My Friend Jason was in town a few weeks ago and i took him to my favorite record store, Bop Street Records. He ended up dropping about $500. Ike and Tina Turner made up a big chunk of his purchases, as did vintage Elton John, but by far the largest chunk of vinyl was a huge stack of Dolly Parton records from her years at RCA in the 70’s and 80’s.

I promised him I’d ship everything to him in NYC, except for the Dolly records, which I wanted to upload to my computer first, and burn onto cds. Why? ‘Cause much of Dolly’s RCA output is completely out of print!

I’ve deccided to start in the 80’s with her first album of that decade, Dolly Dolly Dolly.

If you asked me, Tripl D, as I call it, is a lackluster effort. Without a single self-penned song on the album, it just isn’t Dolly-ish enough. It’s full of famous pop sessions players, most notably Jeff Porcaro of ToTo and producer/arranger Nick Decaro who was made famous by his A&M work with the likes of CLaudine Longet.

The two song where Dolly seems to come to life are the slightly caribbean flavored Sweet Agony, and the country rocker Packin’ It Up. But with too many soulless slow jams, I’d definately give this one a 4 out of 10. However, this album did reach #7 on the country charts and #71 on the pop charts. Crazy.

Next up is Heartbreak Express.

I couldn’t find much charting info on this one, but it does appear to have reached #106 on the Pop charts. I can’t believe that. ‘Cause this album is so much better! Most of the album, with the exception of 2 songs, Single Women and a texas two step cover of Eddy Arnold’s hit Release Me.

Single Women her poem to the Mr. Goodbar era this album came out in has some classic lines in it, like:

And it’s gettin’ near to closin’/ And the seconds pass like years/ Lots of friends to share the laughter/ Not a one to share the tears/ And you wish they’d change the jukebox/ ‘Cause you know every song it plays/ Can I drop you off at my place? What’s the matter, are you gay?

My favorite is the weeper, Hollywood Potters, that closes the album.

I’m not sure why this album didn’t do better, Heartbreak Express is more “Dolly” at it’s core than Triple D. I’d give it a 7 out of 10.

Of note: In 1980 Dolly actually released 3 seperate albums. Along with Triple D she also released a reunion album with Porter Wagoner called Porter and Dolly and the MUCH more popular, Grammy winning and Oscar nominated, 9 To 5 And Other Odd Jobs.