Dumb Blonde

Album: Hello, I'm Dolly (1967)
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Songfacts®:

  • "Dumb Blonde" was written by Nashville songwriter Curly Putman - it was one of Dolly Parton's few early hits that she did not write herself. It was her first chart hit, reaching #24 on the Country singles charts in mid-1967. Ironically, Parton's record label at the time, Monument, was reluctant to let her record country material, instead trying to sell her as a Brenda Lee-style pop artist. Though she had released a number of singles during her prior two years with Monument, they were all aimed at the pop market, and failed to chart. She was known primarily as a songwriter for other artists during this time, not a singer or recording artist.
  • The song's refrain, "Just because I'm blonde, don't think I'm dumb, 'cause this dumb blonde ain't nobody's fool," is a fairly accurate summation of Parton's public persona. >>
    Suggestion credit:
    Mark - Boston, MA, for above 2
  • Dolly Parton recorded a new version of the song with Miranda Lambert for the soundtrack of the 2018 Netflix film Dumplin'.
  • Monument owner Fred Foster also produced the album and selected this tune for Dolly. "Fred thought the song would be good for me because it was uptempo, for one thing, and it didn't really take a lot of singing," she explained in the 2017 book Not Dumb, Not Blonde: Dolly In Conversation. "He figured it would make people forget about whether my voice was any good or not and just listen to the song."
  • Dolly's next single was one she wrote on her own: "Something Fishy."
  • In 1967, the same year she released the album, Dolly replaced the regular singer on The Porter Wagoner Show, which began her long-running musical partnership with the show's host. She also made the switch to Wagoner's label, RCA, for her next solo album, Just Because I'm A Woman.

Comments: 3

  • Grace Puckett from Greenfield Tni love the movie DUMPLIN i love DOLLY
  • Barry from Sauquoit, NyOn April 20th 1959, Louisiana's Goldband Records released "Puppy Love" by Dolly Parton; she was thirteen years old at the time but it was actually recorded two years earlier...
    Eight years later in 1967 she would have her first nationally charted record, "Dumb Blonde", it peaked at #24 on Billboard's Hot Country Singles chart...
    And in 1973 she made Billboard's Hot Top 100 chart for the first time with "Jolene", it reached #60...
    Ms. Parton celebrated her 68th birthday three months ago on January 19th.
  • John from Atlanta, Ga, GaOn NBC's Tonight Show, host Johnny Carson once asked Dolly how she felt when people called her a "dumb blond." She replied "well Johnny, it don't bother me for two reasons. One, I know I'm not dumb. And two, I know I'm not a blond!"
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