Bono: Dolly Parton Left Bed Rest to Record Final Song

Bono tells Rolling Stone that an ailing Dolly Parton got out of bed in June to record "Torn," her final vocal, which she approved before her death in August.

In a Rolling Stone interview published Thursday, Bono revealed that Dolly Parton recorded the closing duet "Torn" on U2's upcoming album "Carnaval de Luz" in June, just two months before her death at age 80 on August 25. According to WWAY, which carried the ABC report, the song was recorded after Parton had fallen ill — and Bono says she "got out of her bed to sing this song." The track, co-written by Parton with U2 and Snow Patrol's Johnny McDaid, closes the 12-track album that arrives November 13 via Island Records.

The surprising twist is how the collaboration came about at all. Bono had first approached Parton to contribute to a separate, unreleased side project inspired by Irish folk music — and she turned it down. Ultimate Classic Rock quotes Bono recalling her reaction: "That's a little too Irish for me." Instead, Parton pitched him her own song, "Torn," suggesting the band "take it somewhere else." Bono and McDaid reworked the lyrics around a mother watching her family fracture, and Parton agreed to sing it. A planned folk collaboration became, by her own redirection, her final recorded vocal performance.

The emotional weight comes through in the quotes multiple outlets are carrying from the Rolling Stone conversation. "She sang her heart out," Bono said, "and I cannot believe that's an 80-year-old woman." He added, "And you can hear that. And I can't even listen to it now." Page Six reports that Bono, 66, described working with Parton in her final months as deeply moving: "It's very moving to have had these intimacies with such a figure. The fact that they're not there now, in any way you can call back, other than through her songs, is very sobering."

A detail singers and producers will note: Parton approved the finished mix before she died. Producer Garret "Jacknife" Lee told Rolling Stone that the team was nervous she might not approve or might feel uncomfortable with the recording, but the opposite happened. According to In Touch Weekly, Lee said she was "so proud of her vocal and the recording" and "thrilled with it." That means her last vocal was released exactly as she wanted it heard — a rare outcome for any posthumous performance, and one Lee described as proof she loved the finished track.

"Carnaval de Luz" is U2's 16th studio album and its first album of entirely new material in nine years, arriving in the band's 50th-anniversary year. u2.com's announcement describes the record as 12 songs exploring spirituality, friendship, freedom and endurance, and confirms "Torn (Feat. Dolly Parton)" as the closing track, calling it "a tender country song detailing broken family ties that holds wider resonances." Daniel Lanois adds pedal steel on the song, and u2.com notes "Torn" is the connective track between the album and the band's two 2026 EPs, "Days of Ash" and "Easter Lily."

Fans will hear "Torn" when "Carnaval de Luz" drops November 13, and pre-orders are already open per u2.com. 96.3 KKLZ frames the duet as a meeting of two great collaborative traditions — Parton, who recorded with everyone from Kenny Rogers to the rock stars of her 2023 "Rockstar" album, and U2, who have partnered with B.B. King, Johnny Cash and Luciano Pavarotti. Page Six adds that "Torn" follows an earlier posthumous Parton release, her "Bound to Ride" cover from a Stanley Brothers tribute album, and that she also left an unreleased song in a Dollywood vault slated for 2045.