Dolly Parton might be the world’s most reluctant rock star.
After Parton told the world she wanted to bow out of her nomination for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, she learned yesterday that she was voted in alongside Lionel Richie, Eminem, Duran Duran, Pat Benatar, Carly Simon and more.
Now, she tells Billboard, she’s ready to embrace the acknowledgment.
“I feel great,” Parton said. “I feel honored that all the people that voted for me did. And I appreciate the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame people for staying there with me. I never meant to cause trouble or stir up any controversy. It was just always my belief — and I think millions of other people out there too — always thought the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame was just set up for the greatest people in the rock ‘n’ roll business. I just didn’t feel like I really measured up to that, and I don’t want to take anything away from the people that have worked so hard. So I just wanted to go pull out before it got started good. I found out later that it’s far more than that, obviously. I’m very honored and humbled by [the induction], and so I’ll try to live up to it.”
That said, Parton tells the magazine that she isn’t sure if she’ll attend the induction ceremony but says if she does, she plans to sing the hardest rock song that she can muster just to show that she can do it.
“I’ll do something to make it fun and to be forgiven for my mistake, to earn my title,” she said.
Parton told Billboard that she’s still considering releasing a rock album, which she alluded to when she found out that she was being considered for entry.
“I had actually thought about that before I even got nominated for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame,” she said. “I’ve always wanted to do a great rock album, and I’m going to do that. I don’t know when, but I will do one.”
If she does make the rock album, she has an a-list rocker at the top of her list for collaborators – Mick Jagger.
“I loved him, and I love ‘Satisfaction,’” Parton said. “I’m hoping we’re both around long enough when I get to doing this record that he’ll come sing with me, and I may have to use The Rolling Stones to play behind me. I might do something like that — try to get some different rock bands, some of the classic bands, to back me on some of the songs I do and then do two or three or four originals. I’d like to get in with some of the great rock groups and do some things, [but] I’ve been working so hard on so many things, and I’ve got to overcome this so-called controversy, which I never meant it to be that. So now I’m in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. So I’m going to have to do a rock album at some point. … Now I may have to call my album ’Rock Star!’”