Big Little Elvises.

[WARNING: This article contains a hunka-hunka burnin' SPOILERS.]

Last night I finally got caught up with Big Little Lies & like so many others, I was shocked--SHOCKED!--by the revelation in the finale: THERE WAS SO MUCH ELVIS!

I have never seen Elvis embodied so thoroughly, so accurately, so lovingly, & with so much variety, as here & yet in a way that was completely tangental to the main plot. Which is to say, if you take Elvis out of the story, the story remains entirely intact.

Based on the Liane Moriarty novel of the same name, Big Little Lies follows a group of deeply unhappy women in Monterey & the darkness that lies beneath their seemingly idyllic & lavish California lives. The fact that the climax occurs at an Elvis & Audrey trivia night (dads dress as Presley, moms dress as Hepburn) for their children's school is somewhat incidental; it could have happened at a normal dress-up fundraiser. Perhaps it was a statement on their rich lives or post-'60s masculinity & femininity, or maybe it was an excuse to get that spooky-but-awesome line of Audreys used in the opening montage.

At any rate, someone on the show LOVES Elvis because they got things done with so much loving detail that it made me wonder if every dad in Monterey was an Elvis expert. I mean, the show could've just as easily put everyone in jumpsuits & nobody would have faulted the show, let alone noticed. &, as an added bonus, there was a Elvis singing contest that three of characters entered, which meant that Elvis songs were sang throughout.

But this finale episode was different, & spoke to the ubiquity & pop culture saturation of Elvis in a way that no other modern figure can touch. Is there anyone else who is so iconic in so many different looks from so many different eras?

So let's take a look, with a special thanks to Vulture, who already briefly mined this territory & from whom I lifted the pictures below to save time, energy, & sanity (thanks, Vulture!).

Let's go in chronological order...of Elvis!

James Tupper as Nathan Carlson As Jailhouse Rock Elvis (1958).

Confident & cocky James Tupper's Nathan Carlson chose to be Elvis in Jailhouse Rock, the film in which Elvis plays Vince Everett, a confident & cocky prison inmate who, rashness aside, is a decent guy underneath it all. Pretty good choice for macho, salt-of-the-earth Nathan, with a costume that's correct down through the stenciled 6240 prison number. Only strange part is that he doesn't actually sing "Jailhouse Rock" in the contest. After an earlier scene finds him testing out the brooding "Burning Love" & "Trouble" but he ends up crooning "How's The World Treating You?", a lackluster ballad from Elvis's second album Elvis in 1956. Of course, his song seems to occur during the dramatic murder sequence, so maybe it was put in to represent a voice of fate, although others hear it as a diss track to his rival Adam Scott's Ed. Still, it's a weird choice since only the most devoted Elvis fans would've known it--in real life, the dance floor would've been filled with the idle chatter of the disinterested.

Jeffrey Nordling as Gordon Klein As Gold Lame' Suit Elvis (1959).

Jeffrey Nordling's Gordon Klein takes on his version of Elvis's gold lame' suit, which he wore on the cover of 1959's 50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong: Elvis' Gold Records, Vol. 2. It feels like a pretty flat choice for a pretty flat character: His main appeal is his massive amount of money; it's hard to figure out why else Laura Dern's Renata would put up with him otherwise. He's a drip in search of a backbone, but he's rich so, sure, why not, do the gold lame' suit thing? It's also the least-accurate of the costumes, what with the black undershirt & gold chains that Elvis wouldn't wear for at least another decade. & he didn't even bother to shave his beard.



Adam Scott as Ed Mackenzie As Blue Hawaii Elvis (1961).

After an earlier scene teased us with Adam Scott's Ed Mackenzie wearing a '70s Vegas jumpsuit costume & crooning "One Night" before his daughter suggests the less-obvious (& less-good) "Pocket Full Of Rainbows." Based on this, I assumed Ed would be dressed in a jumpsuit & singing "Rainbows," but he ended up surprising us all. He instead shaved his beard (!), slipped into a Hawaiian shirt & lei (after all, Ed did say that he loves costumes). For the talent competition, Ed sang a lovely rendition of "The Wonder Of You," a beautiful song that actually did date from the jumpsuit era. Like everyone else who was watching, I wondered if it was/wanted it to be Adam Scott singing, but alas, it was not. Carefully sung as a tender ballad (Ed is smart enough to know that no one could touch Elvis's overwrought storm of a reading), it spoke of his simple devotion to Reese Witherspoon's Madeline, who gets it & is so touched that she cuts out in the middle of the song. We are left to assume that Ed Mackenzie is the only nice person with a y-chromosone in Monterey.

Alexander Skarsgard as Perry Wright As '68 Comeback Special Elvis (1968).

I was fascinated by the fact that Alexander Skarsgard's Perry Wright was the Comeback Elvis. For starters, his character is constantly leaving & coming back, both physically, as work often takes him on trips (probably) & psychologically, as he turns from a seemingly devoted husband into a rage-filled monster just as frequently. Thus, his whole character is about coming back &, as his long-suffering wife, Nicole Kidman's Celeste finally acknowledges in this episode, will keep coming back until she leaves him. If you listen to Elvis's best music from & directly after The Comeback Special, much of it seems to contain a thinly-veiled layer of rage--just check out "Guitar Man" or "Wearin' That Loved On Look." It is the music of a displaced man & part of its thrill lies in its intensity, the terror at which Elvis feels his convictions. With Neil Young's "Helpless" playing over an earlier scene of Celeste's abuse & The Temptations' "Papa Was A Rolling Stone" being lip-synched by fatherless child Ziggy in an earlier episode, one cannot help but wonder what song Perry would have sung had he not been brutally murdered by Bonnie. (Which makes him the only character to also play an equally influential Elvis: Dead Elvis.)



Oh yes, & Bonnie. Zoe Kravitz's Bonnie is the only Audrey Hepburn to sing at the event, as she croons a beautiful rendition of "Don't," Elvis's last single before he went into the Army. 

She is also the only actor who didn't have to lip-sync to another singer (as the daughter of Lenny Kravitz & Lisa Bonet, she didn't need to). She gives a performance that is completely sultry & feminine, reminding you just how gentle Elvis could be to impress the ladies. It is also a reminder of how great the oft-overlooked "Don't" is.

& although I can't find a picture of it, Santiago Cabrera's Joseph was a great '50s Elvis, dressed in the black-&-white suit Elvis often wore onstage & on TV. Out of all the actors, he is the one who naturally looks the most like Elvis, so for him, it felt like less of a costume than as a second skin. Given his stage background, one wonders if crooned elsewhere in the night too. Maybe he too was planning to sing "The Wonder Of You" to Madeline, although "Suspicious Minds" would've been the more appropriate choice.

I also love the Elvises that we only saw glimpses of--the African-American purple Vegas Elvis who we see sing the end of a slow-burn "Treat Me Nice"; the military Private Elvis we see in one shot as people are walking in; all the half-assed Elvises who simply threw on glasses & or fake sideburns because they didn't care enough to do any better.

& perhaps that speaks to the depth of the Elvis well. Iconic & versatile as she was, Audrey never had a chance against Elvis. Most of the women were variations on Breakfast At Tiffany's with a few My Fair "Ladies" thrown in, although I was rewarded in a long-shot of a Sabrina. For so many different men to delve into so many different Elvises, it begs the question, if you were attending this party, which Elvis would you go as? Or more directly, which Elvis are you?

I've often held that Elvis is a figure like William Shakespeare or Abraham Lincoln--we project onto him how we would like to see ourselves.

Much to my surprise & delight, the finale of Big Little Lies showed what a multi-layered & multi-faceted exercise this could be.

Last Thoughts On Chuck Berry, 1926-2017.

Years ago, I once read that Chuck Berry is the rock upon which rock & roll rests; to this day, I cannot think of a better way to put his influence.

Only The Beatles, Elvis, Dylan, & The Rolling Stones can rival him in influence, & of those 4, only Elvis is conceivable without him.

Simply put, Chuck Berry is rock & roll.

The depth, range, & influence of artists who have covered him is staggering: The Beatles, Elvis, The Rolling Stones, The Beach Boys, The Sex Pistols, Jerry Lee Lewis, David Bowie, The Animals, The Kinks, The Band--& that's just off the top of my head & only counting songs that were officially released on official albums. Throw in live recordings, jam sessions, & bootlegs, & you'd have basically everyone ever.

His music is the blood that flows through the veins of rock & roll; take it away, & the history of the music dies.

The Beatles cut their teeth on his records. They paid credit both directly, with blistering covers of "Roll Over Beethoven" & "Rock & Roll Music," but also indirectly, when Lennon lifted the "Here come ol' flat top, he come groovin' up slowly" from Berry's "You Can't Catch Me" to begin his classic "Come Together." Lennon could be forgiven though; it was simply proof that by 1969, Chuck Berry was simply rock's second mind.

The Rolling Stones' first single was a cover of Berry's "Come On," while one of their early standout covers was "Carol." They also went to Chess Records, the temple where Chuck recorded, & laid down a great version of "Around & Around," which was also covered by The Animals that same year. (David Bowie cut a version of the same song seven years later; it was originally slated to go on the Ziggy Stardust album.) Did I write that Chuck Berry was rock's second mind by 1969? I take that back. By 1965, Mick Jagger took the line "I can't get no satisfaction from the judge" from Berry's "Thirty Days" & wrote what many consider to be rock's definitive anthem.

Those people are wrong, though. Rock's definitive anthem came seven years earlier when Chuck Berry released "Johnny B. Goode."

From the blazing guitar intro through the lyrics and the solo, no one could ever beat it, not even Chuck himself. It was the story of the American Dream told through the eyes of a young guitarist, highlighted by those two-note driving solos that Berry used build rock guitar's (which is to say, rock's) basic vocabulary. Any time you hear someone blasting out those double-note riffs, they are reaching for Chuck Berry's performance in "Johnny B. Goode."

Yet that said, "Johnny B. Goode" was not surprisingly the toughest Chuck Berry song to cover. Both The Beatles & Elvis made passes on it in live performances, but neither could come close. To best illustrate the point, listen to The Sex Pistols set it aflame in an early demo where they can't play it & Johnny Rotten doesn't know the words. They end up shouting "Go! Go! Go!" because it's all they can do. It's a pathetic mess, but in its own raw way, it blows away those versions by The Beatles & Elvis.

Elvis couldn't do a Chuck Berry song justice until he tackled "Promised Land" in 1975, & it was his last truly classic recording. Berry had written it in jail some fifteen years earlier & like "Johnny B. Goode" before it, it too told a version of the American Dream, only this time from East Coast to West, &, as Greil Marcus pointed out when he called it the greatest American song of all time (as in, song about America), rags to riches. It's like one big musical montage that ends with a phone call to the folks back home where it all began.

When Elvis had the famous Million Dollar Quartet jam session with Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, & Johnny Cash, Chuck Berry was virtually the only rock on the menu that wasn't someone already in the room. The majority of the session leaned on gospel, country, & blues, but there was a hilarious stretch where they try to remember the words to "Brown-Eyed Handsome Man" & piece it together in a gesture of love & admiration, with Elvis strumming away frantically on the acoustic guitar. Once they finally get it, Carl goes into a story about coming off of tour with Chuck Berry.

Chuck Berry touring was an interesting thing by the 1980s, where Berry would show up to a club with his guitar in hand, get his money, then go onstage & play with whatever band was there. Every band knows his songs, he rationalized, because his songs are the rock & roll songbook. A young Bruce Springsteen was in one of these bands in the 1970s; twenty years later, he would back Berry at the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame Concert in 1995. In the years in between, he released a live version of "Run, Run Rudolph," proving even Berry's Christmas songs were nothing to be ignored.

& then there are the Chuck Berry songs that lead to other songs. Brian Wilson so clearly lifted Berry's "Sweet Little Sixteen" for The Beach Boys' 1963 breakthrough "Surfin' U.S.A." that Wilson eventually had to give him a co-authorship credit; years earlier, rhythm & blues singer Richard Berry (no relation) used the pidgin English of Chuck's "Havana Moon" as a main inspiration for "Louie, Louie," later immortalized by The Kingsmen in a song that all but invented punk rock.

& then there is the popular memory. Back To The Future (Marty McFly playing "Johnny B. Goode" while the film's greatest line is spoken: "Hey Chuck, this is your cousin Marvin, Marvin Berry! You know that new sound you've been looking for? Well listen to THIS!") & Pulp Fiction (the twist dance contest scene, set to "You Never Can Tell") put Chuck Berry into motion picture history in a way that even his own Hail, Hail Rock & Roll documentary could not. When John Lennon & Yoko Ono cohosted The Mike Douglas Show in the 1970s, they jumped at the chance to have Chuck Berry on, & then jumped at the chance to play with him on stage (it serves as a reminder that for everything that Lennon's presence supposedly represented about the counterculture, he was still most wowed by '50s rock & roll). & when NASA shot a rocket into space representing human culture, Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode" was among its artifacts. Saturday Night Live famously quipped that the first response from alien life has been received & it is: "Send more Chuck Berry."

& as some like to tell it, Chuck Berry's 1955 first hit single, "Maybellene," was the first rock & roll record of them all.

The one & only time I ever saw Chuck Berry was 50 years to the day after "Maybellene" was released, in August of 2005, at the nightclub he owned in St. Louis, Blueberry Hill, which oddly named after a Fats Domino song. Even odder was that, after much fanfare about this being the 50th anniversary of "Maybellene," he didn't even play the song. My sister & I had gotten there early, stood in line for a few hours, & sat in the front row. Even though he was in his 80s, he came out like a king & was rock royalty in a way I have only ever seen in person from his contemporaries like Jerry Lee Lewis & B.B. King--those pre-television legends who could really hold a stage.

With his son leading the band, Berry played 10 songs in 60 minutes, 9 of his classics & one Jimmy Reed cover. He was spry, sprightly, having fun, & basking in the glow, & during "Johnny B. Goode," he even duckwalked, to my astonishment. He closed with "Reelin' & Rockin'," never one of my favorites at that time, but a favorite ever since. His band shrewdly pulled up girls onstage to dance (of which my sister was thrilled to be among the first, invited up by none other than Chuck Berry, Jr.), which allowed him to sneak out the back behind the wall of dancing girls. It was the rock & roll equivalent of disappearing in a cloud of smoke.

Now Chuck Berry is truly gone. It may be cliche, but it seems like there is nowhere else to end but with the final verse of "School Day," yet another song that, like so many others, is so vital to rock's repertoire but escaped my stream-of-conscious words above.

As the man said:

Hail, hail rock & roll

Deliver me from the days of old

Long live rock & roll

The beat of the drums, loud & bold

Rock, rock, rock & roll

The feeling is there, body & soul

Chuck Berry is dead. Long live Chuck Berry.

The Top 5 Sun Records Songs Not Released As Singles.

 

Sun Studio, universally hailed as The Birthplace Of Rock & Roll, was an embarrassment of 1950s riches. Their roster formed a Mount Rushmore of rockabilly--Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, & Johnny Cash--& even their second-stringers were future American musical masters like Roy Orbison & Charlie Rich.

But when you start stacking up what was actually released by each artist while they were on the label, the results are surprisingly small. Elvis released only 10 sides while he was at the label, while Carl Perkins only put out 19. Even Jerry Lee Lewis, who recorded the most extensively at Sun--a recent box set of his Sun output clocks in at 18 discs--only released about 2 CDs worth of material while he was employed as an artist there.

So what to do with all of the leftovers? Budget labels & bootleggers have been releasing this ever since, elevating some of these to minor classics in their own right. Everyone may know "That's All Right," "Blue Suede Shoes," & "Great Balls Of Fire," but these ones are arguably as worthy in their own way.

& before we begin, an honorable mention goes out to Carl Perkins' "Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby," which was left off of the list because although it was never released as a single, it was put on his 1957 Sun LP; all of the songs on this list were never released in any format on Sun Records.

5. "Trying To Get To You" by Elvis Presley.

Elvis famously released 10 sides on Sun Records between 1954 & 1955--5 bluesy A-sides backed by 5 country B-sides--& "Trying To Get To You" would've been the 11th side, if only Sam Phillips had a country song to back it with. Unfortunately for Phillips, Elvis signed with RCA before he could record one, which stipulated that Phillips hand over all of Elvis's masters to the new label. (Phillips was sure not to make this mistake again when Columbia signed Johnny Cash, allowing himself to have several years' & albums worth of Cash material ready despite his departure.) Sun's loss is Elvis's first album's gain as his cover of an R&B hit by The Eagles (no, not THAT Eagles--this one was an African-American doo-wop group who are so mysterious that I literally cannot even find a listing of the members' names) was a standout track on an already near-perfect album. It is Elvis's capstone at Sun, singing with all of the confidence & charisma that would carry him through the coming years--although some would argue with increasingly diminishing results.

4. "Domino" by Roy Orbison.

I've always had a soft-spot for Roy Orbison's work at Sun. Although it is overshadowed by his more influential subsequent work at Moment Records (& with ballads like "Cryin'" & rockers like "Oh, Pretty Woman" it's easy to see why), one can hear an eagerness & vulnerability all but absent from his peers. Elvis was the hot one, Jerry Lee Lewis was the crazy one, Johnny Cash was the tough one, Carl Perkins was the quiet one--& Roy Orbison was the awkward one. He didn't have the bravado of the others & to his credit, he didn't try to. Phillips didn't quite know what to do with him but Roy also didn't know what to do with himself either (how else can one explain the coupling of "Chicken Hearted" & "I Like Love" as a single?). In a sea of rebels, Roy was the guy you could relate to. "Domino," his finest Sun cut outside of "Ooby Dooby" & "Go! Go! Go!," was better than nearly all of the other sides he would release during his short stint at the label. One only has to listen to the likes of "Chicken Hearted" & "I Like Love" to get an idea of what people should've been hearing instead.

3. "Wild One" by Jerry Lee Lewis.

"Wild One" was originally written by Johnny O'Keefe, the first major Australian rock & roll star. It kicks, it's cute, it's got lots of saxophone. Enter The Killer. He doesn't so much cover the song as he does eat it up & spit it out as fire in his own image. Gone are the original lyrics, in its place are rushed, half-improvised new ones that allude to his own hits & style. Recorded in 1958, it wouldn't see the light of day until the 1970s, which is a shame because it out-classes "High School Confidential" & most other things that would follow. It's tempting to say it would've provided him with that comeback hit in the wake of his marriage scandal, but if the similarly excellent rave-up "Lovin' Up A Storm" couldn't crack the Top 80, this probably wouldn't have been able to either. Regardless, "Wild One" should with Aretha Franklin's "Respect" & Jimi Hendrix's "All Along The Watchtower" as one of rock's finest covers, but Jerry Lee Lewis so effectively makes it his own that few are even aware that it's a cover in the first place--because after all, Jerry Lee Lewis will always be rock & roll's most wild one.


2. "A Red Cadillac & A Black Mustache" by Warren Smith.

Of all the ones who shoulda-coulda-woulda made it at Sun but didn't, my vote for the least well-known with the best back catalog is Warren Smith. A country singer by trade, he took to the rock music much more naturally than, say, his Sun label-mate Johnny Cash. It was Cash who wrote (or bought for $40 from George Jones) Smith's first single, "Rock & Roll Ruby," which did well enough locally to ensure a few more sides. Despite rockabilly that was equal parts tough & driving (the classic "Ubangi Stomp") & strange & folksy (the "Old, Weird America"-invoking B-sides "Black Jack David" & "Miss Froggie"), the only national hit he ever got was "So Long, I'm Gone," which petered out at #74. Left in the can was this song, a haunting & moody evocation of lost love shrouded in jealousy & suspicion. Only one known take of it exists, placing it in the category of one-known-take wonders like Robert Johnson's "Hell Hound On My Trail" & Elvis's own "Mystery Train." This song alone stands as proof not only as Sun's depth of quality as a label, but of Warren Smith's effortless--& largely forgotten--talent.


1. "Put Your Cat Clothes On" by Carl Perkins.
 

 
On December 4, 1956, the most famous jam session in rock history took place at Sun Studio, where Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, & Johnny Cash sang old gospel, country, & pop songs, over an hour of which made it onto the legendary "Million Dollar Quartet" tape. What is often overlooked is why half of The Million Dollar Quartet (Perkins & Lewis) were there in the first place--to cut a regular session. Perkins was on his way down--it was a little under a year since "Blue Suede Shoes" became a breakthrough smash & he was still looking for that elusive follow-up hit; Jerry Lee Lewis was on his way up--his first single, "Crazy Arms," was just newly released where it would become a local hit & launchpad to a year of glory. But for now, Perkins was the bigger star & this was his session--Lewis was there as an anonymous session man, reportedly to earn some money for Christmas presents. Out of this session came Perkins' masterpiece "Matchbox," which managed to make #67 on the pop charts as the B-side to the inferior "Your True Love."

But arguably better than both songs is "Put Your Cat Clothes On," one of the toughest & most exciting rockabilly record ever cut. Perkins sings with a force & fun that he only ever really matched with "Dixie Fried," rushing lines & keeping the festivities rocking. Also unique for a Perkins record is Lewis's piano solo. Usually Perkins' tight, well-measured electric guitar would play during the solos (as it does during the second musical break), but here a young Lewis takes center stage, with an offhand & breezy, carefree solo. His energy helps to fuel the song's drive & is what arguably pushes Perkins to such a rocking, memorable performance.

It unusual for two rock legends (one past & one future) to collaborate so organically, but therein lies the magic of "Put Your Cat Clothes On"--& by extension, Sun Studio.

Elvis 101: The 101 Essential Recordings.

Elvis Presley released over 700 songs while he was alive, across over 70 albums & nearly a quarter-century of time.

But what are the most essential?

This list, Elvis 101: The 101 Essential Recordings, whittles the artist down to his essence, 4 chronological playlists that are each around 70 minutes in length.

To get an accurate cross-section of his best & most influential material, I made an inventory of his 5 most major multi-disc collections of the CD age:

1. The Top Ten Hits [2 discs, 1987] *
2. ELV1S & 2nd To None [2 discs, 2002 & 2003] #
3. The Essential Elvis Presley: 3.0 [3 discs, 2007] +
4. Artist Of The Century [3 discs, 1999] @
5. Elvis 75: Good Rockin' Tonight [4 discs, 2009] %

Any song that appeared on at least 2 or more of the above compilations automatically made my list. (For the record, there are 17 that appear on all 5.) I also included all of the songs from each time there has been an attempt to make a definitive single-disc anthology of Elvis's music: 1994's The Essential Collection, 1999's Best Of Artist Of The Century, & 2009's Elvis 75. & then I added another half-dozen of my own choices, which should've made the above collections.

Finally, I made sure that all of Elvis's US Pop, Country, & R&B #1 hits were included, all of his US Top 10 Hits, platinum-selling singles, as well as every UK #1 hit.
 

From his first release in 1954 to the last single he would release in his lifetime in 1977--& at least 1 release from every year in between--here is Elvis 101: The Essential 101 Recordings.

 

Volume 1: King (1954-1957).

1. That's All Right: His first single, & as some like to tell it, the first rock & roll record, period. [single A-side, 1954] #+@%

2. Blue Moon Of Kentucky: The flipside of his first single, & it's own way, every bit as rocking & revolutionary. [single B-side, 1954] %

3. Good Rockin' Tonight: A manifesto for all that would follow. [single A-side, 1954] +@%

4. Baby, Let's Play House: His first nationally charting record, making #5 on the US country charts. [single A-side, 1955] +@%

5. Mystery Train: A country song hidden in a blues song hidden in a love song to a corpse, & for some, the finest recording of his life. [single A-side, 1955] +@%

6. I Forgot To Remember To Forget: His first national #1 single (on the Country charts) & the song that facilitated his jump from regional star to national sensation. [single B-side, 1955] #%

7. Trying To Get To You: What would have been his 6th Sun single & evidence the kid was ready for the big-time. [projected single A-side, 1955; LP Elvis Presley, 1956] @

8. Heartbreak Hotel: The song that put him over--#1 for 7 weeks in the US. [single A-side, 1956; #1 US, #2 UK] *#+@%

9. I Was The One: Already on the flipside of his first major single, all of Elvis's stylistics are present--a portrait of the artist as young man, in complete control. [single B-side, 1956; #19 US] +%

10. Blue Suede Shoes: One of his finest rockers that would've been a bigger hit, but he didn't want to overshadow his old Sun label-mate, Carl Perkins, who Elvis always believed cut the better version. [LP Elvis Presley & single A-side, 1956; #20 US, #9 UK] #+@% 

11. I Want You, I Need You, I Love You: A criminally neglected US #1 best-seller, despite what ELV1S: 30 #1 Hits may lead you to believe. [single A-side, 1956; #1 US, #14 UK] *#% 

12. My Baby Left Me: One of the hardest records of the 1950s, buried on a B-side, waiting for thrilling rediscovery. [single B-side, 1956; #31 US] @% 

13. Hound Dog: The hard rock half of his biggest & most famous single, a stateside #1 for a then record-breaking 11 weeks. [single A-side, 1956; #1 US, #2 UK] *#+@% 

14. Don't Be Cruel: The above single's smooth pop half; when Sam Phillips first heard it, he pulled his car off the road--this was the sound he always knew was out there. [single A-side, 1956; #1 US, #2 UK] *#+@%

15. Lawdy Miss Clawdy: Elvis's finest R&B cover, shrewdly revived in his comeback era. [single A-side, 1956] @% 

16. Love Me Tender: A rewrite of a Civil War ballad that was the title track of his first film, the first single to go gold based on advance orders alone, & his signature love song for years to come. [single A-side, 1956; #1 US, #11 UK] *#+@%

17. Love Me: An EP track that was so big, it was the first to chart as a single in US history. [LP Elvis & EP lead track; #2 US] *#@% 

18. Too Much: Gluttony as lust, lifted by internal rhymes. [single A-side, 1957; #1 US, #6 UK] *#% 

19. All Shook Up: A signature hit that invoked his recent performance on The Ed Sullivan Show (from the waist up) & #1 in the US for 9 weeks. [single A-side, 1957; #1 US, #1 UK] *#+@% 

20. (There'll Be) Peace In The Valley (For Me): His first gospel release, & as some like to tell it, his finest. [EP lead track, 1957; #25 US] +% 

21. (Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear: The most subtle song about sleeping with girls EVER--& #1 in the US for 7 weeks. [single A-side, 1957; #1 US, #3 UK] *#+@%

22. Loving You: The title track of Elvis's 2nd film & 3rd LP; immortalized between "Hound Dog" & "All Shook Up" at the top of the original Elvis' Golden Records, still his finest compilation. [single B-side, 1957; #20 US] #


23. Mean Woman Blues: An instant classic that was often covered but never bettered. [LP Loving You, 1957] #%

24. Got A Lot O' Livin' To Do!: The irresistible opening song to first starring film & a knockout upbeat rocker. [LP Loving You, 1957] @

25. Jailhouse Rock: Springsteen said that hearing Elvis for the first time was like busting out of jail; this song takes the Boss at his word--& a US #1 for 7 weeks. [single A-side, 1957; #1 US, #1 UK] *#+@% 

26. Treat Me Nice: A plea to the ladies & a study in atmosphere. [single B-side, 1957; US #27] #@% 

27. (You're So Square) Baby I Don't Care: Elvis's finest deep cut of 1950s, covered by none other than Buddy Holly in his brief career. [EP Jailhouse Rock, 1957] @

28. Blue Christmas: His finest Christmas recording, & in time, a rare platinum-seller that never made the mainstream pop charts. [LP Elvis' Christmas Album, 1957] % 

29. Don't: The last hit before he went into the Army--& in a quiet way, the end of an era. [single A-side, 1958; #1 US, #2 UK] *#@% 

30. I Beg Of You: The underrated Top 10 B-side to "Don't," which like its flip, was recorded the previous year. [single B-side, 1958; #8 US] *
 

Volume 2: Soldier (1958-1962).

31. Wear My Ring Around Your Neck: The first major single not to hit #1 in the US or UK (although it would top the charts in Canada); an early harbinger of the shlock that was to come? [single A-side, 1958; #3 US, #3 UK] *#% 

32. Hard Headed Woman: The history of sexism as hard rock. [single A-side, 1958; #1 US, #2 UK] *#%

33. King Creole: The title track of his finest film. [LP King Creole, 1958] #+%

34. Trouble: A raison d'etre for every role he would ever play--on camera & off.  [LP King Creole, 1958] #+@%

35. One Night: An answer record to The Shirelles' "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow," even though it came first. [single A-side, 1958; US #4, UK #1] *#@%

36. I Got Stung: A Top 10 hit (thanks in part to its risque flip, "One Night") about love as an allergic reaction [single B-side; US #8] *#

37. (Now & Then There's) A Fool Such As I: The point at which style became the substance. [single A-side, 1959; #2 US, #1 UK] *#@%

38. I Need Your Love Tonight: A solid flipside that would've been any other singer's biggest hit. [single B-side, 1959; #4 US] *#%

39. A Big Hunk O' Love: One final blast of rock for the decade, & the song that would first associate "hunka" & "love" in the Elvis lexicon. [single A-side, 1959; #1 US, #4 UK] *#@%

40. Stuck On You: Back from the Army & ready to reconquer the world, one hit single at a time. [single A-side, 1960; #1 US, #3 UK] *#@%

41. Fame & Fortune: A solid ballad with a stunning vocal--rendered all the more bittersweet now that we know how the story will turn out. [single B-side, 1960; #17 US]

42. Girl Of My Best Friend: A fine, effortless vocal on a song that could've been a hit single in it's own right--& in the UK it was. [LP Elvis Is Back!, 1960; UK single A-side, 1960; #2 UK] @

43. Such A Night: A track so irresistible, it was carted out as a single during the doldrums of Beatlemania, where it made the Top 20 in both the US & UK. [LP Elvis Is Back!, 1960; #16 US, #13 UK] +@%

44. Reconsider Baby: Another way his post-Army music could've gone--hard blues full of conviction, with Elvis driving the band like a runaway train; one of his greatest performances, even though he lets "Boots" Randolph's saxophone steal the show. [LP Elvis Is Back!, 1960] +@%

45. It's Now Or Never: A rewrite of an Italian standard that became his best-selling single this side of "Hound Dog"/"Don't Be Cruel." [single A-side, 1960; #1 US, #1 UK] *#+@% 

46. A Mess Of Blues: The above single's flipside, which could've (& should've) been a bigger hit in its own right. [single B-side, 1960; #32 US] #@%

47. Wooden Heart: A rarity: A #1 UK single (for 6 weeks!) that was never issued as an A-side in the US. [LP G.I. Blues, 1960; #1 UK] #

48. Are You Lonesome Tonight?: The final third of his comeback trilogy (along with "Stuck On You" & "It's Now Or Never"), & in the speaking part, the best acting of his life. [single A-side, 1960; #1 US, #1 UK] *#+@%

49. Surrender: Picking up where "It's Now Or Never" left off, Elvis exercises his operatic tendencies a decade before they became a caricature. [single A-side, 1961; #1 US, #1 UK] *#@%

50. I Feel So Bad: As the first major A-side not to hit #1 in either the US or UK, a sign of the coming trouble in paradise? [single A-side, 1961; #5 US, #4 UK] *#+%

51. (Marie's The Name) His Latest Flame: Hot enough to be a hit in its own day, hip enough to be turned into a Smiths song in ours. [single A-side, 1961; #4 US, #1 UK] *#@%

52. Little Sister: Elvis tries to get the girl, despite being wary of her older sister. [single B-side, 1961; #5 US] *#+@%

53. Can't Help Falling In Love: The lead single of his best-selling album (Blue Hawaii) & rightfully the song with which he would close his sets in the later years--what else could ever follow it? [single A-side, 1961; #2 US, #1 UK] *#+@%

54. Rock-A-Hula Baby: Along with its flipside, "Can't Help Falling In Love," a microcosm of Elvis in the '60s, pop beauty on one side, movie junk on the other; "Rock-A-Hula Baby" wasn't the worst song Elvis ever recorded, but it was the biggest hit of his infamous 1960s hackwork. [single B-side, 1961; #23 US] # 

55. Good Luck Charm: Elvis tries to get the girl by invoking the superstitions of talismans. [single A-side, 1962; #1 US, #1 UK] *#@%

56. Follow That Dream: The theme song to Elvis's life. [EP lead track, 1962; #15 US] +

57. She's Not You: Elvis tries to get the girl by re-staging the plot of Vertigo. [single A-side, 1962; #5 US, #1 UK] *#@% 

58. Return To Sender: Elvis tries to get the girl by enlisting the U.S. Postal Service. [single A-side, 1962; #2 US, #1 UK] *#+@%

Volume 3: Phoenix (1963-1969).

59. (You're The) Devil In Disguise: Elvis tries to get the girl by entering a Paradiso-enshrined Inferno. [single A-side, 1963; #3 US, #1 UK] *#+@%

60. Bossa Nova Baby: Elvis tries to get the girl but all she wants to do is dance--also the final single he released before JFK was shot & his last US Top 10 of new material until his comeback later in the decade--coincidence? [single A-side, 1963; #8 US, #13 UK] *#+%

61. It Hurts Me: Elvis proves that a beautiful vocal & a solid bridge can go a long, long way. [single B-side, 1964; #29 US] @%


62. Viva Las Vegas: A telling celebration of the kitschy consumer culture that would consume him in a few short years. [single A-side, 1964; #29 US, #15 UK] #+%

63. Crying In The Chapel: Elvis's only pre-comeback US Top 10 once The Beatles arrived--& it was recorded in 1960. [single A-side, 1965; #3 US, #1 UK] *#%

64. Tomorrow Is A Long Time: Elvis's only real Dylan cover--& the cover that Dylan is said to have treasured the most--buried away as a bonus track at the end of a soundtrack. [LP Speedway, 1966] @%

65. Down In The Alley: The first indication that Elvis was getting ready to take rock seriously again, & it was good. [LP Speedway, 1966] @

66. How Great Thou Art: The greatest sacred performance of Elvis's life. [LP How Great Thou Art, 1967; #101 US] %

67. Big Boss Man: The single that marked Elvis's quiet return to meaningful rock music, before an official comeback vehicle was formed. [single A-side, 1967; #38 US] +@%

68. Guitar Man: The song that would become the theme of the official comeback vehicle. [single A-side, 1968; #43 US, #19 UK] +@%

69. U.S. Male: Along with "Big Boss Man" & "Guitar Man," the 3rd & weakest of his "pre-Comeback" singles--yet oddly, the biggest hit. [single A-side, 1968; #28 US, #15 UK]

70. A Little Less Conversation: A forgotten tune that was so hot it became a #1 single. In England. 30 years later. Through a remix. Yet I find the implied funk of the original all the more exciting. [single A-side, 1968; #69 US] +

71. If I Can Dream: The closing song of the comeback special & one of the finest performances of his life. [single A-side, 1968; #12 US, #11 UK] #+@%

72. Memories: The sentimental theme of the comeback special, which means it's the sentimental theme of his entire career. [LP ELVIS: NBC-TV Special, 1968; single A-side, 1969; #35 US] #+%

73. Tiger Man: A standout track from sit-down set of "The '68 Comeback Special," where Elvis truly reclaimed his rock & roll crown. [LP Elvis Sings Flaming Star, 1968] @

74. In The Ghetto: Keeping with the times, Elvis wanted to do a "message" song; keeping with himself, he did one that spoke out against poverty--although it missed the top of the main US & UK charts, it was snuck onto ELV1S thanks to a #1 in Cashbox. [single A-side, 1969; #3 US, #2 UK] *#+@%

75. Only The Strong Survive: Some motherly wisdom that formed the most recognizable track from the finest studio album he would ever make. [LP From Elvis In Memphis, 1969] +@%

76. Long Black Limousine: His greatest performance, period. (c/f my earlier Long Black Limousine post) [LP From Elvis In Memphis, 1969]

77. Suspicious Minds: His final US #1, driven by a love-fueled paranoia that wouldn't meet its match until Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean." [single A-side, 1969; #1 US, #2 UK] *#+@%

78. Don't Cry Daddy: A tender performance of a country weeper, just before the production values turned the material more maudlin than meaningful. [single A-side, 1969; #6 US, #8 UK] *#+@%

79. Rubberneckin': One of the funkiest things Elvis ever cut--a worthy companion to the contemporary "A Little Less Conversation." [single B-side, 1969]

80. Stranger In My Own Home Town: Hard blues from a stranger in a strange land of the music he himself helped to create. [LP From Memphis To Vegas/From Vegas To Memphis, 1969] @%

81. Kentucky Rain: His greatest single miss the Top 10 (except for in Canada & Australia). [single A-side, 1970; #16 US, #21 UK] #+%

Volume 4: Icon (1970-1977).

82. The Wonder Of You: "Kentucky Rain" notwithstanding (it was a track from 1969 that wasn't released until early 1970), this was the beginning of Elvis's final decade--live, off-handed, passionate, overzealous, & powerful; many subsequent songs would try to meet this standard, but precious few would succeed. [single A-side, 1970; #9 US, #1 UK] *#+@

83. Polk Salad Annie: Never much of a hit or a radio staple, someone at RCA must love this one, as it makes not just every multi-disc anthology, but the one-disc summaries of them too; that said, it nicely captures Elvis on stage in his '70s prime, albeit without the focus or power of "The Wonder Of You." [LP On Stage, 1970; UK single A-side, 1973; #23 UK] +@%

84. I've Lost You: The first sign of the new, mature Elvis that would be revealed on his album That's The Way It Is later in the year, which featured dissolving marriages & babies crying at 6:00 AM; Elvis had grown up & his audience had too. [single A-side, 1970; #32 US, #9 UK] @

85. You Don't Have To Say You Love Me: Along with "I've Lost You," the beginning of the studio '70s--regal, overblown, & at its best (like here), a place where quality of songcraft is met by commitment of performance. [single A-side, 1970; #11 US, #9 UK] #+@

86. I Really Don't Want To Know: The lead single of his last great album, Elvis Country: I'm 10,000 Years Old, which would be released early the following year, & it served as an apt preview--a heartfelt rendering of a country song that brought it just to the edge of soul. [single A-side, 1970; #21 US]

87. I Just Can't Help Believin': Like "Polk Salad Annie," another song that somehow makes nearly every major Elvis compilation; I've always found it solid, but a bit dull & about a minute too long. [LP That's The Way It Is, 1970; UK single A-side, 1971; #6 UK] +@%

88. Faded Love: The most underrated song from his most underrated LP; or: A country song sung like blue-eyed soul, coaxed by horn charts. [LP Elvis Country: I'm 10,000 Years Old, 1971]

 89. Funny How Time Slips Away: Another standout from the underrated Elvis Country--& a performance so natural that it serves as a reminder why Elvis always returned to country music: It feels like home. [LP Elvis Country: I'm 10,000 Years Old, 1971] %

90. I'm Leavin': Elvis loved this song & believed it would be a huge hit; it wasn't, but it remains one of his most committed--& naked--performances of the decade. [single A-side, 1971; #36 US, #23 UK] %

91. An American Trilogy: The paradoxes of the Civil War resolved in a single medley: South ("Dixie"), North ("The Battle Hymn Of The Republic"), & slave ("All My Trials"). [single A-side, 1972; #66 US, #8 UK] #@%

92. Burning Love: His final truly signature hit; snuck onto the ELV1S CD because it reached #1 on Cashbox. [single A-side, 1972; #2 US, #7 UK] *#+@%

93. Separate Ways: As the first of several songs about a dissolved marriage with children in the middle ("You Gave Me A Mountain," "My Boy"), a rare peek into the elusive Elvis psyche as his marriage was crumbling; also the last gold single of his lifetime.  [single A-side, 1972; #20 US]

94. Always On My Mind: A stirring study in melody & regret that outdid its companion flip "Separate Ways"; released as the A-side in the UK, as it should've been here. [single B-side, 1972; #9 UK] #+@%

95. Steamroller Blues: From his "Aloha From Hawaii" concert comes the most unlikely single of them all--a James Taylor cover that climaxes with the singer comparing his love to a napalm bomb. [LP Aloha From Hawaii Via Satellite, 1973; single A-side, #17 US, #15 UK] +%

96. Promised Land: His last classic recording & his first successful Chuck Berry cover. [single A-side, 1974; #14 US, #9 UK] #@%

97. T-R-O-U-B-L-E: A revival-rocker that should've been bigger--it may not have gotten a lot of airplay at the time, but it's been getting it ever since. [single A-side, 1975; #35 US, #31 UK] %

98. Hurt: The anguish of lost love met with an almost operatic delivery in his most celebrated late-period recordings. [single A-side, 1976; #28 US, #37 UK] +%

99. For The Heart: One of Elvis's last great performances, which is to say, a rocker that he sang like he meant it. [single B-side, 1976] @%

100. Moody Blue: The title track of his final album & the final US #1 in his lifetime (on the Country charts). [single A-side, 1976; #31 US, #6 UK] #+

101. Way Down: The last single Elvis released in his lifetime, sales (& significance) buttressed by his death. [single A-side, 1977; #18 US, #1 UK] #%

* * *

So there you have it--the 101 most essential Elvis recordings, as vetted by his most significant collections. Long live The King Of Rock & Roll.

Elvis Presley's "The Last Farewell": A Consideration.

 
I have been listening to nothing but Elvis Presley since last October, but out of all of the songs in his catalog (& I've listened to them all), I don't think I've listened to any as much as "The Last Farewell." According to my iTunes Library, I've heard it some 75 times, although that doesn't count times where I listened to part of it but got interrupted before it finished. I imagine the number is closer to 100.

I am not sure why that is.

There are songs that draw you in for obvious reasons--their melody, arrangement, instrumentation, etc.--but this is not one of those songs. It is a fair-to-poor Elvis song off of a fair-to-poor Elvis album, the cumbersomely-titled From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee, which was a polite way for his label RCA to name it He Is So Disillusioned, Unmotivated, & Depressed, We've Moved The Recording Equipment Into His House, But He Still Barely Uses It. Even Elvis-obsessed aficionados usually dismiss it along with the disappointing music at the end of his career; most treatises on Elvis fail to mention it at all.

When Elvis recorded "The Last Farewell" in February 1976, it was in his first night of recording sessions in the "Jungle Room" of Graceland. By that point, he was generally disinterested about anything relating to recording or producing music, but "The Last Farewell" seemed to be an exception.

Sometime in the summer of 1975, Elvis got a 45 of the song, originally written & recorded in 1971 by the English folksinger Roger Whittaker. Although the song was never much of a hit, it got some airplay some 4 years after its initial release, & was re-released. To date, it is one of the few songs to sell over 10 million copies worldwide.

"The Last Farewell" was not the greatest song ever written. It was maudlin & cliched, telling the tale of a nineteenth-century British maritime soldier returning home on a ship to England to fight in a war. Whittaker's vocal was competent, but not outstanding, & the production values were cheesy, even in the world of 1970s easy listening radio. Still, there was something unique that Elvis heard in it, & he listened to it over & over again, some 20 times a row, trying (& failing) to get his then-girlfriend Melissa Blackwood to appreciate it. "I just kind of like that song," Elvis told her.

He seemed anxious to cut his own version of it, & it was one of the first songs he tried in the Jungle Room. But, as Peter Guralnick described in the second volume of his definitive biography of Elvis, "the musicians were no more able to grasp its fascination than Melissa had been." They worked their way through the arrangement, largely basing it on Whittaker's original--the soaring strings & synthesizers, the dramatic musical flourishes, the small army of backing vocalists, only adding more of each, as though to mask the song with orchestration & flash.

For a man whose finest music sounds utterly timeless--say, "That's All Right," "Mystery Train," "Heartbreak Hotel," "Hound Dog," "Suspicious Minds," & "Burning Love"--Elvis's cover of "The Last Farewell" is painfully dated. The production values sound like they were conceived in Rick Wakeman's head & the tone is much closer to adult contemporary pop than rock & roll. If not for Elvis's vocal, you'd think it was tailor-made for a Reprise-era Frank Sinatra.

Lyrically, it was one of the strangest things Elvis ever sang. The song is sung from the perspective of a British soldier heading back to his home in England in the nineteenth century; Elvis may have not always been the best match for his lyrical content (just check out "The Edge Of Reality" or "Raised On Rock"--or better yet, don't), but the idea of Elvis as a colonial-era British sailor is bizarre to the point of distraction. Indeed, hearing Elvis sing about returning "safe home again to England" where he "shall watch the English mist roll through the dell" is kind of ridiculous. & thrown into a musical score that sounds like it was written for a PBS Nova special, it is rendered even stranger.

Despite all of this, in the subdued, melancholy context of From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee, the song jumps out to the listener with its tender refrain:

For you are beautiful

I have loved you dearly

More dearly than the spoken word can tell.

& again:

For you are beautiful

I have loved you dearly

More dearly than the spoken word can tell.

When Roger Whittaker sang these lines, he did it solo, singing just behind the beat to give it a slight swing (or as much as a Roger Whittaker song can swing). Elvis, on the other hand, keeps the melody directly on the beat & sings with a small entourage--most noticeably his frequent co-harmonizer, Charlie Hodges. It is the one part of the sea-inspired song that actually sounds like a sea-shanty, & it is the part that will stick in your head long after the song has ended, more saccharine than sweet, more cloying than beautiful.

If you listen to it enough times, you might notice that it sounds oddly familiar, & indeed, I find that it sounds just like the refrain of James Taylor's "Carolina In My Mind," originally released a few years before Whittaker's "The Last Farewell":

Can't you see the sunshine?

Can't you just feel the moonshine?

Did Whittaker accidentally lift the melody from Taylor? Or come with it on his own? & did Elvis, who knew James Taylor from covering his "Steamroller Blues" as part of his Aloha From Hawaii concert, hear this familiarity as well? If one connects the dots, a song like the down-home celebration of "Carolina In My Mind" is far closer to the kind of music Elvis liked to cut: All-American, country music-tinged anthems, unabashed with no irony. Did Elvis hear this song about British naval history & catch a melody at its center that brought everything home to the good ol' USA? If so, the vessel he sails is rooted in Carolina.

Perhaps this is what Elvis heard when he listened to it endlessly & tried to get his friends & band-mates interested in it, even if he couldn't exactly articulate why. I just kind of like that song.

If nothing else, it was all worth it if only because it allowed him to sing these lines, which hide in plain sight at the center of the song:

I have no fear of death, it brings no sorrow

But how bitter will be this last farewell?

As with any song that Elvis liked, he put his stamp on the music, which is to say that he sung the words like he meant them. Just as the melody of the refrain raised questions about its meaning for Elvis, so too does the lyric of the verse. Was he drawn to "The Last Farewell" because it was a rare song that looked death in the face but didn't flinch? As he was spending his days in bed & gaining weight on a diet of deep-fried food & prescription drugs, was it a statement about his current living condition (or lack thereof)?

& for us, as listeners, to hear Elvis sing these words, buried at the heart of an otherwise forgettable song on an otherwise forgettable album, what does it mean? They sound brave, but also offhanded, & ultimately prescient.

Furthermore, they are directly followed by the refrain:

For you are beautiful
I have loved you dearly
More dearly than the spoken word can tell

The fact that Elvis often called his audiences "beautiful" in his 1970s concerts towards the end of his life only seems to reinforce the idea that he is singing directly to us, his audience. & in so doing, it is the only love of his life that has stayed true through his musical career.

The song itself ultimately becomes a last farewell--& with all of its messiness & imperfections, it's a bitter one.

Elvis At Sun: A Survey.

Elvis Presley was a recording artist at Sun Records for about a year & a half--from the summer of 1954 through the end of 1955. In that time, he released 10 sides over 5 singles, which have rightfully gone on to become ground zero for rock & roll music.

Over the years, various anthologies of Sun material have appeared--literally once every decade--each with its own merits. What follows is a survey of them, followed by a recommendation for a new one.

I did not bother ranking them on a 5-star scale because the material is excellent & they are all essentially different versions of the same story.

The Original: The Sun Sessions (RCA, 1976).

Tracklisting:

Side A

1. That's All Right

2. Blue Moon Of Kentucky

3. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine

4. Good Rockin' Tonight

5. Milkcow Blues Boogie

6. You're A Heartbreaker

7. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone

8. Baby, Let's Play House

Side B

1. Mystery Train

2. I Forgot To Remember To Forget

3. I'll Never Let You Go (Little Darling)

4. I Love You Because

5. Trying To Get To You

6. Blue Moon

7. Just Because

8. I Love You Because [Alternate Take]

What's New?

The concept of putting (almost) all of Elvis's Sun recordings in a single place; "I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine" makes its album debut.

Accolades

#11 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums Of All-Time (2004); #21 on VH1's 100 Greatest Albums Of Rock & Roll (2001).

Review

Despite the countless reissues RCA released while Elvis was alive, it appears that no one thought to put out a collection of his Sun material until 1976 (perhaps they were waiting for the Bicentennial?). As such, The Sun Sessions was the first time such a collection was assembled, & while it contained only one unreleased track--the alternate take of "I Love You Because" (although "I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine" had never appeared on LP before)--hearing all of the rest assembled in place was a revelation.

It may not have been perfect--I would like to know why "I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine" appears before its A-side "Good Rockin' Tonight" & "I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone" appears before its A-side "Baby, Let's Play House"--but it was first, & sometimes that's all it takes. Although there were more Sun recordings were in the ether ("Tomorrow Night," which had only appeared in a badly-overdubbed version on a compilation LP in 1965 & "Harbor Lights," which appeared on Elvis: A Legendary Performer, Volume 2 earlier in 1976), this was the basic canon, at least as it was known at this point in time.

& even with its flaws, its missing material, & its ugly cover, it was a crowning achievement.

When Rolling Stone issued their 500 Greatest Albums Of All-Time list in 2004 to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the birth of rock & roll (Elvis's recording of "That's All Right" in 1954), The Sun Sessions LP appeared at #11 on the list. It beat out the likes of Jimi Hendrix's Are You Experienced, The Velvet Underground & Nico, The Beatles' Abbey Road, Bruce Springsteen's Born To Run, Michael Jackson's Thriller, & Nirvana's Nevermind, even though it had been out of print for nearly 3 decades. Subsequent revisions of the list would substitute the excellent 2-disc expansion Sunrise (see below), but like with so much else in rock, it appeared that the original was still the greatest.

The Classic: The Sun Sessions CD (RCA, 1987).

Tracklisting:

1. That's All Right

2. Blue Moon Of Kentucky

3. Good Rockin' Tonight

4. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine

5. Milkcow Blues Boogie

6. You're A Heartbreaker

7. Baby, Let's Play House

8. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone

9. Mystery Train

10. I Forgot To Remember To Forget

11. I Love You Because

12. Blue Moon

13. Tomorrow Night

14. I'll Never Let You Go (Little Darlin')

15. Just Because

16. Trying To Get To You

17. Harbor Lights [Take 4]

18. I Love You Because [Take 2]

19. That's All Right [Outtake]

20. Blue Moon Of Kentucky [Take 1]

21. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine [Outtake]

22. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 9]

23. I'll Never Let You Go (Little Darlin') [Outtake]

24. When It Rains It Really Pours [Outtake]

25. I Love You Because [Take 3]

26. I Love You Because [Take 4]*

27. I Love You Because [Take 5]

28. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 7]

29. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 8]*

30. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 10]*

31. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 11]*

32. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 12]

33. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 13]*

(* = Not on CD version)

What's New?

The Sun masters are completed, as "Harbor Lights," "Tomorrow Night," "When It Rains It Really Poors" & the slow version of "I'm Left You're Right, She's Gone" & TONS of alternate takes!

Accolades

Included in Rolling Stone's 200 Essential Rock Albums (1997).

Review

A great collection that fixes the issues of its LP forerunner. First, the single sides appear in the proper order. Secondly, & more importantly, for the first time, all the Sun masters are gathered in one place. It also included all of the existing outtakes (almost!--see below), which what it lacked in programming (have you ever listened to endless takes of "I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version)" back to back?), it made up for in historical importance.

With the CD still in its relative infancy, RCA decided to issue the complete set on double vinyl & a single long-playing cassette; hence the 5 songs above left off of the CD to keep it on a single disc. What this meant is that if you bought the LP or tape, you were getting the complete collection of Elvis's Sun recordings, which is to say every known take that existed up to that time. The CD nearly gave you the same thing, although only a completist would notice the difference.

Still, it was excellently executed & one of the first major CD collections to make ample use of a compact disc's 80-minute running time.


The Modern Classic: Sunrise (RCA, 1999).

Tracklisting:

Disc 1

1. That's All Right
2. Blue Moon Of Kentucky
3. Good Rockin' Tonight
4. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine
5. Milkcow Blues Boogie
6. You're A Heartbraker
7. Baby, Let's Play House
8. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone
9. I Forgot To Remember To Forget
10. Mystery Train
11. I Love You Because
12. Harbor Lights
13. Blue Moon
14. Tomorrow Night
15. I'll Never Let You Go (Lil' Darlin')
16. Just Because
17. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version)
18. Trying To Get To You
19. When It Rains It Really Pours

Disc 2

1. My Happiness [Private Recording]
2. That's When Your Heartaches Begin [Private Recording]
3. I'll Never Stand In Your Way [Private Recording]
4. It Wouldn't Be The Same Without You [Private Recording]
5. I Love You Because [Alternate]
6. That's All Right [Alternate]
7. Blue Moon Of Kentucky [Alternate]
8. Blue Moon [Alternate]
9. I'll Never Let You Go (Lil' Darlin') [Alternate]
10. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine [Alternate]
11. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Alternate]
12. Fool Fool Fool [Demo]
13. Shake, Rattle & Roll [Demo]
14. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone [Live]
15. That's All Right [Live]
16. Money Honey [Live]
17. Tweedle Dee [Live]
18. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine [Live]
19. Hearts Of Stone [Live]

What's New?

Lots of stuff--the previously-unknown private recordings that Elvis made on his own dime, 2 demos from the period recorded at a Texas radio station that were first included in his boxed set of complete '50s masters, & live recordings from the Louisiana Hayride; Sunrise also marks the first time that "I'm Left, You're Right She's Gone (Slow Version)" is included among the masters & not the alternate takes.

Accolades

Time's 100 Essential Albums (2006); subsequent revisions of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums Of All-Time (since The Sun Sessions LP is long out-of-print & Sunrise lives on in iTunes).

Review

A well-made & worthy reissue that nonetheless could have been even better. When Sunrise came out, it was marketed as the fuller, more complete version of The Sun Sessions CD, & everyone seemed to take it at its word. However, Sunrise had only one alternate take of each song, meaning that the initial meat of the set--the Sun Records recordings--was incomplete. Even more frustrating was the fact that all of the unused alternates could have easily fit on the second disc. These could have been included along with (or perhaps in place of) the Louisiana Hayride recordings, which are historically valuable but are so poor in audio quality that they likely were never going to be listened to more than once. I suspect the live recordings were included so that the CD could list more distinct song titles, even though they were not nearly as listenable as anything else on the disc. (Furthermore, if it was to show the range of Elvis's then-current setlist, it also fails, as it leaves off his Louisiana Hayride version of "Maybellene," which had previously been issued on his complete '50s boxed set).

All of which is to say that although this is the first official double-CD of Elvis's Sun material, it ends up being a bunt instead of a home run. I believe that the RCA powers-that-be should've either expanded it to include all of the alternate takes to make it as complete as the Sun Sessions double-LP & cassette incarnation or left off the live recordings & make one cherry-picked disc.

Another far subtle feature of Sunrise is that it is the first to place "I Forgot To Remember To Forget" as the A-side of his final single, as opposed to "Mystery Train." This was done because "I Forgot To Remember To Forget" was Elvis's first national #1 single (on the Country & Western charts), & thus was determined to be the lead single in hindsight. In reality, both sides were released against each other, both battled for more airplay, & in the end, both charted nationally ("Mystery Train" hit #10 on the Country & Western charts). However, given the blues-rocker-backed-by-country model of every other single, I believe that Sun Records producer Sam Phillips intended "Mystery Train" to be the hit side & that it should appear before "I Forgot To Remember To Forget," like it does on The Sun Sessions LP & CD. From this point on, however, the reverse would be accepted as the standard, which to me sounds out-of-sequence with the rest of the singles.

Still, all that said, it is nice to have Elvis's 4 priceless private recordings assembled in one place for the first time. Until Sunrise, they were released bit by bit: "My Happiness" on The Great Performances CD, "That's When Your Heartaches Begin" on The Complete '50s Masters boxed set," & "I'll Never Stand In Your Way" on the Platinum: A Life In Music boxed set; "It Wouldn't Be The Same Without You" was issued here for the first time. It is also nice to have the versions of "Fool, Fool, Fool" & "Shake, Rattle, & Roll" that were cut at a Texas radio station during the Sun years (which first appeared on The Complete '50s Masters boxed set). Finally, it is nice to have it all live on in iTunes, even as CD versions of the album have grown scarce.


The Post-Modern Classic: Elvis At Sun (RCA, 2004).

Tracklisting:

1. Harbor Lights
2. I Love You Because [Alternate]
3. That's All Right
4. Blue Moon Of Kentucky
5. Blue Moon
6. Tomorrow Night
7. I'll Never Let You Go (Lil' Darlin')
8. Just Because
9. Good Rockin' Tonight
10. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine
11. Milkcow Blues Boogie
12. You're A Heartbreaker
13. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version)
14. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone
15. Baby, Let's Play House
16. I Forgot To Remember To Forget
17. Mystery Train
18. Trying To Get To You
19. When It Rains, It Really Pours

What's New?

The sound, which is mastered so that the records sound more direct than ever before. Some have been skeptical of this, the Elvis sessions website has staunchly defended it. "When It Rains, It Really Pours" appears in a 2-minute master without any of the studio dialogue from the earlier issues & for the first time, the songs are presented in the order in which they were recorded, as opposed to the previous versions that put Elvis's 10 single sides up front, followed by the songs not originally issued.

Accolades

Included in 1,000 Recordings To Hear Before You Die (2008).

Review

Issued for the 50th anniversary of Elvis recording "That's All Right," Elvis At Sun was presumably to put a one-disc closer-to-budget-priced Sun collection on the market to provide an alternative to the 2-disc Sunrise. As such, it leaves off all of the private recordings, radio station demos, & live recordings for the 19 "modern" masters, soup to nuts, with no frills.

Almost.

For some unbeknownst reason, the producers included the alternate version of "I Love You Because" instead of the master. This was probably because the master version issued from RCA was a splice between 2 different takes. Still, I believe that they should have included the spliced RCA master & tack on the alternate version of "I Love You Because" at the end, a la the original Sun Sessions LP. This one song notwithstanding, Elvis At Sun is the closet to the original Sun Sessions LP than anything that had appeared since. It simply collects all the master recordings in one place.

As for the sound, it definitely is more immediate, but I've always chalked that up to the way in which CDs have been remastered. To my ears, The Sun Sessions CD now sounds like a CD from 1987--good but muffled; it needs to be turned up to fully appreciated. I also always found the Sunrise CD set to mastered a bit too quietly as well, especially when compared to the brightness of a collection like ELV1S: 30 #1 Hits, which was released  only 3 years later.

Elvis At Sun sounds to me less like a tampering with the original recordings than it does a more modernly-mastered recorded that puts the music more front-&-center than its predecessors. But in all such aesthetic cases, you ultimately just have to decide for yourself.


The Deluxe Treatment: A Boy From Tupelo: The Complete 1953-55 Recordings (FTD, 2012)

Tracklisting:

Disc 1: The MRS Acetates, The Sun Masters & The RCA Masters

1. My Happiness [Private Recording]
2. That's When Your Heartaches Begin [Private Recording]
3. I'll Never Stand In Your Way [Private Recording]
4. It Wouldn't Be The Same Without You [Private Recording]
5. Harbor Lights
6. I Love You Because
7. That's All Right
8. Blue Moon Of Kentucky
9. Blue Moon
10. Tomorrow Night
11. I'll Never Let You Go (Little Darlin')
12. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine
13. Just Because
14. Good Rockin' Tonight
15. Milkcow Blues Boogie
16. You're A Heartbreaker
17. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version)
18. Baby, Let's Play House
19. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone
20. I Forgot To Remember To Forget
21. Mystery Train
22. Tryin' To Get To You
23. When It Rains It Pours
24. That's All Right [RCA Single Version]
25. Blue Moon Of Kentucky [RCA Single Version]
26. I Love You Because [RCA LP Version]
27. Tomorrow Night [RCA LP Version]

Disc 2: The Sun Studio Sessions

1. Harbor Lights [Takes 1-2]
2. Harbor Lights [Take 3/M]
3. Harbor Lights [Take 4]
4. Harbor Lights [Take 5-6]
5. Harbor Lights [Take 7]
6. Harbor Lights [Take 8]
7. I Love You Because [Take 1]
8. I Love You Because [Take 2]
9. I Love You Because [Take 3]
10. I Love You Because [Take 4]
11. I Love You Because [Take 5]
12. That's All Right [Take 1-2]
13. That's All Right [Take 3]
14. Dialogue
15. Blue Moon Of Kentucky [Outtake]
16. Blue Moon [Take 1-3]
17. Blue Moon [Take 4]
18. Blue Moon [Take 5]
19. Blue Moon [Take 6-7]
20. Blue Moon [Take 8]
21. Blue Moon [Take 9/M]
22. Dialog Fragment [Before "Tomorrow Night"]
23. I'll Never Let You Go (Little Darlin') [Incomplete Take]
24. Good Rockin' Tonight [Fragment From Vocal Slapback Tape]
25. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine [Takes 1-2]
26. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine [Take 3/M]
27. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 1]
28. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 2]
29. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 3]
30. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 4]
31. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 5/M]
32. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 6]
33. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Take 7]
34. How Do You Think I Feel [Guitar Slapback Tape, Rehearsal & Take 1]
35. How Do You Think I Feel [Guitar Slapback Tape, Rehearsals]
36. When It Rains It Pours [Take 1]
37. When It Rains It Pours [Take 2]
38. When It Rains It Pours [Take 3-4]
39. When It Rains It Pours [Take 5/M]
40. When It Rains It Pours [Take 6-7]
41. When It Rains It Pours [Take 8]

Disc 3: Live & Radio Performances

1. That's All Right [Live]
2. Blue Moon Of Kentucky [Live]
3. Shake, Rattle & Roll [Demo]
4. Fool, Fool, Fool [Demo]
5. Hearts Of Stone [Live]
6. That's All Right [Live]
7. Tweedlee Dee [Live]
8. Shake, Rattle & Roll [Live]
9. KSIJ Radio Commercial With DJ Tom Perryman
10. Money Honey [Live]
11. Blue Moon Of Kentucky [Live]
12. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine [Live]
13. That's All Right [Live]
14. Tweedlee Dee [Live]
15. Money Honey [Live]
16. Hearts Of Stone [Live]
17. Shake, Rattle & Roll [Live]
18. Little Mama [Live]
19. You're A Heartbreaker [Live]
20. Good Rockin' Tonight [Live]
21. Baby, Let's Play House [Live]
22. Blue Moon Of Kentucky [Live]
23. I Got A Woman [Live]
24. That's All Right [Live]
25. Tweedlee Dee [Live]
26. Interview With Mae Boren Axton [Live]
27. That's All Right [Live]
28. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone [Live]
29. Baby, Let's Play House [Live]
30. Maybellene [Live]
31. That's All Right [Live]
32. Interview With Bob Neal

What's New?

Lots of stuff--including every extant master (regular & overdubbed), alternate take, & live recording. Completely new are some of the takes of "Harbor Lights," "Blue Moon," "When It Rains It Pours," & some of the dialogue fragments; the outtake versions of "How Do You Think I Feel" (on which you can only hear Scotty Moore's electric guitar, not Elvis); & some of the live recordings, including the recently-discovered live recording "Little Mama." Also, & of course, no collection had gathered all of this material so exhaustively.

Accolades

Tons of glowing reviews from the Elvis blogs, almost all of which lament the fact that it was a limited-time release that has since gone out of print.

Review

An anthology fit for a King. Elvis fans are such a rabid force that the Elvis powers-that-be created Follow That Dream (FTD) Records, which has been tasked with reissuing collector's editions of Elvis's recordings.

While most chronicle obscure movie soundtracks or periods of recording, the A Boy From Tupelo set is the rare FTD that deserves to be issued on the main RCA label. At the very least, the first 2 discs should be put out as a "Complete Sun Studio Sessions" set.

It fixes all the problems of the previous collections with its completeness. For example, on a song like "I Love You Because," the set includes the spliced version from Elvis's first RCA album, along with the 5 takes that survive from the original recording session. No piece is too small--such as the recently-discovered 10-second clip from the slapback fragment of "Good Rockin' Tonight." With entire masters missing long ago (such as for songs like "Milkcow Blues Boogie" & "You're A Heartbreaker," which were mastered from 78 records), this is a testament to everything we have--until something new is discovered.

Pretty much the only critique that can be made is that it was a limited-release set that is now woefully out-of-print. Besides that, there is nothing missing because this set literally has everything.


The Recommendation: Sunrise: Elvis Presley's Sun Sessions.

The Tracklisting:

That's All Right
2. Blue Moon Of Kentucky
3. Good Rockin' Tonight
4. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine
5. Milkcow Blues Boogie
6. You're A Heartbraker
7. Baby, Let's Play House
8. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone
9. Mystery Train
10. I Forgot To Remember To Forget
11. I Love You Because
12. Harbor Lights
13. Blue Moon
14. Tomorrow Night
15. I'll Never Let You Go (Lil' Darlin')
16. Just Because
17. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version)
18. Trying To Get To You
19. When It Rains It Pours [Edit]
20. My Happiness [Private Recording]
21. That's When Your Heartaches Begin [Private Recording]
22. I'll Never Stand In Your Way [Private Recording]
23. It Wouldn't Be The Same Without You [Private Recording]
24. I Love You Because [Alternate]
25. That's All Right [Alternate]
26. Blue Moon Of Kentucky [Alternate]
27. Blue Moon [Alternate]
28. I'll Never Let You Go (Lil' Darlin') [Alternate]
29. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine [Alternate]
30. I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone (Slow Version) [Alternate]
31. Fool Fool Fool [Demo]
32. Shake, Rattle & Roll [Demo]

Review

I recently discovered that if you take Sunrise, leave off the live recordings at the end, & use the edited "master" version of "When It Rains It Pours" that was issued on Elvis At Sun, it all fits onto a single disc. Therefore, I propose to do just that, fitting all of Elvis's masters--& a sampling of alternate takes--onto one CD.

I like the Sunrise model of putting the 10 single sides upfront first (with "Mystery Train" appearing before "I Forgot To Remember To Forget"), followed by all of his other masters in chronological order, which in turn are followed by the private recordings & alternate takes that provide a sort of alternative history of the music. I also like Sunrise's cover, which I would also keep.

One thing I would change is the sound quality. Even as an iTunes download, Sunrise sounds kind of low & muffled & would benefit from a remaster to make it more along the lines of Elvis At Sun.

So basically, if you take the essence of Sunrise, edit it around a little, & make it sound like Elvis At Sun, you have a definitive single-disc set.

Until they figure out a new way to release A Boy From Tupelo on a larger scale--or simply discover new hereto-unknown pieces of the puzzle.