?'" Parton recalled in an NPR interview. "And she said, 'Jolene.' And I said, 'Jolene. Jolene. Jolene. Jolene.' I said, 'That is pretty. That sounds like a song.'"

The story, however, came from somewhere far more personal. A red-headed bank teller had developed a crush on Parton's husband, Carl Dean, who seemed to enjoy the attention considerably more than his wife appreciated. "She had everything I didn't," Parton told NPR. "Like legs — you know, she was about 6 feet tall. And had all that stuff that some little short, sawed-off honky like me don't have."

Parton has said she wrote "Jolene" on the same day she wrote "I Will Always Love You" — two songs that would become part of music history, born within the same stretch of hours.

The song was ranked No. 63 on Rolling Stone's revised list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time in 2021, and has been covered by artists spanning virtually every genre imaginable. It has been reimagined so many times, from so many angles, that it almost seemed like every possible take had already been taken.

What Dolly Thinks of the Sequel

When Parton heard Belles' version for the first time, her reaction was immediate. "When I heard 'Son of Jolene,' I thought it was very clever," she told PEOPLE. "No one had ever thought of it that way."

On the finished recording, the two artists' voices layer over and call back to one another — a musical conversation across generations, between the woman who created one of country music's most enduring characters and the young artist who just gave her a son. "What a twist," Parton said, "and I'm proud to now be a small part of this version."

"Son of Jolene" is available for pre-save on all major streaming services now.