Country music icon Dolly Parton certainly surprised some people when she announced she would be putting out a rock album.
The innovative project, titled Rockstar, has a release date set for November 17th. Just based on the massive list of original songs and classic rock covers that are included, along with the artists Dolly is bringing in to help her out, it could be one of Parton’s most popular projects of her illustrious career.
Though there are plenty of music greats that are featured on the highly anticipated rock n’ roll album, one that Dolly really wanted to call in was Tina Turner, who sadly passed away at the age of 83 earlier this year.
The team up between the “Queen of Rock N’ Roll” and arguably the queen of country music would have been one for the ages, but the timing of the recording unfortunately did not work out.
Dolly sat down with USA Today to speak about her love and appreciation for Turner, and how she so badly wanted her to be a part of her upcoming project:
“I love Tina Turner. In fact, I did not know she was ill, or as ill as she was, and I wanted her to sing on my rock ‘n’ roll album.
Chris Lord-Alge, who mixed the album, knew her. He was going over there to do some business anyway where she lives, so he was going to take that to her.”
Chris Lord-Alge checked in on the possibility of having Turner join Parton for a recording, but the illness that she battled for so long had progressed to the point where she was unable to.
Dolly continued:
“He told me, ‘You know, she’s not in good health. I don’t think this is going to happen.’
I was really sad about that, because I had the perfect song that we were going to do. I didn’t even put it on the album.”
And if you are wondering what that perfect song would have been, Parton actually revealed that it was actually set to be a deep cut from a song that she wrote during her acting career that was originally a duet with Sylvester Stallone:
“It was a song I wrote called ‘Stay Out Of My Bedroom’ (from the 1984 movie Rhinestone with Sylvester Stallone).
Maybe I’ll do it some other time with somebody else.”
Man, would I have loved to see that…
If you happened to miss the 1984 movie Rhinestone, where Dolly trained Sylvester Stallone to be a country star, you’ll want to check in on the song that she had in mind below:
No offense to Stallone, but I’d venture to say that Parton and Turner could have performed that song better than he did.
However, if the idea of Dolly rocking out on stage gets you excited for her new album, you can fortunately listen to a couple of the songs that she’s already released ahead of it:
“World On Fire”
“We Are The Champions/We Will Rock You”
“What’s Up?”
Dolly’s still got it…
If you wanted to take a look at the rest of the sprawling 30-song track list (and all of the featured artists included), you can take a look at the full list below:
Rockstar Track List
- “Rockstar” (special guest Richie Sambora)
- “World on Fire”
- “Every Breath You Take” (feat. Sting)
- “Open Arms” (feat. Steve Perry)
- “Magic Man” (feat. Ann Wilson with special guest Howard Leese)
- “Long As I Can See the Light’ (feat. John Fogerty)
- “Either Or” (feat. Kid Rock)
- “I Want You Back” (feat. Steven Tyler with special guest Warren Haynes)
- “What Has Rock and Roll Ever Done for You” (feat. Stevie Nicks with special guest Waddy Wachtel)
- “Purple Rain”
- “Baby, I Love Your Way” (feat. Peter Frampton)
- “I Hate Myself for Loving You” (feat. Joan Jett & The Blackhearts)
- “Night Moves” (feat. Chris Stapleton)
- “Wrecking Ball” (feat. Miley Cyrus)
- “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” (feat. P!nk & Brandi Carlile)
- “Keep on Loving You” (feat. Kevin Cronin)
- “Heart of Glass” (feat. Debbie Harry)
- “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me” (feat. Elton John)
- “Tried to Rock and Roll Me” (feat. Melissa Etheridge)
- “Stairway to Heaven” (feat. Lizzo & Sasha Flute)
- “We Are the Champions”
- “Bygones” (feat. Rob Halford with special guests Nikki Sixx & John 5)
- My Blue Tears (feat. Simon Le Bon)
- “What’s Up?” (feat. Linda Perry)
- “You’re No Good” (feat. Emmylou Harris & Sheryl Crow)
- “Heartbreaker” (feat. Pat Benatar & Neil Giraldo)
- “Bittersweet” (feat. Michael McDonald)
- “I Dreamed About Elvis” (feat. Ronnie McDowell with special guest The Jordanaires)
- “Let It Be” (feat. Paul McCartney & Ringo Starr with special guests Peter Frampton & Mick Fleetwood)
- “Free Bird” (feat. Ronnie Van Zant with special guests Gary Rossington, Artimus Pyle and The Artimus Pyle Band)
