In January 1971, RCA records slipped its latest Elvis Presley LP on the market, not two months after the previous one. That record, “I’m 10,000 Years Old: Elvis Country,” the singer’s 30th of original material (excluding live collections, compilations and greatest hits sets), wasn’t just another Elvis LP. It was an honest to gosh concept LP. The songs were not only linked stylistically and thematically, but all the performances were linked by splices of a song interspersed between each number.

Even the cover wasn’t the usual head shot of a smiling Elvis, concert pose, or movie still. In their place was a sepia toned photo of a very familiar looking young boy. A smaller black and white photo, which included the parents, revealed that the unsmiling child was Elvis Presley aged two. Clearly, Elvis was trying to do something that he had never done before, revealing something about himself in the process.

Prior to this moment, concept albums had been as far away from the image of Elvis Presley as bowling alleys were from Zsa Zsa Gabor. In the bloom of the goodwill created by his comeback, the music press of the era, with a few exceptions, was generous to this new stance, with an especially enthusiastic write up appearing in Rolling Stone.

Despite its ambition and the good press, the album came and went commercially. While it was far from a flop, peaking at #12 and selling half a million units, the numbers it moved were not any better than any of the LPs Presley had released during the past two years, and certainly came nowhere near the barnstorming numbers of Presley’s early ’60s hit soundtracks like “GI Blues” and “Blue Hawaii”. Nor did they match the success of the live albums that would dominate Presley’s public profile in the upcoming decade. They were also short of the numbers put up by acts like Creedence Clearwater Revival, the Rolling Stones, Rod Stewart and Led Zeppelin; other artists who assailed the top of the charts in the early 1970s. In the end, it became just another Elvis album instead of a defining artistic moment. A slew of subsequent country releases by RCA then BMG using the Elvis Country title made it something even less. Somehow this most personal and purposeful release became indistinguishable in the public mind from the hordes of slapped together compilations that have so defined Elvis’ output for the past five decades. “But I thought THIS was ‘Elvis Country.’” This month, the Sony Legacy label has taken a step, albeit a tentative one, to reverse that perception with their new re-release of the LP. This makes it a good time to draw attention to this remarkable document from the last time in Elvis Presley’s career when his ambition matched his talent.

When 1970 began, Elvis was scalding hot, both artistically and commercially, after being out in the cold for a long time. After seeing his recording and movie career bottom out in mid-1968, Elvis stormed back at the end of that year with the highest rated television special of the year, a show that reminded fans of what Elvis had once been and what he still could be. A single from that show “If I Can Dream” sold about 800,000 copies domestically, made the Top Ten in Cashbox and just missed it in Billboard, the best numbers for any Elvis release since 1965.

From there he moved from strength to strength for most of the next year. In January and February 1969, he recorded a series of songs in Memphis, Tennessee under the supervision of Chips Moman and with the American Studios’ house band. The initial series of singles released from those sessions- “In the Ghetto,” “Suspicious Minds” and “Don’t Cry Daddy,” in combination with “If I Can Dream” and “Clean Up Your Own Backyard,” a smaller hit from one of Elvis’ final and more interesting movies, made Elvis Cashbox’s singles artists of the year. The initial LP from those sessions, “From Elvis in Memphis,” wasn’t as successful commercially although it went Gold and made the Top 15, success mostly out of Elvis’ reach since 1966. More importantly, it received a rave lead review from future Elvis biographer Peter Guralnick in Rolling Stone, the first LP accorded such respect in the magazine’s then short history. It has since been almost universally recognized as one of Presley’s most enduring achievements.

In the summer of 1969, Presley returned to live performance in Las Vegas with similar success. Creating one of the most ambitious live shows of its era, Presley floored audiences and critics in both the establishment and underground press with a show that combined nearly all the streams of the mainstream American pop tradition save jazz. The show was so popular that it became the first show in Las Vegas history to make a profit. (Normally shows in Vegas are loss leaders designed to pull people into the casino.)

Elvis on stage at the International, Las Vegas in August 1969

Bizarrely, Presley’s manager “Colonel” Tom Parker elected not to send Elvis out on the road in the wake of that triumph, but to rebook him in Vegas only four months later. Presley, though, was so hot that he effortlessly turned that lemon into lemonade. In late January through mid-February 1970 with “Don’t Cry Daddy” peaking in the Top Ten, Elvis remade his live show. Rather than playing the returning hero, he became Vegas’ King of the Top 40. Scratching many of the oldies from his act, Elvis played his current string of hits and included a slew of songs into the act- “Proud Mary,” “Sweet Caroline,” “Polk Salad Annie,” “Walk a Mile in My Shoes”- that had just recently been in the Top 40. He also threw in a sprinkling of revamped older songs- “See See Rider,” “Release Me,” “Let it Be Me,” “The Wonder of You”- that had not previously been recorded by/or associated with him. All the newly added material continued to reflect Presley’s democratic musical vision, incorporating everything from traditional blues to adult contemporary.

Despite taking place in the dead season for tourism, again the show drew record crowds. Again, the reviews were largely ecstatic. RCA took eight songs from the stand and two from the previous engagement and released a highly successful live album of all previously unrecorded material for Presley, an unusual, if not wholly unprecedented move. The album, “Elvis On Stage,” eventually moved a million copies.

“The Wonder of You” the single pulled from the LP became one of Presley’s signature tunes, selling a million and making the Top Ten in the US and Number One in the UK.

In March, Presley was booked into the Astrodome as the main attraction of the Houston Livestock show. He played four shows, afternoon and evenings, over a weekend. The evening shows both broke attendance records.

Not since the 1950s had Elvis sustained such a string of unqualified successes. This was the environment that informed Elvis’ return to the recording studio in June 1970 for his first recording sessions since the epochal teaming in Memphis with Chips Moman more than a year before. Although Presley was pleased with the results of the Moman sessions, he was not in love with the producer’s heavy-handed and rigidly-structured style of recording. Presley preferred a more spontaneous approach. Additionally, the singer and his in-house producer Felton Jarvis did some post-op overdubs on “Suspicious Minds” that rankled Moman. So, Elvis and Jarvis returned to Nashville, the city that hosted the vast majority of Presley’s sessions.

Jarvis wasn’t going to let things go stale though. He had hired a new band to back Elvis, including guitarist James Burton, who led the singer’s on stage unit, hot young session players like Chip Young, Jerry Carrigan, and Norbert Putnam, and old hands like Charlie McCoy. Many of the players had played in producer Rick Hall’s legendary Muscle Shoals Band.

Flush with the confidence of his recent success, Presley dived into the sessions with enthusiasm. As he had since the ’50s, he approached the sessions as a voyage of discovery. There might be a few preordained objectives going into the session (in these sessions a version of “Bridge Over Troubled Water” seemed to fall into this category), but in general Presley liked to wade his way through demos until he found something he liked. If he didn’t, he’d recall something from the musical past that he could inject with new life. This was not quite as off the cuff as it sounds. Some titles Presley had considered for years before the moment was right. Recording such as “I Washed My Hands in Muddy Water” were born this way, just as earlier recordings had been, including “Reconsider Baby,” “After Loving You” and “Stranger in My Own Hometown.”

Elvis Presley – “I Washed My Hands In Muddy Water”

The sessions, which began on June 4, 1970, got off to a good start. Elvis recorded a first rate original adult contemporary ballad in “Twenty Days and Twenty Nights,” a couple of originals he believed in, but to which time has not been especially kind in “I’ve Lost You” and “The Sound of Your Cry,” along with some terrific blasts from the past. Arguably, the best of these were loose and improvisational attacks at Bill Monroe’s “A Hundred Years From Now,” and “Little Cabin on the Hill.” The bluegrass tunes were the most down home country of any Elvis recordings since Sun, unabashed hillbilly music. No one would hear a “A Hundred Years From Now” for another two and a half decades, but “Little Cabin on the Hill,” along with “I Was Born About Ten Thousand Years Ago” and a remake of Sanford Clark’s rockabilly mini-classic “The Fool,” would take on a completely unanticipated function, one that no Presley songs had fulfilled to that point.

Despite the strong start, the sessions slowed up, especially in their quest to create hit single material. The reason for this was because Presley’s publishing companies were not able to provide a first-rank supply of new material. Presley and Parker had always agreed to give priority to material that had come from their publishing companies, administered through Hill and Range, because the publishing industry was and is, for the most part, more lucrative than recording. This strategy had worked fine in the late 1950s and early 1960s when Hill and Range had a stable of strong writers like Don Robertson, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, Doc Pomus, Mort Shuman, and Otis Blackwell among others. At the same time, Elvis was so much hotter than the rest of the industry that even writers outside the houses could be convinced to make deals because their piece of the pie on one of his cuts was so large. Neither of those situations were the case anymore in 1970.

While Elvis was still a big seller, he was no longer tops in the industry. Plus, the industry had expanded so much that a half million or million selling record was no longer the rarity it once had been. It was a much easier decision for a songwriter to gamble with a new potential hit song.

Compounding the problem was the fact that Hill and Range’s stable of great writers virtually vanished. Some like Leiber, Stoller and Mort Shuman (although he contributed a title in 1969) had flown the coop for greener, or at least different, pastures. Some like Otis Blackwell, Don Robertson, and Doc Pomus had dried up creatively at that time. The industry had changed as well with many songwriters now opting for a career in performing instead of providing material for other performers. The few great remaining non-performing writers were often bound to production deals with record labels or their own artists, or owned their own publishing companies. So, although they still managed to introduce a few solid writers like Eddie Rabbitt (who co-wrote “Kentucky Rain”), none of the new brood were able to fill the shoes of the company’s former stars. Worse, the majority of Hill and Range’s 1970 staff were pedestrian at best. As the decade wore on and Presley became less inspired, this became an increasing problem, and most of Elvis’ better hits came from outside the confines of Hill and Range or were remakes.

Elvis arriving at RCA’s Studio B on June 5, 1970.

In June 1970, Elvis was content to let his personal tastes and memory, along with Hill and Range lead the way. The trouble was the discrepancy between the two. The next two nights, Elvis led the way through first rate remakes of “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” Dusty Springfield’s “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me,” Muddy Water’s “Got My Mojo Working” and Al Martino’s “Mary in the Morning.” To be fair, there were a handful of better than solid Hill and Range songs recorded, out of their dozens of submissions, “Just Pretend,” “Stranger in the Crowd,” “How the Web Was Woven” (a British copyright purchased by the company and a hit in its native land for Jackie Lomax), and “It’s Your Baby, You Rock It.” None of these songs were even close to single material though. (Eventually, “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me” would be the single and would do extremely well.) What’s more, the paucity of good Hill and Range work wore Elvis down to the point where he was elevating the second team.

Elvis Presley – “It’s Your Baby, You Rock It”

The third night of the sessions, ended with Elvis laying down three inferior tracks in a row including one of his all time worst- “Life,” a melodically challenged attempt to explain the universe. When the fourth night of the sessions began with another non-descript ballad from the Hill and Range stable, it seemed the sessions that had gotten off to such a promising start would end up an anti-climax, Elvis’ first step backwards in his recent renaissance.

Then, almost out of the blue, Elvis tore into Don Robertson’s ballad “I Really Don’t Want to Know,” a number that had been a hit for Eddie Arnold, Les Paul and Mary Ford, and Tommy Edwards, and that had always defined the poppiest edge of country music. Elvis didn’t perform it like a pop number though. He didn’t perform it as a country number either. He sang it like it was blues. It was the same type of reinvention he used at Sun on “Blue Moon of Kentucky” and “That’s All Right Mama” all those years ago. Now instead of Sam Phillips recognizing the moment and catching it for posterity, it was Elvis himself. The song set him on a fit of inspiration. Next thing he laid into an absolutely rocking version of Bob Wills’ standard “Faded Love.” A few nights before, Elvis had planned to record the song, but had been put off because he didn’t have the lyrics. Now he did and there was no putting him off. He had a knockout master in one take.

Then it was onto an almost operatic reading of Ernest Tubb’s “Tomorrow Never Comes.” With the exception of a brief side step into the pleasing but dated pop number “The Next Step is Love,” Elvis was into a complete country jam. Soon he had laid down a version of “Make the World Go Away,” an acidic reading of Willie Nelson’s country soul classic ‘Funny How Time Slips Away” and a version of “I Washed My Hands in Muddy Water” that sounded like the jailbreak its lyrics described.

Elvis Presley – “Tomorrow Never Comes”

Norbert Putnam described being caught up in the momentum of Presley’s stroke of genius to writer Gillian G. Gaar:

The run continued the next night when Elvis opened the session with an impassioned rendition of “There Goes My Everything.” Material quickly ran out, but Elvis and Jarvis recognized on the spot that what had developed in the last nights of the sessions was the core of a first rate country and western album. Elvis even spoke of the upcoming country theme album on stage in Vegas that summer.

To his credit, Jarvis recognized that, even with the fine country material that opened the sessions added in, a little bit more material was needed to make a really fine country album. In September, Jarvis got Elvis to come into the studio to complete the set. Elvis wasn’t in the greatest mood to record, but he came up with the two final pieces of the puzzle- a version of “Snowbird” that didn’t change a ton from Anne Murray’s hit recording but was deeply felt and eventually led off the LP, and an absolutely furious smash through “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On.” The fist clenching anger at the heart of Presley’s version made any comparisons to Jerry Lee’s hit moot.

Somewhere along the line, Presley and Jarvis decided against including the gospel traditional “I Was Born About Ten Thousand Years Ago” in its entirety on the LP, despite the aesthetic similarity to much of the material on the collection. Instead they opted to chop the song in splices that would link each song to the next and make some sort of vague comment on the proceedings. The duo felt so strongly about the importance of the linking track that they used a modified version of the song’s title, “I’m 10,000 Years Old,” as the name of the album. “Elvis Country” is actually the subtitle. The move transformed what was a theme album into a full fledged concept album.

RCA’s art department got the hint, and contributed one of the most memorable covers of all Presley’s LPs. Although, Elvis’ debut LP and the Gold Records would contribute more well remembered covers, no Presley cover better conveyed the contents of the LP.

To that point, relatively few people had seen the now iconic photo of the two-year-old Elvis clad in overalls and a broad hat that donned the cover. The first photo ever taken of the future legend, it appeared in Jerry Hopkins’ biography which arrived almost simultaneously with the LP. For a man who did not like to publicly remind people of his upbringing, it said a lot that Elvis would permit its use as the face of his new collection of music.

That’s because this was an LP that said a lot about Elvis. More than any other album in his canon, it is here that Elvis makes the statement: “This is who I am. This is what I’m about.”

That sense of personal disclosure can be seen in the title and subtitle of the collection. “I’m 10,000 Years Old” captured the impact that Elvis had on the pop scene. Although, he had only been a superstar for less than 15 years when the LP came out, to the rock audience it seemed as if he had been there forever. His rise coincided with the rise of the mass media as we would know it- television, radio, movies, and the press. He was basically the only superstar of that initial era to make it into the 1970s intact. (Brando’s resurrection was still a year and a half in the future.) Personally, he had been on a journey that had taken so many diverse twists and turns that he felt older than his years. He would often joke on stage that he had originally had a hit with “Hound Dog” in 1912.

Even the subtitle, which would seem standard due to the nature of the material, is much more personal. This is not just Elvis singing country songs. This is literally Elvis’ country music. It’s the songs that made him like the bluegrass of Bill Monroe and the country swing of Bob Wills. It’s the stuff that his success made possible including everything from rockabilly like “The Fool” and “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin On,” to the countrypolitan bombast of “Tomorrow Never Comes,” to the light country pop of “Snowbird” that would guide many artists to crossover success in the 1970s. Even the LP’s sole original song “It’s Your Baby, You Rock it” was based upon one of the singer’s pet expressions.

When I first got “I’m 10,000 Years Old: Elvis Country” in the mid-1980s, I was amazed at how hard rocking it was. This seemed an odd contradiction on what I thought was going to be a strictly country record. That contradiction is another part of Elvis Presley’s peculiar brand of country. At his best, Presley mixed and matched genres to the point where the performances reside in no recognizable genre save his own. Many times the distance would seem irreconcilable, but he’d still go there. You hear that all over this album.

There’s the blues interpretation of “I Really Don’t Want to Know.” The organ on “Funny How Time Slips Away” underlines why that track has long been a standard in both soul and country. The phrasing and vocal improvisations on many of the tracks bear a closer relationship to gospel than country, although the material and arrangements make the music’s origins clear. “Faded Love” is a prime example. It’s an old country swing tune with a resigned, melancholic lyric that aches of old school Nashville, but James Burton’s guitar solo is all rock n’ roll. Elvis’ vocal drawls enough to be country, but borrows its sense of liberation from gospel. In the end, it can’t be classified as anything but Elvis music.

Elvis Presley – “Faded Love”

He did a lot of the same things with emotions. Gaar commented on the sense of triumph that Elvis imparted to the ending of “Tomorrow Never Comes.” This is an odd note since the song details the end of a breakup. It also was one of Elvis’ most unique gifts. On the surface, it’s Sam Phillips’ mantra of take a sad song and make it happy. But it’s really a manifestation of Presley’s joy in performance. He gives us the meaning of the lyrics, but he also allows us to vicariously taste his joy in performing them. It’s what he does on “Suspicious Minds” and “Mystery Train” and it’s what he does on this song. In the end, it deepens the recordings because it gives us an insight into what happens on the other end, when the songs fade out.

Taken as a whole, this was arguably the most ambitious LP that the singer had undertaken to that point. “From Elvis in Memphis” and the accompanying singles had proved that Elvis was not a figure of the past, that he was aware of contemporary concerns and musical trends. “I’m 10,000 Year Old: Elvis Country” was a step further. A gauntlet had been thrown down. Albums, much more than singles, were now the prime vehicle of expression for rock n’ roll performers. And a great album was no longer simply a collection of great performances. It was now its own statement with each individual piece connected to one another to make a greater point. Performers of the era had also eliminated the lines between themselves and their work. In the 1950s, an artist expressed a point about the world in their work, and their performances could be heartfelt and reflect their worldview. But it was never personal or autobiographical. There was never a sense that it was literally the singer’s experiences emanating through the speakers. In 1970, performers now used their music as a window into their direct personalities.

To this point, Elvis had never tried either method of expression, at least not as pop singer. His gospel LPs showed Elvis thinking beyond song to song, but there was no attempt to link the songs. And there was no overt attempt to allow us an inside view of Elvis. The 1969 recordings had shown that Elvis could perform in the new styles, but was this new mode and style of expression beyond him? “I’m 10,000 Years Old: Elvis Country” answered that question. For the only time in his career, a Presley LP was its own entity, something more than a marketing tool to feature individual performances.

But most people missed it. Today, the LP is known among some rock critics and diehard Elvis fans and that’s about it. What Elvis tried to do has been wiped from the record. What should have been a watershed release has been reduced to a footnote at best. Part of the problem was the marketing strategy of Presley’s record label RCA, which seemed predicated on the idea that the revival of interest in Elvis was a temporary condition mandating the need to maximize quick profits. When “I’m 10,000 Years Old: Elvis Country” was released in January 1971, it was the ninth Elvis album released by RCA in the past eight months, a pace that would have even given a 1950s budget label pause. Most of these LPs were repackages including budget releases, but they were all packaged with a contemporary photo of Elvis and at the very least most of them contained material that hadn’t been available in a while. It was a release schedule that would have taxed the finances of all but the most well heeled Elvis fanatic. And when you’re releasing nine LPs in one year, often fanatics are the only people willing to wade through it all.

Amazingly, RCA compounded their error by releasing the LP a mere six weeks after Elvis’ most recent collection of new music, a mix of studio and live work called “Elvis: That’s the Way it is”. It was a move that cut the market for both albums. Fans who knew that Presley had a new studio album out would have to choose, if they didn’t have enough to buy two at one time. Or they might pick up one LP or the other thinking that it was “the new Elvis.”

One could also imagine that stores had much the same problem, stocking one or the other, not perhaps even dreaming that RCA would release two new products so close together.

Ironically, the strength of the 45 pulled from the album, “I Really Don’t Want to Know”/”There Goes My Everything,” also probably curbed its appeal. Among the people who actually heard it, the single did very well, approaching three quarters of a million copies in the US alone. The problem was that stations played both sides. “I Really Don’t Want to Know” hit #21 on the Billboard Hot 100, but “There Goes My Everything” was played enough to merit its own chart tagalong position. When airplay is split, it often keeps either side from getting enough momentum to make a broad impact. That meant fewer people knew there was a new Elvis LP out that contained these songs.

Elvis Presley – “I Really Don’t Want to Know”

Also, the country aspect of the project may have been a turnoff to some fans, particularly the youth market that was most likely to appreciate a concept album. Country rock had not become a commercial force. While some country stars like Glenn Campbell and Johnny Cash had crossed into the mainstream, their appeal was mostly limited to adults. To the youth audience, the fact that it was a country album probably disguised the fact that Elvis was doing something new here. Hadn’t he been covering country songs since the beginning?

On the other side, the country audience may have resented the concept album idea. Despite valiant efforts by Cash and some others, country was still a very conservative market in the early 1970s. The traditional audience may have resented Elvis’ attempt to gussy up their music, just as their parents had 20 years earlier. Even many diehard Elvis fans found the linking song distracting or annoying.

Elvis and Parker did the LP no favors as well by giving it no extra special promotion. Elvis featured some of the songs in his stage show and mentioned his new country LP, but he engaged in no interviews or any other sort of promotion that would have whetted the public’s appetite and explained what he was trying to accomplish. This was largely standard course for the operation. Presley LPs generally sold themselves as he had a large fan base that bought everything he did. Albums would move beyond that base usually when they featured a hit single, or were connected to larger project like a movie or TV show. The base, though, was enough to keep everything profitable. The problem was that this was not just another record. If Elvis really wanted to make a statement with the album, he had an obligation to let the public know that’s what he wanted to do.

As if that weren’t enough, “I’m 10,000 Years Old: Elvis Country” had the misfortune to be released during, arguably, the greatest year ever for LPs in rock ‘n’ soul history. “Sticky Fingers,” “What’s Going on,” “Who’s Next,” “Led Zeppelin IV,” “There’s a Riot Goin’ On,” “Every Picture Tells a Story,” and “Imagine” were only a handful of the career defining albums released in 1971. While Elvis was doing one of his best, many in the industry were releasing their very best. It was easy to get lost in the shuffle, particularly when Elvis’ organization from top to bottom made no effort at placing their record among the industry’s elite.

Still, over the years the LP has gained a slow but steady appreciation in the public eye (an appreciation that has not translated into sales partly because of RCA abusing the Elvis and country concept and partly because Elvis is not associated with albums). It received five star reviews in the Rolling Stone Record Guide as well as the All Music Guide. In 2000 Mojo included it in their list of the 1,000 greatest albums ever made. It also made an Uncut list of underrated albums. And reviews of the recent reissue have been very positive.

All of which makes it sad because if the response to the LP had been greater there might have been more like it. Save for one more gospel and Christmas LP, this was the last anyone ever saw of Elvis Presley album maker. It was also the last anyone ever saw of Elvis Presley the invigorated artist willing to find new outlets for his talent. While he would have the occasional stroke of inspiration that led to some great records now and then, he was never again able to deliberately channel it as he did here. Save for some records about his divorce, he never again had that something he was just busting to say on record as he did here. In March 1971, with the concept record still on the charts, Elvis went into the studio seemingly bound to do what he had done with country, almost a year before, with folk music. Sadly, the session was limited to four songs because the singer came down with an eye infection. The next time he was back in the studio in May, the folk idea has been largely forgotten. Perhaps discouraged by the lack of public reaction to “I’m 10,000 Years Old,” he figured “why bother?”

Regretting what could have been shouldn’t keep us from appreciating what actually was though. “I’m 10,000 Years Old: Elvis Country” did not need to start a trend. It stands as a unique collection of powerfully personal music that tells us as much about the man who created it as anything he ever did. For that we should be grateful.

Sources:
Return of the King: Elvis Presley’s Great Comeback – Gillian Gaar
Elvis Presley: A Life in Music – Ernst Jorgensen

“Elvis Country – Legacy Edition” is available now from:

Title
Elvis Country – Legacy Edition (2 CDs)	Buy Now	Buy Now	Buy Now

The Legacy Edition pairs the original “Elvis Country” album, as first released in January 1971, with a weaker effort from the same year, “Love Letters From Elvis,” as well as singles and B-sides recorded at the sessions that produced those albums.

The music on “Elvis Country: Legacy Edition” was in large part the product of Elvis’ mammoth session at RCA’s Studio B, Nashville, in June 1970. Elvis was now around 18 months into an impressive comeback during which he had wowed America with a top rated television special, released some of his most critically acclaimed and successful music in years, and made a highly successful return to live performance.

Elvis and the band at Studio B, Nashville in June 1970:

Top: David Briggs, Norbert Putnam, Elvis Presley, Al Pachuki, Jerry Carrigan
Bottom: Felton Jarvis, Chip Young, Charlie McCoy, James Burton

CD 1: Elvis Country

Tracklist (including recording dates):

“Elvis Country” – original album

 1. Snowbird – (22 Sep, 1970)
 2. Tomorrow Never Comes (7 Jun, 1970)
 3. Little Cabin On The Hill (4 Jun, 1970)
 4. Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On (22 Sep)
 5. Funny How Time Slips Away (7 Jun, 1970)
 6. I Really Don’t Want To Know (7 Jun, 1970)
 7. There Goes My Everything (8 Jun, 1970)
 8. It’s Your Baby, You Rock It (5 Jun, 1970)
 9. The Fool (4 Jun, 1970)
10. Faded Love (7 Jun, 1970)
11. I Washed My Hands In Muddy Water (7 Jun, 1970)
12. Make The World Go Away (7 Jun, 1970).

Bonus tracks

13. I Was Born About Ten Thousand Years Ago (4 Jun, 1970)
14. A Hundred Years From Now (4 Jun, 1970)
15. Where Did They Go, Lord (22 Sep, 1970).

The album opens with a solid cover of Anne Murray’s “Snowbird” which deviates very little from the original and is one of the more conventional country recordings on the album. “Tomorrow Never Comes” is an excellent power ballad that builds to an impressive crescendo. The song evokes Roy Orbison’s dramatic style and this was not lost on Elvis who can be heard in an outtake (not included here) singing “Running Scared” over the opening bars of the song.

“Little Cabin On The Hill” is a Bill Monroe song that Elvis had been fooling around with for years in private, including during the so-called Million Dollar Quartet session in 1956. The “Elvis Country” version is good, with a natural singalong quality, but it would have had a little more drive if sung in a slightly higher key. The same is true of “The Fool,” which is a cool bluesy tune that Elvis sings in slightly menacing fashion at the bottom of his register.

“Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin On” features one of Elvis’ best rock ‘n’ roll vocals of the decade. What makes it so great is the variety present in Elvis’ performance. Instead of sticking rigidly to the melody as written, Elvis is all over the place, even exploring the bass harmony on both the verses and chorus. This is a great approach as it brings the rather repetitive lyric to life and gives the performance real dynamic range. It’s the kind of imaginative performance that Elvis gave so often in his first decade of recording on tracks such as “One Sided Love Affair.”

“Funny How Time Slips Away” is a Willie Nelson-penned track that Rick Nelson had recorded for his 1966 album “Country Fever.” It is the Nelson version that inspired the Elvis cut and the similarities are heightened by the fact that James Burton plays dobro on both. As similar as the songs are instrumentally, Elvis invests far more emotion in his vocal and his is easily the more memorable performance.

“I Really Don’t Want To Know” features one of Elvis’ most passionate performances on the album. It is this type of performance that makes some choose this as their favourite Elvis period, because he rarely sang with such intensity and passion before or after.

Elvis arrives at Studio B for the June 4, 1970 session

Elvis delivers a flawless performance on the country standard “There Goes My Everything.” The song had been a big country hit in 1966 for Jack Greene and an even bigger hit the following year on the pop chart for Engelbert Humperdinck. Elvis’ version has a slightly looser arrangement and a very heartfelt vocal.

Don’t be put off by the slightly odd title of “It’s Your Baby, You Rock It” as James Burton’s melodic guitar work, Elvis’ highly engaged and imaginative vocal, and the well judged female backing vocals all contribute to make this a contender for the best recording on the album. The way Elvis sings the line “You made that bed you’re sleeping in and I’m tired of hearing about it friend” for the final time is the kind of moment that makes you want to start the song over.

“I Washed My Hands in Muddy Water” has Elvis and the band cutting loose on a great country blues jam. Elvis was so suited to this kind of performance that it’s a shame he didn’t do more in this style as the decade progressed. Stonewall Jackson and Johnny Rivers had both had success with the track several years before, but Elvis was perhaps drawn to the song by Charlie Rich’s version which was the flipside of “Mohair Sam” – the song Elvis repeatedly played when the Beatles came to visit in 1965.

“Make the World Go Away” is an excellent recording, with Elvis once again fully committed. Listen to him sing the line “Do you remember when you loved me?” for an example of Elvis’ ability to make you really believe a lyric. It’s not as polished as Eddy Arnold’s straight country rendition, but has a truckload more feeling.

“I Was Born About Ten Thousand Years Ago” appears in snippets between tracks on the “Elvis Country” album, but is also present here in full as the first bonus track. It’s a fun, up-tempo gospel song which Elvis relishes singing. Elvis seems to also get a kick out of “A Hundred Years From Now,” which has its roots in bluegrass music and is the kind of song you can imagine Elvis fooling around with at home.

The final bonus track on CD 1 is “Where Did They Go, Lord,” which was released on single in 1971, peaking at number 33 on the Billboard Hot 100.

CD 2: Love Letters From Elvis

Tracklist (including recording dates):

“Love Letters From Elvis” – original album:

 1. Love Letters (7 Jun, 1970)
 2. When I’m Over You (7 Jun, 1970)
 3. If I Were You (8 Jun, 1970)
 4. Got My Mojo Working/Keep Your Hands Off Of It (5 Jun, 1970)
 5. Heart Of Rome (6 Jun, 1970)
 6. Only Believe(8 Jun, 1970)
 7. This Is Our Dance (6 Jun, 1970)
 8. Cindy, Cindy (4 Jun, 1970)
 9. I’ll Never Know (5 Jun, 1970)
10. It Ain’t No Big Thing (But It’s Growing) (6 Jun, 1970)
11. Life – (6 Jun, 1970).

Bonus tracks

12. The Sound Of Your Cry (4 Jun, 1970)
13. Sylvia (8 Jun, 1970)
14. Rags To Riches (22 Sep, 1970).

The second CD features the complete “Love Letters From Elvis” album, plus three bonus tracks. The album opens with a remake of the song “Love Letters,” which Elvis had originally recorded in 1966. It’s sloppy compared to the original and it’s unclear what the motivation was to revisit the song, other than pianist David Briggs’ apparent desire to improve on the piano part that he had laid down on the original.

The songs “When I’m Over You” and “If I Were You” are both well executed country songs, but neither are particularly memorable compared to the best work Elvis was doing in this period. The same can be said of the Neopolitan-flavoured “Heart of Rome” which Elvis enjoyed singing but wasn’t really deserving of a spot on a mainstream Elvis release during a period where his work had been so strong. It’s also sung just a notch too high for comfort, which leads to a slightly over the top performance.

“Got My Mojo Working/Keep Your Hands Off Of It” is a different story, with Elvis ripping into an inspired medley of two old R&B tracks. Elvis’ natural feel for this type of music is very apparent and you only have to listen to the slightly exhausted laugh at the end to know how much fun he was having.

The gospel-flavoured “Only Believe” is simple material, but so well sung that it is a treat for those of us who simply enjoy Elvis’ voice.

“This Is Our Dance” is essentially Elvis occupying Engelbert Humperdinck territory and was actually co-written by Les Reed, who had a hand in penning Humperdinck’s monster hit “The Last Waltz.”

“Cindy, Cindy” was modified from a traditional folk song by songwriters Benjamin Weisman, Dolores Fuller and Fred Wise. It’s hard to escape the suspicion that Elvis isn’t particularly enamoured with the material, as he seems to be going through the motions a little here.

“I’ll Never Know” has a very appealing melody and delicate vocal from Elvis. It’s one of the better songs on the album.

Despite the pretty appalling title, which invites an obvious schoolboy joke, “It Ain’t No Big Thing (But It’s Growing)” is a very listenable straight country track, with good harmonica work from the great Charlie McCoy, an appealing lead guitar break from James Burton, and a solid vocal from Elvis.

“Life” is an unusual track which tells the story of the Creation. It’s the kind of song that is an acquired taste – acceptable as an LP track but a little surprising that it was selected as a single.

The bonus tracks commence with “The Sound of Your Cry” which has a well crafted melody and is nicely recorded, but Elvis perhaps gets a little carried away towards the end.

“Sylvia” was recorded at the June 1970 sessions but wasn’t released until 1972 when it appeared on the “Elvis Now” album. The song and performance is not without appeal, but ultimately it’s fairly average and the decision to hold it back is understandable. Felton Jarvis’ overdubs, which are often criticised, are quite tasteful and interesting here.

The final track on the album is “Rags to Riches” which Elvis delivers in bombastic but appealing fashion. The title suggests that the song might have an autobiographical element, but “Rags to Riches” refers not to financial status, but to the metaphorical change of fortunes that can arise from finding true love.

Summing up

The best of the music that Elvis recorded in Nashville in the summer of 1970 is a notch below his strongest 1969 material, but there is much to enjoy and the “Elvis Country” album that came out of the sessions is one of the most cohesive of his career – often noted as one of Elvis’ few real concept albums.

It’s no surprise that Elvis rose to the occasion on this material, because he had always had a real affinity with country music. What we get here though is rougher and more earthy than the classic Nashville sound of the 1960s. Just as Elvis had done when he first recorded for Sun Records in the mid-’50s, on these tracks he merges genres and puts his own stamp on what are often familiar and well worn song selections.

This release follows the pattern of the previous Elvis Legacy Editions by coupling the main title with a second album from the era. However, this time the policy has attracted more criticism because of the decision to include what is regarded as a classic Elvis album (“Elvis Country”) with a more throwaway selection (“Love Letters From Elvis”). Clearly, the two albums were deemed a neat fit because most of the material came from the same sessions, but there is a marked difference in quality between the two and this release would have been stronger if some of the best outtakes from the main “Elvis Country” album had been included, instead of the weaker material.

Criticisms aside, there is enough strong material here to make it a worthwhile release, particularly given the surprisingly low price and the fact that the highly regarded Vic Anesini 2007 remasters are used throughout.

If you admire Elvis Presley, the album “Elvis Country” belongs in your collection.

“Elvis Country – Legacy Edition” is available now from:

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Elvis’ home town of Memphis has been at the heart of the celebrations over the last couple of days, with a Fan Club Presidents event, an Elvis Insiders reception, a Gospel concert, and a concert featuring the Memphis Symphony Orchestra and Terry Mike Jeffrey. The celebrations culminate today with a special Elvis Birthday Proclamation Ceremony at Graceland which begins at 9.30am CST.

You can view the Elvis Birthday Proclamation Ceremony live at www.elvis.com

The birthday activities in Memphis kick off Elvis Presley Enterprises’ year long celebration of Elvis’ life and legacy to mark the 35th anniversary of the rock ‘n’ roll legend’s death.

Elvis Express Radio are also marking Elvis’ birthday today with a special tribute show that concentrates on the music Elvis recorded in Memphis at Sun Studios, American Studios, Stax Records and Graceland. The show will be uploaded on the Elvis Express Radio website at www.elvis-express.com

In other Elvis news, the 2002 JLS/Elvis remix, “A Little Less Conversation,” may be set for a return to the charts as it is featured in the Olympics-themed advert for BMW’s 3 Series Saloon, which is set to run for several months. The tag line is “What all winners have in common….is joy.”

Winfield Scott Moore III was born on December 27, 1931 near Gadsden, Tennessee and began playing guitar as a child. After serving in the Navy from 1948 to 1952, he formed a country band called “The Starlite Wranglers” which also featured future Elvis bassist Bill Black. Everything would change in July 1954 when Sun Records owner, Sam Phillips, asked Scotty to work with an enthusiastic young singer called Elvis Presley.

Left to right: Elvis Presley, Bill Black, Scotty Moore & Sam Phillips at Sun Records

On July 5, 1954, Scotty was involved in one of the most important moments in rock ‘n’ roll history while at an informal session at Sun with Elvis and Bill Black. Here’s how Scotty remembered the incident when speaking to author Jerry Hopkins in 1971:

It was Elvis’ energy and instincts that brought a new dimenion to the Crudup tune, but Scotty’s subtle yet driving guitar work, and Bill Black’s throbbing bass were hugely important in bringing the whole thing together and producing a sound that would enthrall local teens at the time and continues to enthrall listeners today.

Elvis Presley – “That’s All Right”

Phillips convinced Dewey Phillips (no relation) to play the song on his “Red, Hot and Blue” radio show in Memphis and the local response was such that the young Elvis was rushed to the studio to be interviewed on the show – he’d been so nervous at the prospect of the song being played, that he had to be tracked down hiding out at the movies.

The response to “That’s All Right” meant that a B-side was required. For the A-side, the trio had added country elements to a blues song, but for the flip they would add blues elements to Bill Monroe’s country hit “Blue Moon of Kentucky.” The results were on a par with the A-side and it was evident that something special was happening.

Scotty’s pioneering rockabilly style would feature on many classic Elvis recordings over the next few years, including “Good Rockin’ Tonight,” “Baby Let’s Play House,” “I’m Left, You’re Right, She’s Gone,” “Mystery Train,” “Heartbreak Hotel,” “Hound Dog,” “Blue Suede Shoes,” “Too Much,” “Lawdy Miss Clawdy,” “Jailhouse Rock” and many more.

Elvis Presley – “Baby Let’s Play House”

Elvis Presley – “Blue Suede Shoes”

Scotty also played hundreds of concerts with Elvis in the early barnstorming days and appeared in the classic movies Loving You, Jailhouse Rock and King Creole, each time as a member of Elvis’ band. He’d continue to play at Elvis sessions throughout the 1960s, and the pair ended their professional relationship on a high in 1968 as Scotty backed Elvis on the acclaimed so-called “sit down” segment of his 1968 television special.

The next 20 years saw Scotty working in the studio for the most part, engineering records such as Ringo Starr’s “Beaucoups of Blues” and Carl Perkins’ “EP Express,” and also engineering television shows for the likes of Bob Hope, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis and Dolly Parton.

Fans got a chance to see Scotty live on stage for the first time since 1968 when he joined Carl Perkins at the Ellis Auditorium in Memphis as part of the “Good Rockin’ Tonight” show in 1992. This welcome return to the stage continued with a number of tours and appearances at special events, including the 1994 Elvis tribute at the Pyramid in Memphis.

Scotty has also been involved in a number of reunion/tribute recording projects, including “All the Kings Men” in 1997 which featured artists such as Keith Richards, Ron Wood, Jeff Beck, and members of the Bill Black combo.

In 2004, some of rock music’s finest gathered in London’s Abbey Road studios to pay tribute to and play alongside Scotty Moore. The artists assembled included Eric Clapton, Ron Wood, Dave Gilmour, Bill Wyman and Albert Lee. Here’s one of the highlights from that night.

Scotty Moore and Eric Clapton – “Mystery Train”

Recognising that arthritis was compromising his ability to play guitar, Scotty Moore made his farewell live performances in the two “Last Man Standing” shows during the 2007 Elvis Week at the Peabody Hotel in Memphis. Scotty played alongside “The Mighty Handful,” which featured some of the all time great session musicians, including Bob Moore and Boots Randolph, who had played with Scotty on Elvis recording in the 1960s. Scotty also produced the two-volume “Might Handful” CDs.

Scotty celebrated his 80th birthday earlier this month with a party at the Gibson Memphis Showcase. Among those in attendence were Elvis’ ex-wife Priscilla Presley and Gibson Guitar President David Berryman, who presented Scotty with a Gibson Custom ES-295 replica of the guitar that he had played throughout his career.

Scotty Moore was an integral part of Elvis’ early band and one of the real pioneers of rock ‘n’ roll guitar. Twentieth century popular music would have been very different without his contribution.

Happy Birthday Scotty and thanks for all the fine music.

For those who want to know more about Scotty, the excellent out-of-print “That’s Alright, Elvis: The Untold Story of Elvis’s First Guitarist and Manager, Scotty Moore” has recently been made available on Kindle by author James L. Dickerson. The 1997 book is Scotty’s account (as told to Dickerson) of his long career, including his time playing guitar for Elvis Presley.

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The Christmas number one has long been regarded as a prestigious achievement in the UK, with some of the biggest artists competing for the honour. Over the years, the Christmas number one has been occupied by classic pop songs, fun seasonal offerings, best forgotten novelties and, in recent years, the debut singles of television talent show winners.

The Beatles hold the record for the most UK Christmas number ones with four, followed by Cliff Richard and the Spice Girls who both have three.

* – As established by the Official Charts Company, the official British singles chart is the New Musical Express chart from 1952 to 1960, the Record Retailer chart from 1960 to 1969, and the Official UK Singles Chart from 1969 on.

The 1950s

The first Christmas number one on the UK singles chart was Al Martino’s “Here in My Heart” which was at number one for nine weeks in 1952.

Pre-rock ‘n’ roll favourites Frankie Laine, Winifred Atwell and Johnny Ray all hit the top spot at Christmas after this, with the latter’s “Just Walkin’ in the Rain” staying on top for seven weeks.

The first rock ‘n’ roller to achieve a Christmas number one was Conway Twitty, with the classic “It’s Only Make Believe” in 1958.

Harry Belafonte’s “Mary’s Boy Child” and Dickie Valentine’s “Christmas Alphabet” were the only songs with a Christmas theme to reach number one at Christmas in the 1950s.

Harry Belafonte – “Mary’s Boy Child”

The 1960s

Although Cliff Richard and Christmas are linked in the public consciousness, his first Christmas number one was the chirpy love song “I Love You” which carried no seasonal theme. This trend continued throughout the decade, with none of the remaining Christmas number ones having anything to do with Christmas.

Elvis Presley recorded the best selling Christmas album of all time, but his only Christmas number one was the pop classic “Return to Sender.”

Each of the Beatles’ Christmas number ones were in the 1960s, starting with “I Want To Hold Your Hand” in 1963 and concluding with “Hello, Goodbye” in 1967.

The Beatles – “I Feel Fine”

Tom Jones’ “Green Green Grass of Home” occupied the top spot for Christmas 1966.

The 1970s

In contrast to the previous decade, the 1970s saw several Christmas-themed songs achieve the coveted Christmas number one, including the perennial favourite “Merry Xmas Everybody” by Slade, Mud’s “Lonely this Christmas,” Johnny Mathis’ “When a Child is Born” and “Boney M’s “Mary’s Boy Child.”

Slade – “Merry Xmas Everybody”

The novelty song tends to do well around Christmas time in the UK and the 1970s saw two examples reaching the Christmas number one – Benny Hill’s “Ernie (The Fastest Milkman in the West) and Jimmy Osmond’s “Long Haired Lover from Liverpool.”

The 1980s

The 1980s Christmas chart toppers are a real mixed bag, including the great synth pop song “Don’t You Want Me” by the Human League, a welcome vintage offering in the shape of Jackie Wilson’s “Reet Petite” and a handful of classic Christmas songs.

Band Aid’s “Do they Know It’s Christmas?” reaching the top spot in both its original incarnation and when re-recorded by a new batch of pop stars, including Cliff Richard who had the previous year’s Christmas number one with “Mistletoe and Wine.”

Cliff Richard – “Mistletoe And Wine”

The other seasonal offering to reach the top spot in the 1980s was Shakin’ Stevens’ very catchy and still popular “Merry Christmas Everyone.”

The 1990s

Cliff Richard’s third and final Christmas number one, “Saviour’s Day,” was the only Christmas-themed song to reach the top spot at Christmas in the 1990s.

Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” had already been a Christmas number one in 1975 and repeated the feat in 1991 (backed with “These Are the Days of Our Lives”) in the wake of Freddie Mercury’s untimely death.

The Spice Girls were the biggest thing in pop in the mid-late 1990s, as reflected by their hat-trick of Christmas number ones from 1996 to 1998.

Spice Girls – “2 Become 1″

The year before the Spice Girls’ period of dominance began, Michael Jackson achieved his first and only Christmas number one with “Earth Song.”

2000+

The Christmas number one spot has been dominated by reality tv show winners since 2002. The only exceptions have been Michael Andrews and Gary Jules’ “Mad World” and Rage Against the Machine’s “Killing in the Name,” with the latter only achieving the top spot as a result of a Facebook campaign to prevent the X-Factor winner hitting number one.

Robbie Williams was at his commercial peak when his duet with Nicole Kidman on the Sinatra classic “Somethin’ Stupid” reached number one for Christmas 2001.

Robbie Williams and Nicole Kidman – Somethin’ Stupid”

Scotty’s groundbreaking guitar work featured on a string of classic Elvis recordings, including “Good Rockin’ Tonight,” “Mystery Train,” “Baby Let’s Play House,” “Heartbreak Hotel,” “Hound Dog” and many many more. He also played on hundreds of live performances and television shows with Elvis, culminating in the classic so-called “sit-down” segment of Elvis’ acclaimed NBC television special in 1968.

The Kindle edition of “That’s Alright, Elvis: The Untold Story of Elvis’s First Guitarist and Manager, Scotty Moore” can be downloaded now:

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The three new exhibits are:

Elvis on Tour Exhibit

Next year is the 40th anniversary of Elvis’ Golden Globe winning documentary “Elvis On Tour” which followed Elvis on and off stage during a multi-city tour. The exhibit, located at Graceland Crossing, will include artifacts from the movie, including Elvis’ stage clothing and rarely seen photos and video.

Most fans will also be hoping for a special edition “Elvis On Tour” Blu-ray/DVD release to mark the anniversary.

Elvis…Through His Daughter’s Eyes

This exhibit will explore Elvis’ relationship with his daughter Lisa Marie through family photos and home movies, and other artifacts relating to Lisa’s childhood.

The exhibit will form part of the VIP Tour and will open on February 1, which is Lisa Marie’s birthday.

ICON: The Influence of Elvis Presley Exhibit

This exhibit celebrates Elvis’ position as a music icon with artifacts borrowed from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the collections of leading musicians, such as Bruce Springsteen, Elton John, Bono, James Brown, and many more.

The exhibit opens on March 1 at Sincerely Elvis.

Click here for more information on Graceland.

The auction, organised by Gotta Have Rock and Roll, includes stage and video worn costumes, concert played instruments, personal clothing, handwritten lyrics, set lists and letters, signed and inscribed guitars and album covers, contracts, never-before-seen photographs, rare concert posters, gold album awards and much, much more.

Among the many highlights of the auction are a pair of leopard spotted mohair shoes worn on stage by Elvis Presley in 1954, which are expected to fetch $45000 – $50000. Other top Elvis lots include the leather boots worn by the star in his legendary 1968 NBC television special, and a suit he wore on stage in 1956 during his short season at the Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas. The suit was purchased at Lanskys In Memphis.

These are just two of 59 Elvis-related lots up for auction. The Beatles are also very well represented with 175 items relating to the band or the members’ solo projects, including a “Twist and Shout” promotional flyer signed by all four members, and a McCartney-signed “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” album.

There are 32 Hendrix items, including the publishing agreement for his first album and a guitar strap worn on stage at the 1968 Lincoln Center in New York. Bruce Springsteen is also represented by 32 items, including a copy of the “Born To Run” album signed by Bruce and E Street Band members Clarence Clemons (now deceased), Roy Bittan, Garry Tallent, Danny Federici (now deceased), Max Weinberg, Steven Van Zandt, Patty Scialfa and Nils Lofgren.

Other highlights in the Rock & Pop Culture Auction include:

• Prince’s stage used “Yellow Cloud” guitar
• Bob Dylan’s stage used Martin acoustic guitar
• a fedora worn by Michael Jackson on stage
• Joni Mitchell handwritten “For Free” lyrics
• a motorcycle jacket jacket worn by Madonna
• the 1990 “Stravinski” Custom Strat used by Slash on Guns N’ Roses “Use Your Illusion” Tour
• a “Concert For New York City” drum head featuring over 50 signatures from musicians and VIPs, including Paul McCartney, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Elton John, and President Bill Clinton.

Click here to view the full Rock & Pop Culture Auction catalogue.

On November 22 1961, Elvis Presley’s eighth film “Blue Hawaii” was released. It would be one of the great multi-media coups of the mid-20th century and arguably the most commercially successful project of the singer/actor’s career. By the time the year was out, the film would earn enough money to make the #2 spot on Variety’s weekly list of top grossing films and enough to finish at #18 for the entire year despite the fact that it was released with only five weeks left. In 1962 the film would do even better, finishing as the #14 film for that year.

The “Blue Hawaii” soundtrack reached #1 in December where it would reside without a break for the next five months, setting a record for a rock artist that would last 16 years. The single from the film “Can’t Help Falling in Love/Rock a Hula Baby” was all over the radio and would peak at #2 in early 1962 and eventually top the charts in the UK.

The lead side would become one of the most iconic titles introduced by Presley and would later serve as the climax to all of his live appearances.

“Can’t Help Falling in Love” – Elvis Presley

This was the most dominant showing by Presley or any other artist since he had turned the world upside down in his breakthrough year of 1956. In that year he had also dominated television, but arguably 1961 was even sweeter because no one in 1956 expected Presley to be around five years later. Yet here he was as big, if not bigger, than ever. Strangely, instead of serving as a springboard for even greater achievements, the very enormity of the project’s success would derail the singer artistically and commercially.

Part of the reason that “Blue Hawaii” led to Presley’s eventual mid-decade artistic and commercial decline was the fact that all the success was based upon a very slight product. For all its considerable virtues, it was a lightweight film; a well crafted but not especially inspired Hollywood product that served as the model for progressively weaker copies that came to define Presley as a movie star and as a recording artist for much of the decade.

Things didn’t have to turn out that way. Having proven Presley’s staying power and massive commercial potential, the success of “Blue Hawaii” could have been a base upon which the Presley organization could have built more ambitious work. The trouble was that the success of the film and LP did not come in a vacuum. They were not Presley’s only offerings to the market place in the early 1960s. When he was first released from the army, he embarked on some of the most ambitious work of his career.

Presley’s initial LP upon exiting the service, “Elvis is Back,” is widely considered to be his definitive statement within the medium. The LP contained all of the styles that Elvis favored and featured a handful of first rate new songs – “Dirty Dirty Feeling,” “It Feels So Right,” “Thrill of Your Love,” “Like a Baby” – and some of the greatest blues, rock and vocal group songs from the previous decade – “Fever,” “Reconsider Baby,” “I Will Be Home Again,” and “Soldier Boy.”

The arrangements and production on “Elvis is Back” were thoughtful and adventurous. Presley’s singing was amongst his most passionate and assured, moving between styles with a casual ease that made the listener not even notice a leap had been made. It was without doubt one of the handful of essential rock LPs from the pre-Beatles era.

“Reconsider Baby” – Elvis Presley

Yet for all that, “Elvis is Back” did not sell particularly well. The record’s initial sales of just under 300,000 (it has since been certified Gold) were good enough to get it to the #2 slot for almost three weeks in the summer of 1960. However, this was a disappointment for Presley, his manager “Colonel” Tom Parker, and the RCA record label for several reasons. One was that the initial sales were lower than those of any original Presley LP to that point, save the “King Creole” soundtrack, which had been broken up into separate EP releases prior to its release, and the Christmas LP, which only competed for store space during the final six weeks of the year. The majority of Elvis’ early LPs sold 350,000 or more, with LPs like 1956′s “Elvis” selling more than 500,000, an extremely impressive number for the era. The music on those LPs sold a lot more because, as they did with “King Creole,” RCA simultaneously offered all or a majority of the tracks on those LPs broken up into a series of EPs. This made sense because in 1956 the LP was very much a luxury format and relatively few people, especially few teens, could afford LPs or even had a record player that could accommodate them. By 1960 this had changed, with more people buying LPs than ever before and EPs starting to fade from the market place. For the first time the contents of an Elvis Presley LP were exclusively available on that LP, and that album was Presley’s first new offering in more than two years. In this context, 300,000 units was a huge disappointment.

The King’s next LP “GI Blues” gave a hint at what was commercially possible for the LP format. It sold 700,000 copies domestically in only its first few months of release, more than any Presley LP in its original run to that point. It logged up a run of ten weeks at the pole position and spent 111 weeks on the Billboard Top 200, to this day a record for a Presley album. Musically, it was a lion’s leap backwards from “Elvis is Back” and the majority of his catalogue to that point.

Although the “GI Blues” soundtrack contained some fine songs, most notably “Pocketful of Rainbows,” and “Doing the Best I Can,” and was brilliantly performed by Presley throughout, the majority of the songs were lightweight pop. Worse, a number of the songs were script-based novelties not intended to really have a life outside the film, let alone as the latest contributions from the hottest singer in the business. Elvis found some life in a few of these (“Frankfort Special” springs to mind) but it was mostly a losing battle.

“Pocketful of Rainbows” – Elvis Presley

Priscilla Beaulieu, Presley’s wife from 1967-1973, remembered that Elvis was extremely displeased with the songs from the film. By contrast, writer Paul Simpson noted that the copy of “Elvis is Back” contained in Elvis’ personal record collection at Graceland had been played so often that it had almost turned white – an amazing verdict on this music from a man who generally didn’t care to listen to his own recordings. The album Elvis did not want to record had sold more than twice the number of the album that he had played into the ground.

The film, a lightweight service concoction that could have just as easily starred Dean Martin, Dick Haymes or Bing Crosby or any of a dozen other talents from a previous generation, was almost as successful. Despite being released in late November it finished as the 14th highest grossing film of 1960 and out performed every Elvis film to that time, save the debut “Love Me Tender.” Elvis didn’t like it any better than he did the soundtrack and soon got himself into something more exciting.

“Flaming Star” and “Wild in the Country,” his next two films, were as ambitious for Elvis the actor as his initial recording sessions were for him as a recording artist. The former was a project originally tailored for Marlon Brando and directed by screen legend in the making Don Siegel. Its main theme was racism, one of the defining issues of the era. The latter was a coming-of-age drama written by the great playwright Clifford Odets. Both had stellar supporting casts. Arguably they were the most demanding dramatic projects that Presley had ever undertaken. (As it turned out, he would never do anything on screen more challenging.) Unlike “King Creole,” the film that had previously offered Presley a dramatic test, there was almost no music in these two films.

In “Flaming Star,” Presley sings only one song after the opening credits and that is five minutes into the movie. “Wild in the Country” features a mere two songs after the credits along with a brief a cappella snippet. While 1956′s “Love Me Tender” was not stocked wall-to-wall with songs, Elvis’ role was a supporting one. In these films, he was the lead. The rising actor was working without a net.

So, fresh out of the army Presley re-established himself as a creative force in the recording studio and strove to establish himself as a true actor. Unfortunately, although both films made a modest profit, these were the first Elvis films that were not full fledged box office hits. Elvis did receive some positive notices in the era for his performances in both projects but there weren’t enough of them and the ones that were there weren’t vociferous enough to make the industry take notice. The same could be said about the films themselves. (Subsequent critics have been much more appreciative of the singer’s work in these movies, if not always the movies themselves.)

Since there were so few songs, the music from “Flaming Star” and “Wild in the Country” was basically a washout commercially, especially in comparison to previous Presley projects. The title track of “Flaming Star” served as the lead of an EP that made #14 and the title track of “Wild in the Country” made #26 as B-side. Some of the music from the movies, including deleted songs, wouldn’t even be available in stores for years.

Worse for Elvis was the fact that “Something For Everybody,” his first LP full of secular songs after “GI Blues,” made #1 but sold only 300,000 units, a success for the era but a tremendous disappointment after the dizzying heights of “GI Blues.”

Even the 45 RPM single no longer seemed the sure bet for Presley that it once had been. Elvis’s first four singles after returning home from the service (“Stuck on You,” “It’s Now or Never,” “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” and “Surrender”) all topped the charts with more than a million units; in fact the middle two singles were amongst the most successful that the singer ever made. “Are You Lonesome To-Night?” moved a million copies in its first week of release and “It’s Now or Never” was Presley’s all time international best seller. Unlike LP or movie audiences, the Top 40 mainstream seemed initially willing to move with Presley.

Then he followed “Surrender” with a remake of Chuck Willis’ “I Feel So Bad” (backed with “Wild in the Country”), a tormented blues that followed the construction of Willis’ 1956 R&B hit closely. Switching from ballads to blues cost Presley dearly. “I Feel So Bad” moved 600,000 units in its nine week Billboard chart run. This was good enough to make #5 but it was the fewest records any mainline Presley 45 had sold since the singer had started with RCA in 1956. (This would be the smallest run for a Presley single until 1964.)

Undeterred, Presley switched again on his next release, moving back to rock with one of the all time greatest two-sided releases in the history of rock ‘n’ soul, “(Marie’s The Name) His Latest Flame”/ “Little Sister.” Audiences liked the rock n’ roll Elvis more than the blues Elvis, buying up about 750,000 records and pushing both titles into the Top Ten. Even that success was modest compared to the million plus that Presley had grown accustomed to prior to 1961 and was a blip compared to the two million plus of “Are You Lonesome Tonight?”

“(Marie’s The Name) His Latest Flame” – Elvis Presley

“Blue Hawaii” single-handedly stopped this downward trend in the record shops, and at the box office. “Can’t Help Falling in Love”/ “Rock a Hula Baby” obliterated the one million units mark in quick time. The soundtrack was the fastest selling album of the year by any artist. By the end of 1962, it had moved more than two million units, completely quashing the mark established by “GI Blues.” It would go on to move more than three million copies, making it the biggest selling LP within Presley’s lifetime.

The “Blue Hawaii” LP not only set a standard for Presley, it set a standard for the industry in general. The 20 weeks it spent at #1 were the most for any LP since the “South Pacific” soundtrack in 1958. In the decade of the 1960s, only the movie soundtrack for “West Side Story,” released almost simultaneously, spent more time at #1 (an incredible 54 weeks over the decade). In the next 25 years only four LPs had more time at the top. It was an incredible run. Although this was not a rock ‘n’ roll LP, no rock ‘n’ roller at that point had ever touched these type of numbers in total sales or weeks on the chart.

At the box office, “Blue Hawaii” wasn’t as much of an industry smashing event, but Jerry Hopkins noted that the film grossed as much as beloved classics like “Gunfight at the OK Corral” and “Pal Joey.” He also pointed out that Variety placed the movie on its all time list of box office champions.

If “Blue Hawaii” had not so significantly influenced what Elvis did next, its mind boggling success would have been one of those little curious blips in history, where a relatively mild work presses the button of a generation and leaves subsequent generations scratching their heads. However, its massive success made it the model for Presley’s career for years to come, stifling his artist growth and changing the potential face of popular music.

Despite what you may have heard, or where you think this piece might be leading, “Blue Hawaii” the film and the soundtrack are not without value even today. The soundtrack is dazzlingly sung and performed with several highlights, not only “Can’t Help Falling in Love,” one of the best and most loved performances of Presley’s entire career, but also a lovely version of “Hawaiian Wedding Song,” a rendition of “Blue Hawaii” that matches Crosby’s in its wistful quality, a commanding performance of “No More” (a rewrite of the Spanish song “La Paloma”), and the gorgeous underrated movie song “Hawaiian Sunset.” But even on the slightest pieces there is no mistaking the precision of Elvis’ singing or the mellifluous quality of his voice. At its worst, it’s still pleasant. Even when things get absurd, Presley and his band elevate it to an enjoyable level.

“No More” – Elvis Presley

The film has those songs. It also has gorgeous scenery capturing many of the most beautiful sights of the Islands. There’s a solid supporting cast to augment its appealing leading man, at his most physically beautiful. The colors are sharp and vibrant. There are also numerous scantily clad beautiful women. On a winter’s day, it can be a very reasonable escape. Many critics have even compared the film to a postcard.

Movies though are not postcards and postcards are not something upon which a young recording artist and actor wants to build his career. The big problem with “Blue Hawaii” the movie is that not a whole heck of a lot happens. Most of the musical numbers are presented in a straightforward, unimaginative manner. The plot is scant, and outside of a fight and a few songs, there’s not really any memorable incidents in the leisurely paced flick.

Ironically, one of the problems with the soundtrack is that some of the songs are tailored to the movie’s modest events. One memorable moment, Elvis sings a song to a friend with a hearty appetite leading to a level of absurdity that no Presley recording had previously reached. Given that the film had a couple of other novelties that could have qualified for that position, that wasn’t good news. And although performing in the Hawaiian motif gave the artist some variety and challenge, much of the soundtrack was as safe and uneventful as the film. A modest rocker like “Almost Always True” was guaranteed not to offend anyone, but also not to overly excite anyone either. This was not something you could say about Presley’s earlier rock ‘n’ roll songs, even something as contrived as 1958′s “Wear My Ring Around Your Neck.”

What’s more, the film completed Presley’s drift away from his roots. In one scene, Elvis is seen spanking a teenage girl that gets out of line, a girl who was the age of Elvis’ then core audience members. He makes it clear, “We are no longer the same.”

The character Elvis plays is a young rich man whose only worry is that his life will be too easy for him. This is a long way from the working class hero of the 1950s, created mutually by the cultures of disenfranchised whites and blacks. This move away from his roots alienated a large part of those audiences even as it picked a whole host of new fans.

But it was more than the overwhelming popularity of the milder more mainstream Presley that made “Blue Hawaii” the model for the rest of Elvis’ 1960s work. It was also the fact that the audience was no longer responding to the more challenging figure he had been to that point. The reception to his most recent studio LPs and 45s demonstrated that, although support for that type of artistry still existed, it was dwindling and was now completely dwarfed by the cleaner, less demanding performer. The ambitious films that Presley made before this told an even worse story. Outside of the relatively large base that would see Presley in anything, there was complete public indifference.

The Presley organization led by his manager “Colonel” Tom Parker got the idea that the more ambitious stuff was not worth promoting. That there were alternate reasons for the relative disappointments seemed to be something that no one, even Elvis, seemed to comprehend. Perhaps “(Marie’s the Name of) His Latest Flame,”/”Little Sister” failed to move a million because the singles market was in a downturn. Perhaps “Can’t Help Falling in Love” zoomed past it because it was one of those rare records that just happened to grab vast swaths of the public, even the people who normally don’t make it to record stores. Perhaps its placement on the soundtrack album was a key in making that LP such a commercial juggernaut.

Maybe it’s why it more than doubled “GI Blues.” That album was advertised via the film but featured no hit singles. The lack of hit singles was a trait shared with the three studio LPs of the era. Although Presley had a string of hit singles in the early 1960s, none of these singles were on an album. This fact alone may explain the relatively low commercial impact of the studio LPs.

Albums in the 1960s, although cheaper than they had been a few years prior, were still relatively high ticket items (priced at about the equivalent of $20 today) and the teen audience for rock ‘n’ roll, while certainly much richer than its predecessors, did not have quite the level of disposable income they possess today. (And even today kids don’t like to spend that kind of coin on CDs.) Buying an LP was a big decision. Fans had to make sure they would like the songs on an album before they bought it. If it contained one or more hit singles, they knew they were ahead of the game. If they recognized all the songs, as many did with the Presley movies, then that was even better. So, an LP like “Blue Hawaii” was advertised on the radio and at the movies. The only way you knew anything about “Elvis is Back” was by gazing at the song titles on the back, buying it, taking it home and spinning it up.

There was no denying that audiences found the light entertainment of “Blue Hawaii” palatable. Yet if Presley and Parker had examined the wreckage of the two dramatic projects they could have come up with alternate explanations for the demise of those projects as well, other than a sheer rejection of Presley and drama. “Wild in the Country,” for instance, was not a very good movie, slowly paced and over-written. Had it been a truly exciting film, perhaps word of mouth would have created audiences. And both films did indeed make money, only relative failures. Perhaps Elvis could have traded off the more ambitious projects like these (as long as they covered costs) with lighter musicals. Sadly, team Presley was incapable of such introspection and took the disparity in success between the dramatic projects and the lighter musicals as direct marching orders from the public.

Elvis began the next year with one of his lightest ever singles, “Good Luck Charm,” which zoomed to #1, but he had not yet gone whole hog. The first two films of the year, “Follow That Dream” and “Kid Galahad,” were kind of hybrid projects which attempted to marry the musical format with layered narratives. There were about half as many songs as featured in the conventional Presley musicals but about twice as many as appeared in the dramas. The commercial results were middling at the box office and in the record shops.

The year closed with the movie “Girls, Girls, Girls,” a sort of sideways sequel or partner to “Blue Hawaii.” Like “Blue Hawaii,” the movie was a big hit, although not as big as that film. The soundtrack again contained a hit single, “Return to Sender,” which was Elvis’ biggest hit of the year, and again the LP easily outstripped Presley’s lone studio album of the year (which predictably contained no hit singles). Again, though, the LP was a much, much smaller hit than “Blue Hawaii.” This was because it wasn’t as good. There were fewer highlights in the soundtrack. There were more novelty or goofy songs. The pop was a little bit less substantial. Presley’s roots were further away and while he was still committed he was just a hair less inspired than he had been the last time out.

The plot of “Girls, Girls, Girls” was a little less demanding than the already not too taxing story of “Blue Hawaii.” The supporting cast wasn’t as good. Seen for the second time in two years, the scenery didn’t seem quite as impressive. In every way, it was a fuzzy copy of a not inspired original. And Presley, his handlers and the studios opted to release further copies of this copy for the next five years.

Elvis made 13 consecutive musicals in that time. Twelve of his next 14 albums of previously unavailable material were film soundtracks based upon the “Blue Hawaii” format, but invariably inferior. The formula was so ingrained that even when Presley went into the studio to record new tracks for traditional LPs, those songs were used as “bonuses” to pad out the soundtracks. Even his slate of singles became dominated by film soundtrack songs, including even film novelty songs.

This all resulted in tracks like “Do the Clam,” “Kissin’ Cousins,” and “Long Legged Girl With the Short Dress On” as Presley’s latest offerings to the pop singles chart. It also resulted in LPs like “Harum Scarum,” “Paradise Hawaiian Style,” and “Double Trouble” filled with songs like “Shake That Tambourine,” “A Dog’s Life,” “Queenie Wahine’s Papaya,” “I Love Only One Girl,” “Old MacDonald” and other titles that made “Rock-a-Hula Baby” seem like “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” by comparison, at a time when the rest of the industry was in a creative renaissance.

Commercially the strategy worked for a few years. “Viva Las Vegas,” one of the few films that mildly tweaked the formula mostly through the presence of white hot co-star Ann-Margret, became Presley’s all time top grosser in 1964. The following year, three of his films made the year’s Top 25. Early in that year, the soundtrack to one of those films, “Roustabout,” became his fourth number one LP of the decade and his last for eight years. Until 1966, all of the soundtrack LPs made the Top Ten and they would continue to make the Top 20 until 1967. The soundtrack singles became slightly less successful, moving roughly the same as his few studio releases of the era, although his biggest hit was a dusted off unreleased studio nugget from 1960 “Crying in the Chapel.”

By the end of 1967, the wheels had fallen off. Presley’s latest singles made the numbers put up by “I Feel So Bad” look spectacular. His LPs took a similar nosedive and his films were struggling just to make back their costs. The subsequent years had convinced the movie industry that Presley had nothing to offer artistically or commercially. Worse, the very thriving, creative and newly self-consciously self-serious pop music audience had assumed the same thing. With a thrilling television show at the end of 1968, Elvis would prove that criticism was wrong musically. But, a substantial portion of the new youth audience would never accept him back into the fold. This was a shame as Presley could have used their support for some of his more adventurous later efforts like 1971′s “Elvis Country,” an honest to gosh concept album and a great one. The LP passed though as just another Elvis album diminishing any chances for a follow up or for even good scholarship on the project’s origins.

Presley also wound up losing several prime years as a recording artist, years that if the singer could have made all the right moves, could have possibly changed the industry. Although there were definite pockets of quality here and there, Elvis’ late 20s and early 30s wound up mostly devoted to lackluster “for hire” work rather than a pursuit of the singer’s own ambitions. At 30 in 1965, it was unlikely that Elvis was going to compete head to head with the younger and fresher Beatles and all the acts that followed them. Each generation needs its own heroes. Commercially, many of Elvis’ peers, including ones who followed the contemporary trends like the Everly Brothers, were unable to even register, at least in their home country. And there’s not even a guarantee that left to his own devices, Presley would have been able to capitalize on the creative spirit of the era. All artists are bound to slump, popular artists especially, and Elvis had some other problems beyond his movie career. Many fans would also argue that Presley’s mid-60s struggles provided a lot of the fire that drove the singer’s renaissance at the end of the decade. Without those struggles, those later triumphs may not have occurred. Still it would have been nice to see him try and to see the impact that would have resulted from such an effort.

If the King ever thought about it, he’d have probably laughed at the irony of it all. His career and ambitions were driven off the track by the one thing that many popular artists covet but very few obtain: An industry defining hit. The cliché says “Be careful what you wish for, you might receive it.” It was a lesson that Elvis Presley lived.

Sources:
Elvis Day by Day: Peter Guralnick and Ernst Jorgensen
Elvis: A Biography: Jerry Hopkins
Billboard’s Pop Annual 1955-1999 – Joel Whitburn
Top Pop Albums 1955-1985- Joel Whitburn

Jackson was unhappy with the finished documentary and so decided not to release it, but he did give a VHS copy to his chauffeur as a bonus. It is this copy that is being sold and the lot does not come with distribution rights.

Fame Bureau’s CEO, Ted Owen, told The Independent:

Other highlights of the unusually named “Rock ‘n’ Roll & Holy Soles” auction include:

• Elvis Presley’s Alden solid body copper/bronze finish guitar that he used while in the army. This comes complete with its original valve amplifier and lead
• Roger McGuinn’s Regal 12-string acoustic guitar. This was the first 12-string that McGuinn ever owned
• Frank Zappa’s customised 1952/53 Les Paul Goldtop Guitar, which he used during the early to mid 1960s on stage and in the studio
• an original 1966 Hofner left-handed violin bass gitar used by Paul McCartney in 2002
• the Rolling Stones Rock ‘n’ Roll Circus photo archive with copyright
• a Fender Duo-Sonic guitar played by John Lennon in the 1970s.

Click here to view all the lots in the auction.

For those whose budget doesn’t stretch to £4 million there is a new Michael Jackson documentary out this month titled “Michael Jackson – The Life of an Icon.”

Title
Michael Jackson – The Life of an Icon (DVD)	Buy Now	Buy Now	Buy Now	Buy Now
Michael Jackson – The Life of an Icon (Blu-ray)	Buy Now	Buy Now	* Buy Now	Buy Now

* – the UK edition is a Blu-ray/DVD combo