Jonathan Currinn
Released last month, Angel X Star has totally transformed Dolly Parton’s iconic single, “Jolene”, by adding afro beats and an R&B melody with a different lyrical narrative. This fun version has quickly risen in Spotify streams for this incredible duo, managing to start to close the gap with their 2021 single, “No Answer”, to become their most-streamed track. The release of “Jolene” follows their previous single, “Sei”, which was dropped in July 2022.
Angel X Star are a British brother-sister duo from Hertfordshire who are making huge waves in the indie afrobeat and R&B music industry. They are self-taught musicians, creating infectious Afrobeat tracks centred around the genres of pop and R&B. They first started singing together in church and other local events, originally as a trio with their younger sister – unfortunately, she passed away, and Angel X Star decided to honour her by continuing to make music and to gift the world with their incredible voices. They should feel a huge amount of pride for what they’ve already achieved especially with the heartbreak they’ve had to endure to get to this point – a lot of people would’ve found it too much. If anything, this just shows how strong they are, and in doing so, fans around the world get to witness Angel X Star grow into phenomenal artists. Using the pain and grief, this duo pour all of it into their music and it fully shows in every song and it’s this special quality that is going to make them into global stars.
The original Dolly Parton track was released in 1974, and Angel X Star uses the hurt that is found in “Jolene” and transformed it and related it to their own experiences, recreating the lyrics around the iconic chorus line, throwing in afro beats, a soulful tempo, and R&B melodies, determined to make their “Jolene” become a fan-favourite. They cross their own individual pain rooting it in love, as they harmonise effortlessly with layered bouncy beats and playful synths. There’s no doubt that this awesome duo have not only put their own stamp on this ’70s classic but they’ve also made it uniquely their own. Considering that this version from Angel X Star was purely originally an experiment, and is now set to become their most-streamed track, “Jolene” just continually shows how iconic it is, regardless of how much you transform and reinvent it.
Talking about the track, Angel X Star said: “This is a heartbreak song inspired by Dolly Parton. We took the vision and the hurt from that song and related it to our own heartbreak. Angel is singing about a girl he ‘fumbled’ yet to find out that that was his love, his first love and Star comes from a different perspective asking questions like, ‘you could have told me that love will hurt like this’.”
Stream “Jolene” by Angel X Star on Spotify here:
Check out Dolly Parton’s original version on Spotify too:
“Jolene”, by Angel X Star, is available to download and stream, right now, across all platforms.
