Elle King Is the ‘Best Version’ Herself After Viral Drunk Concert

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Elle King focused on self-improvement after she made headlines for her drunken tribute to Dolly Parton earlier this year.

“I’m doing things that make me proud of myself,” the singer, 35, said in an interview with People published on Friday, September 20. “I’ve got a small son. He’s going to find out about all this one day, and he’s going to see that I tried to be just the best version of myself, and I used it to make myself better, and I did. It’s more of a love story of self than anything.”

King, who shares 3-year-old son Lucky with Dan Tooker (whom she recently reconciled with), added that it feels like a “blessing” to feel “very happy” and “very content,” especially after beginning the year with a tumultuous start. In January, King made headlines after performing drunk and shouting profanities at the crowd during a family-friendly Dolly Parton birthday tribute concert at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. The Opry issued an apology on her behalf at the time.

“Try having something bad you did go f—ing viral — that was pretty hard,” she reflected while noting that she was experiencing a “high level of pain” at the time. “I never thought that a single human being would ever buy a ticket to my show again. But they do.”

After the incident, King postponed several of her concerts. King confessed on Friday that she “felt so afraid” to have a drink before going on stage because she didn’t want to let down her fans again.

“I appreciated someone buying tickets to my concert. I wasn’t going to let them down,” she explained. “I did let people down. And ultimately, I let myself down that day, and I never wanted to feel that ever again … I’m definitely able to put on a better show because of some changes that I’ve made in my life, and it gets me more excited.”

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While King was worried about what her fans thought of her for her mistake, Parton came to her defense and gave her grace.

“Elle King is a doll,” Parton, 78, told E! News in a February interview. “I called her and I said, ‘You know, there are many F-words. Why don’t we use the right one? Forgiveness, friends, forget it.’”

Months after the scandal occurred, King revealed that she sought out help during her struggles.

“After everything that happened in January, I went to a different type of therapeutic program because I was very sad, and nobody really [knew] what I was going through behind closed doors,” King said on an August episode of Kaitlyn Bristowe’s “Off the Vine” podcast. “I just took that as, A, if it wasn’t this, it was gonna be something else. And B, I had to heal and deal and go through things.”