Dolly Parton’s last song, “Torn,” was released yesterday, Friday, November 13, as the closing track on U2’s Carnaval De Luz. iimiTV’s full story on the release covers how the song began as Parton’s own idea, how Bono and Johnny McDaid reshaped it, and the June session in Nashville where she recorded her vocal.
Parton died on August 25 at 80, two months after that session, having heard and approved the final mix. Yesterday the record arrived. Overnight, the story around it moved: Bono gave the song a new name for what it is, U2 opened its video to the fans, and a third version of the track surfaced.
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Dolly Parton Last Song Becomes A Last Prayer On Kimmel
All four members of U2 sat on the Jimmy Kimmel Live! couch on Thursday night, November 12, the eve of the release. Parade, reporting the appearance, recorded the detail that recasts the June session: “We are told that she did not know that she was that ill.” Bono told Zane Lowe the same thing in the band’s Apple Music interview, as Country Rebel reported: “She was ill at the time, we didn’t know how ill, of course, and she got out of bed to sing this song. It meant a lot to us.”
On Kimmel, Bono called the session a master class and said Parton “sang herself to some other place” on the song. “Dolly Parton is a mythical figure who actually existed recently,” he said. “And our hearts are broken by this, but we are also blessed to be given her last vocal.” The Edge added that it was a “real shock” Parton trusted the band with her song, aiming as they were for something he called “sci-fi country.” Billboard’s account of the appearance carried each of those lines.
Then Bono said what the song has become. “It’s her last prayer in a way, was this song,” he said. “It feels like a prayer, and I think it’s for America, but I think it’s for anywhere where there’s a divided politics.” He pointed at the Thanksgiving table after a bitter midterm season, and at Parton’s own line in the song, “Nothing hurts a mother more than a family at war.” Country Rebel carried the close of that thought in full: “She never had kids. We are all, especially ‘Mericans, you are the children of Dolly Parton, and it is her prayer that you reach across the table and find common purpose.”
Fans Now Help Build The Torn Video
The band released a lyric video for “Torn” on Friday, built from still images of Parton mixed with footage of Nashville and the countryside. A second, open-ended video is now under way. Because U2 could not film with the ailing Parton, Bono explained on Kimmel, they borrowed the model of the Johnny Cash Project: the crowdsourced posthumous video for Cash’s “Ain’t No Grave” in 2010 drew contributions from more than 250,000 fans in 172 countries, figures Billboard reported in its Kimmel account.
Parton’s estate has given U2 the same permission the Cash estate gave then. At the Torn Project at dolly.u2.com, fans can draw, decorate or graffiti over the baseline video and attach messages of love or memories of Parton. Parade reported that contributors will also receive footage that has not been seen before, and that Google, which worked on the Cash project, has agreed to help. The first version is expected within a week or two. “This will keep going,” Bono said, “so we could be here in a year and the video that’s out in a week or two will just be the start of it. It will be an infinite testament to her.” A report published today, November 14, recaps the project the same way: an evolving visual work, not a single finished video.
Torn Now Exists In Three Versions
Yesterday also settled how many ways there are to hear the last session. The album version closes Carnaval De Luz. The country arrangement, “Torn” (Kent Wells Version), had its country radio premiere on Thursday, November 12; Country Rebel notes it was recorded at Blackbird Studios in Nashville, with Wells, Parton’s longtime producer, playing acoustic guitar as well as producing. Hear it here:
A third version arrived with the album on Friday: the “T Bone Burnett Take,” reworked by the guitarist and producer T Bone Burnett. Country Rebel’s release report and Dork’s release report both list all three versions, each carrying the same June vocal. Hear the Burnett take here:
Critics Split On The Album, And What Comes Next
The first reviews agree on the closing track’s weight and split on the record around it. Early review coverage records The Guardian praising the album’s uplifting character and describing “Torn” as a moving closing duet, while NME heard a brighter, more playful U2 but argued that some tracks lean on familiar stadium-rock formulas and that the final song changes the album’s mood sharply.
What is already scheduled gives the song a longer road. Dork reports that U2 are working on plans to take the album on the road in 2027 under the name “Carnaval De Luz presents: The Greatest Show On Earth World Tour,” and that Parton will be remembered at this year’s CMA Awards, which will include a tribute to her. Between the tribute, the tour plans and a fan video designed to keep growing, Parton’s final session is not closing with release week. It is the rare last recording that arrives with its afterlife already built: three versions to hear, a video her listeners get to keep making, and a prayer, as Bono now hears it, aimed at every divided table it reaches.
References
Billboard via RapHooks, Bono Says Dolly Parton Sang Herself to Some Other Place on Torn
Parade, Bono Says Dolly Parton’s Final Song with U2 Was Her Last Prayer
Country Rebel, Final Vocal Recording By Dolly Parton, A Duet With U2, Is Out Now
Dork, Dolly Parton’s Last Recorded Vocal Is Out Now, On U2’s Torn
Playback, Bono Reveals the Story Behind U2’s Torn With Dolly Parton (November 14)
