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Welcome to the "Elvis Information Network", home to the best news, reviews, interviews & articles about the King of Rock & Roll, Elvis Aaron Presley...
The latest on www.elvisinfonet.com:
Chart update: In Austria "The King" remains #1 on the Album Charts while "Viva LAs Vegas" is at #7. In Spain "The King" drops from #11 to #16. In New Zealand "The King" remains steady at #2. In Finland, "The Essential Elvis Presley" drops from #11 to #15. Elvis films a hit on DVD: Warner Home Video recently participated in the largest Elvis Week in history with the release of some of Elvis’s greatest movies and the results have been amazing. A whole generation is being introduced to the fun of an Elvis movie, while Elvis fans who already knew, have been able to add to their collections. Some of the new releases are on DVD for the first time, some include new content and added scenes and a some have even been digitally remastered to look and sound even better than when they were first released. Details on each movie are available here (News, Source: EPE)
Sid Shaw back in court in "Elvis vs. The Beatles": A store owner who had trouble celebrating the 30th anniversary of Elvis’s death in style is ready to fight it out further in court. While a musical showdown between Elvis Presley and The Beatles may never go down in rock history, a dispute involving the two rock greats has left fans of the king of rock’n’roll and The Fab Four all shook up. On the surface, the turf war between two memorabilia stores in London’s tourist district has all the hallmarks of an almighty battle. The ‘rock war’ is shaping up into quite a drama in Baker Street, famed for its stores that stock mementos of British legends such as Sherlock Holmes. It all began when Sid Shaw, who runs the Elvisly Yours store, tried desperately to get Howard Cohen from The Beatles Museum next door, to see it his way. With both singing a different tune, Shaw decided to go to court in his bid to evict Cohen from the basement in time for the 30th anniversary of his idol's death on Aug 16. Shaw, who held a grand party to mark the singer’s passing, was devastated when the judge threw out his application. “The 30th anniversary is very important since many people who were alive during Elvis’ time would be dead when the 40th comes along,” he told local newspapers. Shaw also wants to use the basement to run an Elvis karaoke tour business, using impersonators instead of guides, on open-top buses. The two music fans share a joint lease for the stores and their basements, with Shaw subletting his basement to Cohen last year. Shaw claimed his Beatles-loving counterpart breached the agreement by not waterproofing the basement, damaging his merchandise and not paying him 20% of ticket sales for the gallery. “The whole thing is very sad. Why does he put me through so much anguish?” he was quoted as telling the media. Shaw, whose wife Maureen died in March, said he was trying to rebuild his life and to do the things they had both loved to do. Cohen, on the other hand, said he had been working like a dog to pay the rent and was not prepared to budge. His counsel, Gillian Crew, told the court her client had been paying the rent for both men and was consequently owed money. She also claimed there was a delay in bringing the row to court after the agreement between both parties broke down last December. Central London County Court judge Peter Cowell refused to grant the injunction, saying Cohen was breaking even and providing employment. The case has now been referred for a full trial in October. An epic battle seems to be looming ahead between the colourful Shaw, who wore wearing blue suede shoes to court, and the enigmatic Cohen, who’s determind to stand his ground. But as far as Cohen is concerned, Paul McCartney is absolutely brilliant and “we can hardly wait for his UK tour.” In any case, he drove home the point that he was getting publicity from The Beatles’ great music, not from private matters. Shaw is adamant he’ll come out a winner. “I’m a fighter. I fought to get the rights for Elvis in this country for 20 years and I won,” he was quoted as saying. Whatever the outcome, the media hype surrounding the controversy should prove more entertaining than the case itself. But the publicity generated may actually provide a welcome boost in sales for both stores. After all, no one stands to benefit from any bad blood between fans of the two rock greats. (News, Source: Choi Tuck Wo, The Star Online/EER) Latest celebrity visitors to Graceland: Diane Sawyer visited Graceland on August 15th to tape an interview with Lisa Marie Presley for the August 16th edition of Good Morning America. Larry King hosted an entire edition of Larry King Live inside Graceland on August 15th with special guest Priscilla Presley. Film and television producer James L. Brooks toured Graceland on August 23rd. Actor/comedian Andrew Dice Clay, who visited once before, toured Graceland on August 24th. (News, Source: EPE)
Click banner to buy New MRS project revealed: Accompanying the new MRS single, My Baby Left Me (see above), is promotion announcing "New York RCA Studio 1 - The Complete Sessions" as the latest MRS project. Joseph Pirzada talks about both the New York and My Baby Left Me releases in part 2 of his interview with EIN (coming soon). (News, Source: Joseph Pirzada)
More Elvis for sale: The owners of the Tupelo Hardware Store, the place where Gladys bought her son his First guitar, found another interesting way to cash in on Elvis. A few weeks ago, the glass of the display case in which the guitar was stored, broke because of an accident. The 400 pieces of glass of the original counter, are now for sale for 4.95 $US each – including a certificate of authenticity.
Elvis gun stolen during Elvis Week: An Elvis fan went too far in the quest for memorabilia during Elvis Week festivities at Graceland. Someone broke into a glass display case at the Elvis After Dark Exhibit last week and stole a gun belonging to the King of Rock and Roll. The Smith and Wesson handgun was valued at $30,000, a police report said. According to the report, the thief was seen on surveillance video shaking the case before removing the glass and walking away with the gun. The report said the theft happened Tuesday August 14, 2007 around midnight but wasn't noticed by exhibit officials until Friday August 17th. Police collected the surveillance video and blood evidence left on the display case to use as evidence in the investigation. Officials with Elvis Presley Enterprises had no comment about the theft. (News, Source: Presley In The Press/Elvis News)
No more "Elvis In Concert": While band members had hinted this would be case during their shows "downunder", it is now official. Priscilla Presley announced that the EW 2007 performance was the last. While the earlier show was a sell-out (see below), the midnight show during EW 2007 was not. (News, Source: EIN)
EW 2007 not everyone's cup of tea!: Old-timers, veterans of almost every Elvis Week past, say this year's experience was "horrible." All the jam-packed venues, the over-commercialism, the pushing and shoving. Plus the ultra-high prices everywhere. The old-timers are saying they will be glad to see 2008 come and the crowds drop back down. (News, Source: Bill E. Burk) Elvis The King (again) of UK pop charts: Elvis Presley was once again king of the pop charts on Sunday as fans marked the 30th anniversary of his death by sending a greatest hits album straight to the number one spot. The compilation titled The King dethroned London singer-songwriter Kate Nash who slipped to second in the album charts with her debut effort Made of Bricks, the Official UK Charts Company said. Elvis was the only new entry in the top 10 which was otherwise little changed. (News, Source: Reuters)
Watch Priscilla on Larry King: On the CNN site you can now watch the interview with Priscilla Presley with by Larry King. (Source: CNN/Elvis News) “He’s a real guy,” says Howard Foxhugh (played by Carl Betz). “He drives a Duesenberg, he races a Cobra and he told me to go to hell.” Sound like any real-life auto racers you’ve heard of? Maybe one who raced a black Chevrolet and told more than one person who tried to tell him how to conduct his business, to go, um, take a hike? Perhaps a cosmic nexus is why, on this, the week of the 30th anniversary of Presley’s death, members of Dale Earnhardt’s family traveled to Graceland for a visit that touched all involved. Taking the special tour of the Presley mansion were Martha Earnhardt (Earnhardt’s mother), Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Cathy Watkins (Earnhardt Jr.’s aunt). “He (Elvis) was her man, her favorite,” Earnhardt Jr. said of Martha Earnhardt. And as a result, Elvis became one of Earnhardt Jr.’s favorites as well. “I just learned a lot from her about his music and his films,” he said, “and that has stuck with me as I’ve grown up. I think there’s a powerful connection people have with the music they grow up with, and Elvis fits into that category with me.” Because of Martha, Junior began collecting Elvis memorabilia. He once dedicated a room in his house to Elvis, calling it, oddly enough, the “Elvis Room.” Most of the memorabilia has been moved to Junior’s JR Motorsports race shop, but affection for the King of Rock ’n’ Roll has remained where it has always been. On Monday, after the tour, Earnhardt Jr. signed autographs, held a question-and-answer session with fans and unveiled a special Elvis paint scheme that he will run on his Nextel Cup car. He also took part in the unveiling of the digitally remastered Elvis film, “Viva Las Vegas” at Graceland. “Viva” was one of three Elvis movies that had auto racing as part of the “plot” — the others were “Spinout” and “Speedway”. None won Academy Awards: Not for acting (sorry about that, Elvis) and not for music (bummer). But especially not for special effects, as scenes of Elvis “driving” in races add more laughs and painful grimacing to the films than gasps of “gee-whiz, look at The King drive.” Earnhardt Jr. told reporters that his favorite of the three movies is “Speedway.” Most NASCAR fans would probably have to agree. It is the only movie where Elvis is strictly a stock-car driver. It was filmed on location in 1967 at Lowe’s Motor Speedway back when that track was known as Charlotte Motor Speedway and was released in 1968. “Speedway” also picks up track cred for including some of the best drivers of the time — Richard Petty (King vs. King), Cale Yarborough, Buddy Baker and Tiny Lund. That movie, like the others, is more high camp than high art when it comes right down to it. But all are worth viewing if you like Elvis or racing. (News, Source: Jim Pedley, KansasCityStar.com)
Elvis rides high on Aussie album & DVD charts: On this week's ARIA charts 'Elvis The King' rockets to #4 on the Albums chart while the 'Comeback Special' and 'Aloha From Hawaii' jump to #2 and #3 respectively on the Music DVD chart. (News, Source: ARIA)
"The Truth About Elvis" Film Update
Elvis is for the oldies: The world is run by Elvis fans. Which means the world is run by old people. It is to guard themselves that they call the youth, “the future”. Opinion leaders are old. People who decide what popular culture is are old. And they are in the delusion that Elvis Presley is an eternal icon. But in reality he is the mascot of the aging. To the youth of today which appreciates good music of every era, the charm of Elvis is confusing. The Beatles, The Eagles, Jim Morrison, Pink Floyd, Ray Charles and Johnny Cash, they can understand. But Elvis, even though he had a great voice, is somewhat laughable.
Upcoming International Elvis CD Releases from Sony BMG (News, Source: EPE)
Record crowds in Memphis!: While the EPE and Visitor Center estimates of 75,000 to 100,000 may be clever pr rhetoric, there is no doubt Memphis has been invaded this week. Elvis World's Bill E. Burk says estimates of 50,000 are not far off the mark. Bill also says the Candlelight Vigil start time was brought forward to 8pm (15/8) and at 8.30am (16/8) a stready stream of fans was still going up the hill to pay their respects. (News, Source: Bill E. Burk) Deadly Memphis heat takes its toll: Bill E. Burk also reports: 'We had one Elvis fan die from the heat - a 67-year-old woman fan from New Jersey was found dead in a tent next to her RV, parked behind Heartbreak Hotel, at 2 p.m. on 15 August. Temperature inside the tent reported at 111 degrees(F). Overall, 8 people in Memphis have died from the heat. Many more hospitalized.' (News, Source: Bill E. Burk)
Elvis street dance today in London: IF YOU'RE ANYWHERE near the London area and will not make it to Elvis Week in Memphis, make an effort to attend the Elvisly Yours Street Dance at 233 Baker Street from noon to 5 p.m. Thursday (16th). The party will also raise money for the Linda Jackson MacMillan Center to honor Maureen, Sid Shaw's life companion for 27 years, who lost her long battle with cancer earlier this year. For more info, go to: Sid@elvisly-yours.com (News, Source: Sid Shaw/Bill E. Burk)
Track listing: A Mess Of Blues (alt. take) / After Loving You (alt. take 2) / Aloha Oe (take 1) / Danny Boy (remix) / Double Trouble (take 1) / Gently (take 2) / Going Home (take 2) / I Need Somebody To Lean On (take 8) / I Want To Be Free (alt take) / If That Isn't Love (spliced take) / It's Midnight (unknown take) / I've Got A Thing About You Baby (take 14) / Make Me Know It (take 18) / My Way (master take) / Night Life (take 3) / One Track Heart (master take) / Pledging My Love (take 3) / Singing Tree (take 4) / Such An Easy Question (take 1, 2) / That Someone You'll Never Forget (alt. take) / Without Love (take 1) / You Asked Me To (take 2) (News, Source: Elvis News) EPE warned about ETAs contest: A high-ranking official with RCA/BMG records has twice told Elvis World, in private, that in a planning session with EPE for Elvis Week 2007, the record company strongly advised against EPE starting its own Elvis impersonator contest. "We told them that if they got into the impersonator (ETA) business, all the press would flock to the Elvis look-alikes and would forget everything else. When they insisted they push ahead, we (RCA/BMG) felt like we didn't want to come out with some special release for the 30th anniversary because it would get lost in all the hoopla the press would be giving to the impersonators." WELL, FOLKS, the warning has proven true! You don't pick up a local Memphis newspaper, or turn on a local TV channel, without seeing Elvis impersonators everywhere you look. They're everywhere! They're everywhere! And, of course, media cameras always seek out the heaviest-set, ugliest ones with the worst looking sideburns. One on TV last night sang a few bars of an Elvis song and I felt my TV screen was going to shatter! Even at the new Elvis Expo at the Cook Convention Center downtown, they are there entertaining and there's even an Elvis karaoke which attracts them like flies to a dumpster ! SO ... RCA/BMG seems to have known what it was talking about. The new Elvis Expo has dealer tables covering over 35,000 square feet of space. Heretofore, dealers have been limited to independent productions at the Clarion Hotel and Airport Inn. Now, with the advent of Elvis Expo, we'd venture to say the independent Elvis "conventions" may soon be a thing of the past. ONE WORD can be used to describe Elvis Week 2007: Commercialism! Or maybe two words: ELVIS COMMERCIALISM !!And this is nothing but a preview of what is to come. Whereas the independent dealers' "Elvis conventions" cost $2 at the door; the Elvis Expo charges $15. And being downtown, add another $10 or so for parking.
(News, Source: Bill E. Burk)
"The Vigil": We found this timely poem by Scatter on the FECC board: It's gonna be another long and sleepless night "A Little Less Conversation" most downloaded Elvis track: Although he’s been gone for 30 years, Elvis is still popular with today’s modern media. The American newspaper USA Today found out that his hits have been downloaded over 4 million times. On the number 5 spot of downloads is Hound Dog (188,000), and further more: Can’t Help Falling In Love (210,000), Jailhouse Rock (222,000), Suspicious Minds (243,000) and on top: the remix of A Little Less Conversation (284,000). (News, Source: Elvis Matters) Robert Sillerman quoted in USA Today: "The next five years will see an orderly release of new music, some of which have never been heard".
Warner Bros working on next exciting Elvis project: George Feltonstein, head of Warner Entertainment told the Elvis Insiders Conference in Memphis that his company is now working on its next exciting Elvis DVD project. Many fans are now wondering...is it the only outstanding Elvis film yet to be officially released on DVD...Elvis On Tour? (News, Source: Amber Smith)
"We had two hours to lay down my vocals," she says. "So the next morning, I heard the rough ... and ... I've never cried when I've done anything ... ever ... but I just lost it when I heard it.Lisa Marie Presley also talks in the interview about how she was offended to see her father's song "Viva Las Vegas" used in a Viagra commercial. "I find that revolting," she said. "Some songs we have no control over. I know we didn't license that one."Proceeds from the new song and video will be used to help build temporary housing for the homeless in New Orleans, she said. The project is to be similar to Presley Place, a 12-unit apartment building for the homeless built in Memphis by Elvis Presley Enterprises Inc. in 2001. At the time, Elvis Presley Enterprises was owned by Lisa Marie Presley. She sold 85 percent of the company two years ago to CKX Inc., which now controls the worldwide business in marketing Elvis' name and image.Elvis Presley died at his Memphis home, Graceland, on Aug. 16, 1977, and thousands of fans are in town this week for the 30th anniversary of his death.Lisa Marie Presley, 39, is scheduled to attend a concert Thursday in Memphis that will feature her father performing on video, with live support from his former backup singers and band members. Her most recent album of her own music was "Now What" in 2005, but she said in the interview that she hopes to put out a new album soon. "I'm definitely going to do it," she said. "I just have to figure out the right way. I'm on a clean slate right now — I just got off my label (Capitol Records). So I'm figuring out my next route." (News/Lisa Presley's World, Source: Christine Bamford)
Originally invented in 1882 and recognized as one of the earliest forms of interactive multimedia, flip books create the optical illusion of motion when images stacked in sequential stages of movement are flipped. Produced by Flippies, a New York based manufacturer, the flip books are bringing images of Elvis: The Miniseries to life for fans at events and happenings in Memphis throughout the week. “In this age of high tech interactive multimedia, the simplicity of flip books is not only refreshing, but its illusion is even more captivating than ever,” said Jeffrey Kay, President of Flippies. “Creative marketers like Starz Home Entertainment are, once again, beginning to add flip books into the mix as consumers rediscover the medium as a fun and engaging promotional marketing item.” "Elvis The King" charts in UK: The new double album "Elvis The King" is currently #3 in the UK midweek sales charts; the definitive chart will be compiled on Sunday. (News, Source: Brian Quinn, FECC Forum)
CD 2: Bridge Over Troubled Water/You Gave Me A Mountain/(Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear/ Memories/Just Pretend/(Marie's The Name) His Latest Flame/A Little Less Conversation/ Heartbreak Hotel/Guitar Man/(Now And Then There's) A Fool Such As I/Polk Salad Annie/Kiss Me Quick/Viva Las Vegas/You Don't Have To Say You Love Me/That's Allright Mama/Loving You/I'll Remember You/Don't/All Shook Up/Suspicion/Kentucky Rain/Such A Night/Hound Dog/I Can't Stop Loving You/Are You Lonesome Tonight? (Laughing version) (News, Source: EP Gold/Elvis News) Graceland welcomes the impersonators - a sign of the new Elvis world: Viewed for years by the gatekeepers to Elvis Presley's Graceland with a mixture of resigned bemusement and outright disgust, impersonators of the King finally have their first chance to participate in an officially sanctioned tribute to the rock legend.Managers of Presley's home in Memphis plan to anoint their first-ever official Elvis "tribute artist" on Friday, near the end of a week of events commemorating the 30th anniversary of Presley's death on Aug. 16, 1977. Elvis died at 42 of heart disease worsened by drug abuse.The rules are simple: Nothing tacky or kitschy, and no ridiculous spoof. The contest judges will be looking for sincerity and respect — even if it is accompanied by karate moves, black pompadours and rhinestone jumpsuits."It's all about paying tribute to the life and legacy of Elvis," said Paul Jankowski, marketing chief for Elvis Presley Enterprises Inc., the company that operates Graceland and its sprawling tourist complex.The "Ultimate Elvis" search has been under way since March with a series of preliminary contests around the world. Twenty-four contestants made it to Memphis, but 14 were eliminated Sunday in a final qualifier. The decision to hold the contest follows a change of heart by Elvis Presley Enterprises after its sale two years ago to CKX Inc., which also owns the "American Idol" TV show."There are competitions all over the world and they're all fantastic, but to have one run by Elvis Presley Enterprises is something special," said Paul Larcombe, a professional tribute artist from Crewe, England, and one of 10 finalists for the Graceland crown.Unofficial Elvis impersonator contests, with performers ranging from the ridiculous to the reverential, are held around the globe, drawing participants of all sizes, shapes, ethnicity and ages. There are even female Elvises. But for the serious tribute artists, some of whom make a living copying the King, winning the official Graceland title, or just getting to the finals, may be rewarding. (News/Sale of EPE, Source: AP)
Elvis and Me with Suzi Quatro: To mark the 30th anniversary of the death of Elvis Presley on 16 August, this programme features a selection of people talking about their memories of Elvis.
Surprise for EC fan club presidents during Elvis Week: European Elvis fan club presidents Hubert Vindevogel and Peter Haan got the surprise of their Elvis careers Monday night in Memphis. Vindevogel is president of the United Elvis Presley Society of Belgium. Haan is president of It's Elvis Time FC in the Netherlands. The two clubs went together Monday night and staged a 45th anniversary party for the clubs. Both Vindevogel and Haan have led their clubs the entire time -- surely a world record?
When ELVIS WORLD publisher Bill E. Burk heard of the party, he approached both Memphis Mayor Willie W. Herenton and Shelby County Mayor A C Wharton and suggested they each award the two presidents on the basis of the many Elvis fans they have brought to Memphis over these many years.
Hundreds of Belgian and Dutch fans have spent hundreds of thousands of US Dollars in the city-- in hotels, restaurants and on Beale Street.
Herenton awarded Vindevogel and Haan a Key to the City ... while Wharton certified them as Honorary Citizens of Shelby County.
Both were extremely surprised at the twin honors, but shocked when Burk told them now they were "citizens," they could expect tax bills in the mail soon! (Burk, since 1983, has been an honorary citizen of Enschede, Holland, and has visited there 18 times.)
IT WAS THE FIRST TIME any Elvis fan club president got honors from both mayors. (News, Source: Bill E. Burk)
Parade celebrates Elvis!: This week, Parade.com commemorates the 30th anniversary of the death of Elvis Presley with several special features on The King.
BBC1 wants to set Elvis record: BBC 1's The ONE Show is trying to break a World Record. The aim is to gather the greatest number of people to impersonate Elvis. The BBC doesn't mind if you're an Elvis fan, an Elvis Tribute Artist, called Elvis Presley or just want to take part for fun. Male or female. The filming will be on August 16 at the BBC Studios in White City. Anyone interested should contact BBC 1 (Claire: 0208 752 4614)
Elvis "no Scot": Elvis Presley's family heritage is getting people all shook up in north-east Scotland, as fans across the world prepare to mark the 30th anniversary of his death. Although the singer's distant Scottish heritage is generally accepted, 91-year-old Jack Presley, from Fraserburgh, north of Aberdeen, believes genealogists have got it wrong.Officially, the entertainer descended from emigre blacksmith Andrew Presley, the 10th son of Andrew Presley and Elspeth Leg, who married in the tiny village of Lonmay, Aberdeenshire, on August 27, 1713. But Pressley - who is a relative of the Scotland and Celtic footballer Steven - says that is not true."They've got the wrong Andrew. It was a nephew of the Andrew that got married in Lonmay who went to America," he told the Independent on Sunday newspaper. Scottish author Allan Morrison, who wrote about Elvis's Scottish link in a 2004 book The Presley Prophecy, disagreed. (News, Source: Gulf Daily News)
Thirty years after he was a pallbearer at Presley's funeral, riding in that long cortege of white Cadillacs, Schilling sits in his home in the Hollywood Hills - the house which Presley paid for, outright - and recalls the singer's impact on his life. Schilling was a working-class Memphis kid, whose mother died when he was barely more than a year old and who was brought up largely by grandparents, aunts and uncles. When he got the phone call on 16 August 1977, telling him Presley had died, he found himself flashing back to that insecure 12-year-old. "Having come from a background that knew some really hard times, I somehow thought that nothing could ever happen to me while Elvis was alive. And I felt that someone had just taken all that away from me." Captivated by this charismatic new acquaintance, who later became prone to turning up at Sunday football games with dark-eyed Hollywood starlet Natalie Wood on the back of his motorcycle, the teenage Schilling took to frequenting Presley's concerts and hang-outs, and ultimately found himself admitted into the inner sanctum of Graceland, which a rapidly rising Presley bought in 1957. He was swept up in the singer's extravagant leisure life, such as the after-hours sprees when he'd commandeer an entire cinema or fairground for the exclusive use of his magic circle. To help understand the controversy ignited by Elvis' early, raw music at a time when even popular radio stations were effectively segregated in their playlists and audiences, Schilling's book recounts a childhood incident when, at a friend's house, he played one of his 78s by the Dominoes, a black outfit. His friend's normally amiable mother underwent a kind of Jekyll and Hyde transformation, ripped the disc from the turntable and smashed it. "You're not going to play that nigger music in my house," she raged. Small wonder that by some, Presley was branded a "traitor to his race". In 1964, Schilling, contemplating a career as a history teacher, football coach and "generally upstanding citizen", was chatting to Presley on the front porch of Graceland when the star - who had been using an oxygen mask, showing early signs of the ill health which would ruin him - invited him to work for him, there and then. Within hours he was on board the tour coach, a full-time member of the "Memphis Mafia", as the singer's entourage was known. Moving into Graceland (where, despite the lavish lifestyle, his bedroom had a leaky roof which required him to put a plank over the resulting puddle), Schilling became a close associate and friend of Presley and his family. It was Schilling who was detailed by Presley to drive the couple to hospital for Lisa Marie's birth. He was also often asked to accompany the singer on visits to his mother's grave, while other duties entailed everything from bodyguard to photo double. Presley he describes as a man who, regardless of his early image as a tearaway, read widely and was interested in "spiritual" subjects, absorbing the likes of Khalil Gibran and Autobiography of a Yogi. Life at Graceland was easygoing, although everyone was expected to drop everything to attend to the man at the hub of it all, who could be prone to sudden mood changes. "There might be a dark day when Elvis was in a bad mood and everybody walked on eggshells, but that wasn't the norm," he says. And one way to really arouse the wrath of the man who revolutionised rock and roll was to play one of his own recordings at his parties - "Get that crap off," was his reaction on one occasion when someone had the temerity to put All Shook Up on the jukebox. The wealthy singer could be wildly generous to those around him, presenting each member of the Memphis Mafia with a Triumph Bonneville motorbike (Elvis was a Harley Davidson man himself), or dispensing Cadillacs as thank-you presents. As the pair become closer, he paid for Schilling's house above Sunset Strip. The King's increasingly desperate need to spend could alarm those around him, not least his wily manager and Svengali, the legendary "Colonel" Tom Parker. Having once blown a million dollars renovating a ranch, he decided that everyone needed a brand-new Ranchero pick-up. Schilling refused it, so a puzzled Presley simply presented it to a visiting electrician instead. Then there were the "prescription" drugs. As early as 1964, Presley and company were regularly taking Dexedrine, or "speed", to keep them awake at night while driving between venues, then resorting to sleeping tablets to rest up the next day. The Dexedrine, adds Schilling, "was also a diet thing, if he was getting back to making another movie and had put on some pounds". However, he thinks it wasn't these pills that affected Presley so badly as the painkillers, upon which he became dependent, for chronic complaints such as a twisted colon. As things started to fall apart, one memorable fit of paranoia erupted over Mike Stone, a karate instructor boyfriend of the by-then departed Priscilla. Presley actually demanded that a contract be taken out on Stone's life, but the moment of truth came when he was informed that $10,000 (£4,900) would see the job done. "Elvis immediately went pale," recalls Schilling. "His words had taken us right up to the edge of a terrifying cliff. He wasn't going to take us over it. "'That's a little heavy,' he said. 'Let's just leave it alone for a while.'" But perhaps the most bizarre example of Presley's sometimes spectacularly unpredictable behaviour was in December 1970, when, on the spur of the moment, he flew to Washington where, accompanied by a somewhat agitated Schilling and a trusted chauffeur, Sonny West, he handed a letter to the security guards at the White House, to be passed to the President, Richard Nixon. In it, he asked to be granted credentials as a "federal agent-at-large" in the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs. The episode became increasingly surreal within the hour, as they indeed found themselves in the Oval Office, schmoozing with Tricky Dicky. The resulting photograph remains the most requested of all the documents in the possession of the US National Archive. But Presley's star, his health and his state of mind were all in the descendant. Ultimately, however, Schilling doesn't believe that it was drugs that helped kill Presley at the age of 42, so much as his acute sense of creative disappointment and frustration. The price of being one of the highest-paid performers in Hollywood was the second and third-rate film scripts and other material with which he was landed. "I believe the drugs were just the Band-Aid," says his old friend. "You can't take a genius like he was and just give them the same old stuff." Schilling walked away from the Memphis Mafia more than once, latterly to pursue a career managing Billy Joel and the Beach Boys, but maintained contact with Presley. It wasn't until he saw a posthumous screening of a CBS TV special filmed shortly before the singer's death that he realised how much he had become a bloated caricature of himself. "I never, in all the years I knew him, saw him look anything close to that," he tells me. "I was furious with the Colonel and said, 'How could you have let him even walk on stage, let alone in front of a camera, like that?'" Not that he paints an entirely bad picture of the oft-maligned Parker: "He looks like the bad guy, he's got the image of the carnie and all that, and I had creative differences with him. "But there were some great qualities about him. I just think he was more of a promoter than a creative guy. He would have been happy if Elvis had just done Bing Crosby-type Christmas shows." So the young iconoclast whose gyrations shocked one generation and electrified another, was eventually crushed by the triumph of the anodyne. Schilling, now 65, is currently much in demand for Elvis TV specials and, later this month, will host an "Elvis cruise" in the Bahamas. Cashing in on the anniversary? He is, after all, creative director of Elvis Presley Enterprises. However, he insists that he's turned down other lucrative Elvis-related offers: "For years after Elvis passed away, I didn't talk about him and I got on with my career. When I decided to write the book, four years ago, I had no idea when I would finish it." Presley, he concludes, "was not about being normal. He was either hot or cold, no in between". Yet, he adds, "when people say to me, if I had just one wish, what would it be, I always say I'd just like to stay up all night, just shooting pool with Elvis". • Me and a Guy Named Elvis is published by Penguin/Michael Joseph Read EIN's review
Included in the box set:
This is Elvis (2-Disc Special Edition) Elvis: That’s The Way It Is (2-Disc Special Edition) Jailhouse Rock (Deluxe Edition) Viva Las Vegas (Deluxe Edition) Also included are five new-to-DVD titles: Charro! Stay Away Joe Kissin’ Cousins Girl Happy Live A Little, Love A Little (News, Source: Amazon UK)
Click banner to buy Elvis Myths and Legends: (Source: Scotsman.com)ELVIS WAS AN ALIEN: SOME fans attribute Elvis's uniqueness to the theory that he was not of this Earth - Elvis, surprisingly, was one of them. He believed that he may have arrived here from a blue star planet in the Orion constellation, mainly because of his father, Vernon, who said that on the night Elvis was born a dazzling blue light appeared in the sky above the Presleys' home. Some fans claim that Elvis had contact with "cosmic beings of light" as a child, and even believe that he didn't die in 1977, he just went back to his own planet. EP phone home? ELVIS WAS GAY: A RECENT biography, Elvis: The Hollywood Years, by celebrity writer David Bret, suggests that, despite his legions of girlfriends, Elvis was homosexual. Bret claims that his manager, Colonel Tom Parker, used his knowledge of the King's affair with actor Nick Adams to blackmail Elvis and keep him under his control. Several relatives and biographers of Presley have also made this claim, though most who knew him dismiss it, especially the women. WAS IT REALLY ELVIS IN THAT COFFIN?: IN 1977, National Enquirer magazine smuggled a mini-camera into the public viewing of his corpse at Graceland. The resulting published picture caused shock-waves among fans, because the figure in the coffin looked nothing like him. Rumour had it that a wax figure of Elvis was purchased by a Presley family member days after his death, and that this dummy had been used to cover up the fact that Elvis was still alive. However, when the autopsy had been carried out, Elvis's internal organs, including his brain, were removed and not replaced, so it's unsurprising his form did not resemble its original state when stitched up again. His famous sideburns had to be glued back on to his face before the body was returned to his family for the funeral and viewing. The coffin in which Elvis was buried weighed an astonishing 900 pounds, leading the wax-dummy conspiracy theorists to speculate that there was also an air-conditioning unit inside it to keep the effigy from melting. In fact it was so abnormally heavy not because of that, nor as a result of the rock'n'roll star's obesity or heavy gold jewellery, but because - like his mother Gladys's before him - Elvis's coffin was lined with copper.
New Elvis releases chart in Australia: Elvis has more Top 40 Hits in Australia - on the ARIA Album Chart "Elvis The King" has debuted with a bullet at #22, while on the ARIA Music DVD Chart the '68 Comeback Special and Aloha From Hawaii have re-entered at #7 and #8 respectively. (News, Source: ARIA)
Elvis' white piano for sale on ebay: Elvis' beloved white piano, which was the centerpiece of the Music Room at Graceland for many years, was played by Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Cab Calloway, and Jerry Lee Lewis, among many others. (News, Source: Charmaine Voisine)
Is Elvis alive in Curaçao?: Elvis Presley Gospel memorial by chaplain Fred Omvlee in Base Chapel Parera. Coming Thursday, August 16th, it’ll be thirty years since Elvis Presley died at the age of 42. Elvis, known as the King of Rock ‘ n ‘ Roll, changed the Western world by introducing Rock ‘n’ Roll in 1955.
His death will be remembered all around the world, and in Curacao as well. Is Elvis known and loved here? In other words: Is Elvis alive in Curacao? On Thursday August 16th Reverend Fred Omvlee will organise an Elvis Gospel Memorial in the chapel of Navy Base Parera. Chaplain Omvlee is an Elvis fan and organised several Elvis Gospel services in the Netherlands and founded www.elvisgospel.nl. Is it appropriate to use the King of Rock ‘n‘ Roll in a church? According to reverend Fred Omvlee was a devoted Gospel singer and a religious man. Elvis always objected when he was called the King. “There’s only one King and that’s Jesus Christ” , he then used to say. He tried to find peace of mind in singing Gospels before and after his shows. “Off course, Elvis was not a saint and had his human shortcomings. Apart from being very talented, rich and famous, he had a low self-esteem, was addicted to prescription-drugs, was divorced. Is that a reason to condemn him? In my view Elvis is recognisable as a man like us, and a believer like us. Even if you end up like Elvis, you will never fall out of Gods hand.Elvis’ Gospels are still very inspiring and moving. In this Memorial chaplain Fred Omvlee will let us hear some of the most beautiful songs like Peace in the Valley, If I can Dream, How Great Thou Art. He will tell about the life and beliefs of Elvis. There will be a prayer, and the possibility to light a candle. Bring your own candle, if possible. There will be coffee and cake. Entrance is free, but please bring an ID to enter the base. Meet me and other fellow Elvis Fans at http://www.elvisdisco.com/forum (you'll like it!) Check our website: www.elvisdisco.com (News, Source: Christine Bamford)
Spotted in Memphis this week: With the city sweltering under very humid conditions, reliable reports are now in that more than one person resembling Elvis in a white jumpsuit has been spotted strolling the streets of Memphis. EIN has been told if fans see one of these "Elvii" they should approach them with caution...otherwise it could be a case of a hunka, hunka Burning Love! Elvis Week 2007 attendance - marketing hype or on the edge of reality?: It is sure a biggie but as we enter the 2nd day of Elvis Week 2007 a number of prominent Memphis hotels such as The Clarion Hotel on Brooks Road still have rooms. With another 7 days to go in the commemoration it remains to be seen if EW 2007 eclipses the "granddaddy" of them all...EW 1987 (10th anniversary, when it really was very difficult to find a hotel room!). (News, Source: Bill E. Burk/EIN) Elvis Presley - he was the King of Rock 'n' Roll - online audio biography (very basic & at times somewhat questionable - but great music!): (Source: Voice of America/Amber Smith) Elvis fan seeks to refurbish the King's Palm Springs home: An Elvis Presley fan wants to give Graceland a run for the money by refurbishing the King's old desert home as a tourist attraction. Reno Fontana and his wife, Laura, bought the Palm Springs home site unseen in November."I want this to be Elvis of California," he said.The Spanish-style white stucco home has five bedrooms and seven bathrooms, with a sunken tub and a pool. Elvis and Priscilla Presley bought the home in April 1970. The family, including daughter Lisa Marie, lived there part-time. After his death, Presley's lawyer took control of the estate. It was not immediately known whether anyone lived in the house before the Fontanas bought it. The house is already a bit of a tourist draw."I get asked probably six times a day to see the inside of the Elvis house," said Bill Davis, owner of Celebrity Tours in Palm Springs. "In fact, last week I had a woman from Poland, and all she could say was: 'inside Elvis house,'" he said. "People want to see what's inside."Fontana says he'll provide a look to anyone who knocks on the door. Right now, there's not much to see in the unfurnished home. But Fontana, a lifelong Elvis fan, plans to decorate it in elaborate Elvis style and build a chapel, banquet hall and recording studio to attract weddings and recording business. "We may have our names on the deed, but we are the caretakers," he said. "This house belongs to Elvis fans around the world." (News, Source: Chris Bamford) Shoddy reporting in conspiracy story: Australia's Sunday Herald Sun newspaper ran the following story today. It contains factual errors (Hinton's book was supposedly non-fiction and came out in 2001, not 2006) and "old" news (Kingtinued and Americans for Cloning Elvis). It appears the newspaper has simply taken old news and given it a 2007 context: 'THIS week's 30th anniversary of Elvis Presley's death has sparked a spate of weird conspiracy theories and resurrection stories. Fan sites have been awash with fresh takes on the real story behind Elvis's demise, including alien abductions and witness protection programs. Some fans even go as far to say a wax dummy was in the air-conditioned coffin at his funeral so it would not melt. Elvis.lives.net suggests The King is now working as an Elvis impersonator and has released an album called Kingtinued.The fansite claims Presley's voice has been compared by a computer program to the crooner on the new album and an exact match has been found. The group claims Elvis's involvement with the Nixon administration meant he had to go into witness protection. Americans for Cloning Elvis have been running an internet petition to get cells from Presley so that "future generations may witness his presence". A novel, The Truth About Elvis Presley: In His Own Words was written by Donald Hinton, who says he helped Presley write it – last year.Other fans are not quite so caught in the conspiracy trap, but hold on to the hope that The King will return to grace the stage once more. The Lincolnshire Echo in England reports two local women will travel to Graceland, to join a candlelit vigil for their hero on the day of his passing. They are expected to be among 100,000 coming to pay their respects. Many of those to gather at the gates of Graceland continue to have suspicious minds about what really happened to The King.' Lisa Marie Presley on Good Morning America - send in your questions: What's it like being the daughter of a Rock legend? What was Elvis like around the house and as a dad? Talk Back to find out!
A big news day to open Elvis Week 2007 as EIN adds more than 20 news items, updates and reviews, including arguably the best Elvis Week blog you will read:
EIN speaks with Lamar Fike: EIN's Vice-President, Piers Beagley, briefly caught up with MM member Lamar Fike as part of our Ultimate Tour to Elvis Week 2007. Piers reports Lamar was in very good spirits and doing fine after his recent hospitalisation. Lamar joked that now all he has to do is lose 600 pounds! Lamar also said he is still expecting his book about Elvis to be released in 2008. (News, Source: EIN) Elvis, the enterprise, looms bigger 30 years on: Thirty years ago, alone and adrift in Graceland, dismissed by some as fat and over 40, Elvis Presley embarked on the ultimate career make-over. By the time he died on August 16, 1977, Elvis had revolutionized popular music, starred in over 30 Hollywood movies and reinvented himself in Las Vegas as a kind of all-American superhero, the iconic man in the gilded jumpsuit.But the next phase was arguably just as big and has run longer. As fans gather next week in Memphis, Tennessee, to mark the 30th anniversary of Presley's death in what backers have dubbed the "The Summer of Elvis," it is clear that The King is still taking care of business. Thousands of Elvis devotees are expected to make the pilgrimage for a packed calendar of events endorsed by Elvis Presley Enterprises, the firm that manages his lucrative estate."We're gearing up for the best Elvis Week we've ever had," spokesman Todd Morgan said.For a start, there is the Elvis Expo at the Memphis convention center that features sold-out appearances by members of Presley's TCB Band and former wife, Priscilla Presley. There are tours of the Presley birthplace just down Highway 78 in Tupelo, Mississippi, including the hardware store where his mother, Gladys, bought Elvis his first guitar.The main event is an overnight candlelight vigil at Graceland that will be covered live by the all-Elvis-all-the-time Elvis Radio channel on Sirius Satellite Radio. Some 50,000 fans are expected to attend. (News, Source: Reuters)
ELVIS WEEK PARKING PASS FOR VISITING GRACELAND: Graceland/EPE is offering a discounted parking pass as a service to Elvis fans who visit the Graceland complex on multiple days of Elvis Week: Aussie price watch - Elvis music: Yesterday we reported that K-Mart Australia had some great deals on Elvis' films on DVD. Well K-Mart Australia is also offering great savings on his music releases: the three new 2CD albums are on sale - Early Elvis A$14.99; Elvis The King A$20.82 and Viva Las Vegas A$20.82. Meanwhile K-Mart also has the following Elvis music DVDs for A$13.92 each: Elvis By The Presleys; Elvis '68 Comeback Special; and Elvis Aloha From Hawaii. (News, Source: K-Mart)
Soundscan sales figures (USA): According to Nielsen SoundScan, Elvis sold 410,000 copies of the holiday album "White Christmas" in 2000 and about 900,000 of "Second to None" in 2003. His 2004 gospel album, "Ultimate Gospel," racked up 350,000. The 2002 collection "30 #1 Hits" sold 4 million copies. (News, Source: Brian Quinn, FECC board) Gold and Platinum for Elvis: The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) lists two Elvis titles that have been certified since Elvis' birthday last January. Both special edition DVD sets of the "'68 Comeback" and "Aloha" were awarded Gold and Platinum on March 3 2007. (News, Source: Brian Quinn, FECC board) Billboard's Fred Bronson on Elvis' chart statistics: Amassing 40 chart entries is impressive, but you might be surprised to know that the artist with the most entries on our R&B singles chart has almost three times that many songs to his credit. The leader of the pack is James Brown, with 117 chart entries between 1956 and 1993. In second place is Aretha Franklin, who collected 98 chart entries between 1960 and 2003. There's a tie for third place, between the Temptations and Ray Charles. The former had 86 chart entries between 1962 and 2000, while the latter's 86 chart entries were between 1949 and 2002. So Mariah will have to more than double her number to be in the top three, and almost triple it to become the artist with the most entries on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs. EIN Comment: The Billboard chart is based on a combination of radio airplay and sales. In the past, Jukebox Plays was also used in compiling the chart.
USA Today ETA poll: USAToday.com will soon launch a vote to discover which of the contestants in The Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist Contest is their reader's favorite. Voting will continue through Friday, August 17. USA TODAY will announce their reader favorite in print and online on Monday, August 20 along with the official winner of the contest. Be watching Elvis.com and USAToday.com for more details soon. (News, Source: EPE) Elvis Week chat room now open: ShopElvis.com is providing a free chat room for Elvis Week. It's a great way to chat with other fans around the world as you watch the Meditation Garden LiveCam and listen to the live broadcast on ElvisRadio. (News, Source: EPE) Judges for Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist Contest announced: The judges for the Memphis rounds of the Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist Contest have now been announced. Judges will be: Tom Brown, Vice-President of Original Productions, Turner Classic Movies "I Love Elvis Papercrafting" Contest from EK Success: EK Success, the licensed partner for Elvis craft & scrapbooking products is sponsoring an "I Love Elvis Papercrafting" Contest. Submit a paper crafting project or scrapbook page and you could win a trip for two to Graceland! For contest details, official rules or to purchase product visit www.eksuccess.com/contest . Contest runs now through Sept 14, 2007. (News, Source: EPE) Last Man Standing concert tickets: Don't miss Scotty Moore's farewell concert on August 15th at 2 p.m. or 5 p.m. at the Peabody Hotel! You can get your tickets directly from the "Elvis...The Magazine" table at the Peabody Hotel, 2nd Level, from August 12th through 15th from 11 a.m. - 5 p.m. daily. (News, Source: Elvis International) Good Rockin' Tonite concert tickets: Don't miss the "Good Rockin' Tonite" concert on August 14th at 5:00 p.m. or 8:00 p.m.! You can get your tickets directly from the "Elvis...The Magazine" table at the Peabody Hotel, 2nd Level, from August 12th through 14th from 11 a.m. - 5 p.m. daily. (News, Source: Elvis International)
Elvis and his public image: We found this very interesting discussion in the paper "Policing Elvis: Legal Action and the Shaping of Post-Mortem Celebrity Culture as Contested Space" by David S. Wall (Entertainment Law, Vol. 2, No. 3, Autumn 2003): "In constructing his own public image during the early 1950s, Elvis unconsciously appropriated, synthesised and ultimately capitalised upon images from a series of contemporary cultural icons. These ranged from Captain Marvel and Dean Martin to Jackie Wilson. 'Cultural production' states Madow, 'is always (and necessarily) a matter of reworking, recombining, and redeploying already existing symbolic forms, sounds, narratives, and images'. To this effect - on the current standing of US publicity rights law - one could actually begin to question Elvis's right to call the Elvis image his own in the first place; however, few would deny that the Elvis whole was definitely greater than the sum of its parts. The overall effect of his efforts was to create a unique image which had a fresh and vital meaning in post-war society." "Viva Las Vegas" debuts at #94 on Billboard: According to Soundscan the album has sold 8,100 copies at retail. (News, Source: Brian Quinn, FECC board)
Girl Happy (part 2 - continued from yesterday) - Sherry Rich - folk rock singer/songwriter: My mother, a country folk singer, said she married my father because he looked like Elvis. He still does. The first record I owned was an Elvis 45, He could say so many things from just moving a little bit. He didn't have to thrash around and jump up and down - he could just curl his lip or raise an eyebrow. I met my (musician) husband, Rick, in Nashville. We were married on Elvis' birthday (January 8). Rick played recently in a studio in Nashville where they still had a trapdoor that Elvis escaped through to his Cadillac when he got sick of the session.I went to Graceland a couple of times. You get very emotional after you've done the whole tour, listening to the Elvis story told by Priscilla on the headphones. By the time I got to his grave I was overcome with emotion. You just realise what he went through. I was at a girl-guide camp when he died. I remember my sadness when a girl came through the woods telling me Elvis was dead. I was one when he died so I might have been thinking about something else. As a drummer I love D.J. Fontana; that Sun sound is something I will often try and emulate in recording. I've stuck a wallet under the snare drums to get a certain sound like they did.I grew up in a Johnny Cash household. I have a funny video of him impersonating Elvis and he acted really faggy. My husband, who is a big Elvis fan, said that's a bit rough. But I said not really, because Johnny Cash was always a man and Elvis was a bit of a boy and a bit effeminate.I remember coming home from school and hearing on the radio Elvis had died and being saddened to live in a world without him - it was later that I fully appreciated him and realised that he does live on.
Elvis Presley No 2 released: Elvis Presley No 2 has been released. The CD is a remake of Elvis' second album originally released in Britain in April 1957. The content is the same as on the original album, but the design is not. (News, Source: Elvis Unlimited /Elvis News)
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| Thursday 9 August 2007................the countdown continues............2 days until Elvis Week 2007!!! |
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HMV price reductions on Elvis CD singles: HMV have just reduced the prices for all the upcoming Elvis CD singles on their site.
Girl Happy: A week today, it will be 30 years since Elvis Presley died. Many women want never to forget. Chris Beck meets four of them.ELVIS and girls have been attached at the hip ever since teenagers swooned at his swivelling hips in the '50s. And decades after his death his image is still kissed goodnight.Elvis movies had a continual rollcall of sexy female co-stars: Ann-Margaret, Juliet Prowse, Stella Stevens, even a chaste Mary Tyler Moore in his final narrative film, Someone once said that in a perfect world Elvis would be alive and all the impersonators would be dead. Jane Dust, Susan Shaw, Sherry Rich and Tanya Lee Davies on Davies' bed, over which The King keeps watch. Picture: Chris Beck |
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Tanya Lee (singer/songwriter and cabaret dabbler): Elvis has always been in my life. I feel like John Lennon - before Elvis there was nothing.The movies were pretty kooky but who else could have muttered that stupid dialogue and still look self-possessed and poised? It's like when he was on the Steve Allen show in the '50s singing
| Radio Times magazine: Elvis is featured on the cover of the UK's Radio Times television magazine for August 11 to 17, 2007. And here is a list of all the Elvis movies and documentaries that we could find being screened on UK TV over the 30th Anniversary period: Friday 10th August on VH1 Classic at 2:00am - Classic Albums: Elvis Presley Friday 10th August on Travel Channel at 8:30pm-Global Guides: Elvis Week in Memphis, USA Saturday 11th August on ITV1 at 1:30pm-Kid Galahad Radio Times magazine: Saturday 11th August on TCM at 2:30pm-Ernst Jorgensen on Elvis Saturday 11th August on TCM at 3:00pm-Kissin' Cousins Saturday 11th August on ITV1 at 3:15pm-Elvis By The Presleys Sunday 12th August on TCM at 2:25pm-Jerry Schilling on Elvis |
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Thursday 16th August on Sky Movies Classics at 7:50am
Love Me Tender
Thursday 16th August on Sky Movies Classics at 9:35am-Wild in the Country
Thursday 16th August on Sky Movies Classics at 11:35am-Clambake
Thursday 16th August on BBC2 at 11:50am-Flaming Star
Thursday 16th August on BBC2 at 1:20pm-Viva Las Vegas
Thursday 16th August on TCM at 4:35pm-Adrian Wootton on Elvis
Thursday 16th August on TCM at 5:00pm-Double Trouble
Thursday 16th August on TCM at 6:45pm-Girl Happy
Thursday 16th August on ITV3 at 7:00pm-Frankie and Johnny
Thursday 16th August on Biography at 7:00pm-Priscilla Presley
Thursday 16th August on Biography at 8:00pm-Lisa Marie Presley
Thursday 16th August on E! at 8:00pm-The E! True Hollywood Story
Thursday 16th August on ITV1 at 9:00pm-Young Elvis in Colour (NEW)
ITV1 (UK) is to mark the 30th anniversary of Elvis Presley's death next month with an hour-long documentary. Young Elvis In Colour will feature the singer's early film screen-tests together with footage of him in concert. There will also be interviews with his childhood friends and musicians.
It's been 30 years since Elvis Presley shook, rattled and rolled off this mortal coil and despite the occasional sighting by people cheerfully described as "eccentric", his reputation's been set in stone. But does Elvis deserve all this reverence?
What would Elvis be doing if he was still with us today? And how far has his influence spread? This week, RT's Stuart Maconie is joined by a whole host of celebrity Elvis fans to examine the King's legacy and speculate about what might've been if the reaper hadn't been quite so hasty…
Thursday 16th August on TCM at 9:00pm-Elvis: That's the Way It Is
Thursday 16th August on Biography at 9:00pm-A Little Bit of Elvis
Thursday 16th August on Sky Arts at 10:00pm-Altered By Elvis
Thursday 16th August on TCM at 10:50pm-Sanjeev Bhaskar on Elvis
Friday 17th August on VH1 at 8:00pm-Elvis in the Beginning
Friday 17th August on VH1 at 9:30pm-Elvis 56 Special
Friday 17th August on Biography at 11:00pm-Schmelvis (News, Source: Elvis News)
| "Elvis Presley Most Wanted" CD: Due for release in September is the CD "Elvis Presley Most Wanted" featuring rarities including the Celine Dion - Elvis Presley duet of "If I Can Dream" and the Lisa Marie - Elvis duet of "Don’t Cry Daddy". Both in great quality according to the information we received. (News, Source: Elvis News) |  |
Elvis and the Train to Nowhere:
The year was 1955, and I had just heard Chuck Berry on the radio singing “Maybelline.” I was electrified. By the time Berry appeared on television, duckwalking across the stage and playing his guitar, there was no turning back. America had its first black rock’n’roll hero, and rock’n’roll had fused with my soul.
Then along came Elvis Presley. Although Berry had moved me, Elvis became part of me. He combined all the images of rebellion—such as James Dean and others—into one solitary figure and quickly became the poster boy for our generation. And, at first, his story seemed like the American Dream come true.
Sam Phillips, a Memphis recording artist and African-American music enthusiast, had been looking for “a white boy who could sing like a black boy and catch the beat of black music.” With his early “greaser” style, Elvis fit the bill, and Phillips recorded him on his now-legendary Sun label.
Those 1954-55 soundtracks for Sun Records, including “It’s All Right, Mama” and “Blue Moon of Kentucky,” were some of Elvis’ best recordings. A synthesis of the white and black cultures, Elvis’ music also had a general gospel flavor that reflected his early singing in church.
By the time he had conquered the South with regional appearances, Elvis had also perfected his act. Most notably, he added body gyrations reminiscent of the movements of gospel singers. But on Elvis, the movements took on sexual overtones. The first time Elvis gyrated onstage, the crowd went wild. From then on, wiggling hips became a signature move.
With Elvis’ performances often described as “demon rock as jungle music” by local newspapers, it was little surprise that ministers publicly attacked him. In fact, they threatened to lead a crusade to have him arrested if he set foot in their communities. But religious and parental disapproval only increased Elvis’ popularity, and his television appearances cemented it.
After Elvis performed his first national hit, “Heartbreak Hotel,” on the Milton Berle Show in April 1956, the song moved to number one on the music charts. An appearance on the Steve Allen Show followed in July 1956. Although Allen had persuaded Presley to wear a tuxedo and limit his movements, he still only shot Presley from the waist up to avoid those wiggling hips. And for the first time, Allen beat the legendary Ed Sullivan in ratings.
Between his dislike of rockers and his belief that Elvis’ act was too sexually suggestive, Sullivan wanted nothing to do with Elvis. But after Steve Allen’s success, Sullivan surrendered to market economics and signed Elvis for three shows at the unprecedented sum of $50,000. However, a concern about Elvis’ wiggling hips caused the producers to also shoot Elvis only from the waist up on the first show. Still, after the third show, Sullivan conceded to the audience that Elvis was a “real decent, fine boy.”
In reality, Sullivan’s decision to sign Elvis augured a profound change in American taste. While the white elite had appreciated black jazz in the past, they had a visceral, democratic reaction to Elvis. The old order had been challenged and had not held. New forces were at work, driven primarily by technology. The young no longer had to listen to their parents. It was a critical moment for American society.
Soon Elvis was everywhere, even starring in movies (he made more than 30). However, although Elvis could sing, he couldn’t act. Then, in 1958, Elvis joined the Army. Suddenly, he was part of the establishment, and that’s when his rebel image was tarnished. Indeed, years later, when John Lennon heard of Elvis’ death, he remarked, “Elvis died the day he went into the army.”
By the late 1960s, the British rock invasion, led by the Beatles, had dated the music and stance of ‘50s rockers like Elvis. But his appearance on the classic 1968 Singer Television Special for NBC proved that the boy from Memphis could still move an audience. And in the mid-1970s, with a couple of new hits, Elvis made a comeback.
However, his success was short-lived. After his 1972 divorce brought on violent mood swings, Elvis began to eat voraciously, sometimes consuming a dozen cheeseburgers and a pound of bacon at a time. Literally ballooning to around 250 pounds, the whale-like Elvis was forced to cancel all-important Las Vegas and Lake Tahoe shows. And after hints of drug dependence circulated, Elvis secluded himself at Graceland or his Palm Springs home. Then, on August 16, 1977, Elvis died. He was only 42.
After his death, which shocked and saddened his fans worldwide, Elvis became larger than life. In fact, the Elvis cult that began shortly after his death has now become, in essence, a religion. There are still those who believe he is alive.
In Elvis’ life, we see an allegory of the entire American experience during the 1950s, 1960s and beyond. Like many before and after him, a youthful and dynamic beginning ended in premature old age and a bloated, overweight body. A victim of success, Elvis became a parody of himself and of modern, materialistic America. Like so many of the generation he spawned, Elvis was a lonely soul on that train to nowhere. (Source: John W. Whitehead, www.rutherford.org)
I still think of him as alive, it's a bit sad, really. I know he's not around.I was at art school on the day he died. I was devastated. The boy I was dating wore a black armband. He and Elvis were my first true loves.
Sherry Rich - folk rock singer/songwriter
Jane Dust - indie-country singer
I'm like a born-again Elvis believer. I picked up a compilation of Elvis in Nashville five years ago. I love '70s country tracks,
I was one when he died, so I might have been crying about something else.
Susan Shaw - rock'n'roll drummer and gospel/bluegrass singer
| Wednesday 8 August 2007................the countdown continues............3 days until Elvis Week 2007!!! |
Sonny West talks to EIN: Sonny West needs no introduction to Elvis fans. As one of the members of the iconic Memphis Mafia, Sonny was a close friend to Elvis over many years. Accordingly, Sonny has many great stories to share with fans and many rare insights to offer about the real Elvis Presley, not to mention Sonny's own very interesting life since Elvis' death in 1977. In part 1 of a long interview with EIN, Sonny talks about:
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Lisa Marie Presley planning something for 30th Anniversary: Lisa Presley apparently posted the following message on her MySpace blog on Monday:
It’s THAT time of year......... After months of deliberation, it has finally come to me what I want to do for the 30th Anniversary, Aug 16th Event. Of course it all came to me in the 11th hour and is nearly impossible to pull off (and everyone is definitely letting me know that) REGARDLESS, I am on the case myself pretty much 24/7.... It's no simple task as it involves many people and many things and all at the last minute. The opposition at almost every turn has been UN ****ING BELIEVABLE but there are also some amazing people who are helping me pull this together out of good will for absolutely nothing in return. I LOVE THOSE PEOPLE MORE THAN ANYTHING RIGHT NOW!!! I wanted whatever I do to mean something, this is NO easy task. Wish me luck I need it, ~LMP (Lisa Presley's World, Source: Elvis Express Radio)
| Artwork for CD releases: Here are the covers of two "Elvis And Friends" compilations which were released on April 30, 2007. The Cheapolata label released a 5 disc "Elvis And Friends" compilation while the Legends & Co label released a single disc compilation. "Don't Be Cruel" is a 2 CD set released on the Black Box label on April 30, 2007 featuring just Elvis. (News, Source: Elvis News) |
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Joseph Pirzada interview update: EIN had intended publishing part 2 of our controversial interview with Joseph Pirzada after Elvis Week. We now intend publishing it in September in order to also include discussion of Joseph's latest project which will be announced shortly. Part 2 of the interview will include Joseph's response to issues raised after part 1 of the interview, the MRS Tupelo set, My Baby Left Me single release and Joseph's next project.
Sound Archives boasts large Elvis collection: Even the most devoted Elvis Presley fan would have a hard time matching Bill Schurk's collection of the King in words and music.Schurk, Bowling Green State University's sound recordings archivist, figures he has more than 200 books about Elvis, as well as 283 recordings-LPs and compact discs alone-featuring Presley or others singing his songs. It's all in BGSU's 40-year-old Sound Recordings Archives, where the 100,000th item to be cataloged, in January 2004, was the 2003 LP Elvis 2nd to None-a title that remains appropriate, says Schurk, who chose the recording for the milestone.“He's as popular as ever,” the archivist adds about Elvis, who died 30 years ago Aug. 16. As evidence, he cites the recent announcement of a planned overhaul of Graceland, Presley's Memphis mansion and, since his death, tourist attraction.
“His fan base started early,” according to Schurk, who says the people who became Elvis fans as teenagers or younger more than 50 years ago “are passing the baton” now to their grandchildren. Elvis, he continues, crossed the boundaries of one type of music and is among the select performers whose interpretation of songs inspires ongoing interest and curiosity in listeners. “There's always a new wonderment,” he says. (News, Source: Newswise Art)
Suzanna Leigh banned from Sirius Radio "Elvis" channel: It appears politics has again raised its ugly head as this report from Elvis World's Bill E. Burk suggests:
A very angry Suzanna Leigh called EW on 2 August to report she has been banned from appearances on Sirius Radio's Elvis channel. This after she had appeared on the George Klein show the past two weekends.
Elvis special on Finnish radio: Finnish National Broadcasting company Yleisradio will respect the memory of Elvis on this weekend. Between Friday and Saturday, radio channel called Radio Suomi will broadcast Elvis special from 0.05 PM to 5.00 AM. Finnish timezone is UTC +2. Radio Suomi is the most popular Finnish radio station. (News, Source: Elvis News)
Prince visits Tupelo: Jim Beane has dished up some of his finest pork barbecue for some famous folk, but never a prince.
"We have now," Beane said after last week's visit from Prince Albert of Monaco.
The prince dropped in on Tupelo to pay homage to Elvis Presley, the King of Rock 'n' Roll. He called for lunch at Beane's place as his plane landed at the Tupelo Regional Airport on Thursday. "I was here when he called," said Beane, who had to leave before the prince picked up his call-in order for lunch.
Albert, the son of the late Princess Grace and her husband, the late Prince Rainier, tooled around town with his entourage of about 10. One of his stops was the Elvis Presley Birthplace, where he spent about two hours and loaded up on goodies from the gift shop.
"He was really nice," said Rhonda Lamb, who works in the gift shop.
Dick Guyton, director of the birthplace, said he hasn't seen royalty at the site in the five year he has been director. Nobody at the birthplace knew of the prince's visit until that morning "probably 1 1/2 hours before he arrived."
Albert visited the museum, the little house and the chapel. The folks at the birthplace gave the prince a T-shirt and a small statue of Elvis at age 13. After paying respects to the Elvis birthplace in August, the 30th anniversary of his death, the visitors ventured to Tupelo Hardware, where owner George Booth was surprised by the visit.
"He was very nice," Booth said. "He was wearing a white shirt, khaki shorts and tennis shoes."
Booth didn't recognize any other of the members of the group. Of course, Albert wanted to know about Elvis' first guitar, which was purchased from the hardware store.
"It was a very nice visit," Booth said. (News, Source: Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal)
Croner Elvis Poll Reveals Employees’ ‘Suspicious Minds’: On the eve of the 30th anniversary of the death of Elvis Presley (16 August), an online poll by workplace experts Croner has revealed that almost a quarter of employees felt they were ‘caught in a trap’ at work.
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Others (13% of respondents) felt ‘All Shook Up’ by work because they were too worried or stressed by not being able to keep to deadlines.
When asked about their boss, the poll did show that 13 per cent of employees had a manager who recognised people’s skills and took them with them as they move up and on in their own careers - ‘Goodluck Charm’ was the Elvis song most people felt appropriate here.
However, 11% of respondents were not so complimentary likening their boss to the classic 1970 Number One hit ‘The Wonder of You’ - somebody who favoured some colleagues over others. Only 5% of those asked felt their boss had a ‘Wooden Heart’.
Although a light hearted look at employees’ attitudes towards the workplace, Croner believes the results have revealed some interesting themes that bosses ignore at their peril. Richard Smith, employment services director at Croner, said: “The results serve as a timely reminder that 30 years on from Elvis’s death there are still issues in the workplace that employers need to be aware of and deal with.
“Stress and feelings of loneliness, isolation and being trapped are as pertinent today as they were in 1977 - perhaps even more so in modern Britain where the pressure to succeed and long hours worked mean that career-minded individuals push themselves to the limit.
“Employers need to be alert to the dangers and develop strategies for tackling any issues that employees have before they become really serious problems and start to undermine employees’ confidence and feelings of worth and value.” (News, Source: onrec.com)
Suspicious Minds tops poll of best Elvis songs: "Suspicious Minds," Elvis Presley’s last No. 1 U.S. record, has been named his best song in a new British poll, the Daily Mail reported Tuesday. The Radio Times survey asked 12,000 fans to name their favorite Presley songs, in honor of the 30th anniversary of the music legend’s death Aug. 16.
"Jailhouse Rock" and "Always on My Mind" followed a close second and third, with "In the Ghetto" and "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" rounding out the top five.
Although 63 percent of those who participated in the poll said they preferred the King of Rock and Roll when he was young and sexy in the 1950s to when he was older and working the Vegas circuit in the 1970s, 32 percent of his fans said they loved him either way. Radio Times columnist Stuart Macone said Presley would still be revered if he was alive today.
"Elvis would be in his 70s, reborn as a Mount Rushmore-style icon of America," Macone said. "He’d have played an emotional blinder at Live Aid." (News, Source: UPI)
Elvis/VH1 Save The Music Shoe: PSDI USA, manufacturers of the celebrity coveted Ed Hardy Shoes, Christian Audigier Shoes and Elvis Shoes, announced today that Elvis Shoes will partner with the VH1 Save The Music to produce an exclusive limited edition Elvis/VH1 Save The Music Shoe supporting the launch of the new Elvis Shoes collection. These limited edition shoes will be available nationwide for Holiday 2007 marking the successful launch of the Elvis Shoes collection.
As part of the partnership, PSDI USA and Elvis Shoes will donate at least $10,000 to the VH1 Save The Music Foundation from the sale of the exclusive limited edition Elvis VH1 Save The Music shoes.
The Elvis Shoes "Future Rock Royalty" ad campaign embodies the spirit of personal creativity and self-expression inherent to the King of Rock 'N' Roll and the Elvis Shoes collection. The Elvis footwear collection marks the first ever signature footwear collection inspired by the King of Rock 'N' Roll. The collection is made possible through a licensing arrangement with Elvis Presley Enterprises, Inc.
The Elvis Shoes Fall 2007 collection evokes the spirit of the famous and groundbreaking 68' Comeback Special, in which Elvis(TM) rocked the nation in an all black leather suit. PSDI USA evokes this same bold spirit in the line accompanied by bold bright accents and metallic details and shine. Throughout the line PSDI USA will continue the ELVIS(TM) status crown symbol, the Lion's Den crest and Gothic "E" signature marques.
Elvis Shoes will introduce a series of print ads to support the campaign launch. The rising underground music artists selected for the "Future Rock Royalty" ad campaign were selected for their ability to inspire a generation of musicians, poets, and children through their music and for their iconic personal style, all of which Elvis Shoes collection of footwear represents. (News, Source: Elites TV)
| Tuesday 7 August 2007................the countdown continues............4 days until Elvis Week 2007!!! |
Ernst Jorgensen responds to October FTD rumours: Apparently the British Fan Club has published that the October FTD releases are Girls! Girls! Girls! (single CD) and Pot Luck (2CD). Andylon Lensen from EP Gold contacted Ernst who has indicated decisions are yet to be made on the October releases. He also said there will be no soundboard album in October. Stay tuned. (News, Source: EP Gold)
| Elvis feature in Record Collector magazine: The October 2007 edition of the UK published Record Collector includes a 12 pages feature on The King. (News, Source: Maurice Colgan/EP Gold) |  |
Warner Bros DVDs now shipping: The Warner Bros Elvis DVD releases are now shipping from online retailers including Amazon. The Hollywood Collection boxset contains Charro; Tickle Me; Girl Happy; Kissin' Cousins; Live A Little, Love A Little; and Stay Away, Joe. Each of the films is also available individually. (News, Source: Amazon)
Aussie retailer "out of stock" of new DVDs: Meanwhile the online retailer, EzyDVD, is already temporarily out of stock of the Elvis DVD titles released "downunder" yesterday. Also released yesterday "downunder" was the documentary DVD Altered By Elvis (News, Source: EZYDVD/EIN)
Chart update: The new "Elvis The Essential" compilation is a new entry at #12 in the French official Top 40 compilation albums chart this week. In Sweden the "Elvis Love Me Tender" DVD has once again re-entered the Top 20 Music DVD chart at #16 and has now charted for 24 weeks. (News, Source: Elvis News)
Alternative cover to Elvis DVD set: The online retailer, Barnes & Noble, shows a different cover for the boxset from Paramount (see earlier artwork in yesterday's news). (News, Source: B&N/Elvis News)
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| More budget CD releases: Here are four new budget compilations with famous titles: "Hound Dog", "That's All Right", "Heartbreak Hotel" and the 3CD box "Love Me Tender". (News, Source: Elvis Corner/ Elvis News) |  |
Recent book release: Published in the US in June 2007 was "Health and Happiness Elvis Style: Building a better planet through Elvisness". Written by Kristi Weldon and released by BookSurge Publishing, the 188 page book is apparently a collection of platitudes based on Elvis' life and music. (News, Source: ElvisBookResearch) |
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WHBQ vault opened: WHBQ Memphis famous radio an TV station has opened its video vault for every Elvis fan as a tribute to the man on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of his passing, to watch some very interresting videos indeed. (News, Source: Elvis News)
| Two "Suspicious Minds" CD singles: There will be two CD-single editions of the "Suspicious Minds" single reissue, one vinyl reissue and an iTunes exclusive download. The details: Standard CD: cat no 88697122372 (9) released Thu 16 Aug – Numbered limited edition: 1. Suspicious Minds 2. You'll Think Of Me 3. Suspicious Minds (Alt. take 7) 10” : cat no 88697122371 (2) released Thu 16 Aug – Numbered limited edition A. Suspicious Minds B1. You'll Think Of Me B2. Suspicious Minds (Alt. take 7) 2 Track CD : cat no 88697147212 (7) released Thu 16 Aug – Not limited 1. Suspicious Minds 2. You'll Think Of Me (Alt take 7)* iTunes Exclusive : G10001218458M / 88888239365 / released Mon 13 Aug 1. Suspicious Minds 2. You'll Think Of Me 3. Suspicious Minds (Alt. take 7) 4. Do You Know Who I Am (Alt. take 5)* (News, Source: Noble PR/Elvis News) |
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| Another "Early Years" album: The Dutch Kruitvat chain of drug stores added another budget compilation to their site. For 3.89 euro can get get the 3 CD set "Early Years". CD 1:1. Love Me Tender 2. Any Way You Want Me 3. Rip It Up 4. Love Me Tender 5. Long Tall Sally 6. Paralyzed 7. So Glad You're Mine 8. Old Shep 9. Poor Boy 10. Ready Teddy 11. Anyplace Is Paradise 12. How's The World Treating You 13. How Do You Think I Feel 14. We're Gonna Move 15. Tutti Frutti CD 2:1. Just Because 2. I'm Counting On You 3. One Sided Love Affair 4. Trying To Get You 5. I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Cry 6. I'll Never Let You Go 7. I Love You Because 8. Blue Moon 9. Money Honey 10. I Want You I Need You I Love You 11. My Baby Left Me 12. Hound Dog 13. Don't Be Cruel 14. Lawdy Miss Clawdy 15. Shake, Rattle And Roll |
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CD 3:1. That's All Right Mama 2. Blue Moon Of Kentucky 3. Good Rockin' Tonight 4. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine 5. Milk Cow Blues Boogy 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. Heartbreak Hotel 12. Let Me 13. Blue Suede Shoes 14. First In Line 15. When My Blue Moon Turns To Gold Again (News, Source: Source: Kruidvat Entertainment /Elvis News)
No Elvis ebb as 30th anniversary approaches: Although the 30th anniversary of Elvis Presley's death is not until Aug. 16, DVD distributors are feeding the Elvis appetite now.Already in stores is the four-movie Elvis (MGM, $39.98), with Kid Galahad, Clambake, Follow That Dream and Frankie and Johnny. Tuesday will find 24 Elvis titles on DVD, including Paramount's blue-suede boxed, eight-movie Lights! Camera! Elvis! Collection ($76.99, or $12 individually) and Warner's Elvis: The Hollywood Collection, with six movies ($49.92 for the box, $12.97 individually). (See the accompanying list for titles).There are also new editions of Elvis landmarks like Viva Las Vegas ($19.97) and Jailhouse Rock ($19.97), a set of Elvis: That's the Way It Is with both the 1970 and 2000 versions ($20.97) and a new-to-DVD This Is Elvis, with both the 1981 original and the 1983 expanded version ($20.97).Of course, how much this matters depends on how much you care about the King. (For example, have you really been longing for the widescreen version of Charro? Or for Girl Happy and Kissin' Cousins with restored songs cut from the original versions?) I care enough to have dipped into some movies, but skipped plenty of others.
But people with a sense of humor and a strong stomach may want to venture outside the Elvis canon for the funny, twisted Bubba Ho-Tep. It has Elvis (Bruce Campbell) living in a nursing home and battling a 3,000-year-old mummy. The latest DVD release of it (MGM, $22.98, in stores Tuesday) contains the extras from an earlier DVD version, but a nice DVD sleeve resembling one of the King's sequined jackets. (News, Source: ohio.com)
"The SUN Recordings" single album release: The Chrome Dreams label will release a single disc edition of their original 2CD compilation "The SUN Recordings". (News, Source: Elvis Corner /Elvis News)
| Monday 6 August 2007................the countdown continues............5 days until Elvis Week 2007!!! |
Your guide to "Elvis Week 2007"
Elvis set to top charts again: August 16th will mark the thirtieth anniversary of Elvis Presley’s untimely death, and what better way to celebrate than by re-releasing some of his most famous songs for a monstrous profits. Man, I love record labels. The campaign will be focused primarily in the U.K. and will mainly target collectors. This is just the type of rampant bottom line exploitation of deceased artists that I would normally rail against, but we’re talking about Elvis Presley here. Any reason to celebrate his heavenly voice is gyratingly OK with me.
According to Billboard, the reissues will come one at a time over eighteen weeks. This brilliant marketing strategy should mirror the success of the 2005 Presley re-release extravaganza that saw all of the limited editions jump into the top 5. A full list of song choices is yet to be released, but it has been confirmed that gems like “Heartbreak Hotel” and “Blue Suede Shoes” will be featured. The collection kicks off with “Suspicious Minds” on August 16th. Each CD is individually numbered; so, I would suggest that you head to the record store shortly after that. (News, Source; Mark Rawden, CB Music)
Remembering the "real" Elvis: In the early Seventies Elvis Presley's record label, RCA, released an album of unreleased outtakes called A Legendary Performer. When it outsold his new album of maudlin country ballads the singer must have felt he had begun to lose the battle with his own myth. Trapped inside Graceland, the Memphis mansion that was half home, half prison, the humble country boy who had done more than anyone to invent teen culture became overweight and suffered severe depression. To the outside world, though, he was still the ultimate superstar, the invincible King of Rock'n'Roll.
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Eighteen months before he died Elvis told his producer, Felton Jarvis: "I'm so tired of being Elvis Presley." Thirty years after the death of the man, the icon remains as strong as a crucifix. The person behind the curling lip, the real Elvis, remains nothing as straightforward as the image. In innumerous books, he is variously described as generous, charming, sensitive, narcissistic, self-destructive and paranoid. Sam Phillips, the producer at Sun Records who first recorded him in 1954, remembered Elvis, even at the outset, as having "the greatest inferiority complex of any person, black or white, that I had worked with. He was a total loner. He kind of felt locked out."
One of his Memphis brethren was Jerry Schilling, who met Elvis playing football when he was just 12 in 1954. By 1965 Schilling was in his hero's employ, at a time when Elvis had been eclipsed by the Beatles and Bob Dylan and was rapidly becoming an anachronism who churned out vapid movies. "He wanted to grow like any of us," says Schilling, "but the machinery wasn't built that way."
Trapped by his manager Colonel Tom Parker into a Hollywood contract that required three movies a year, there was barely time to sing enough songs for the soundtracks, let alone anything worthwhile. In the year of Rubber Soul and Like a Rolling Stone, the King Rocker was singing Do the Clamand Petunia the Gardener's Daughter. No wonder he was looking for a way out. That option arrived in the unlikely guise of a hairdresser called Larry Geller. "We were just good old boys," says Schilling of the Memphis Mafia. "We talked about girls, football, but Elvis was a real thinker. Larry gave him an outlet. He could explore his spiritual side." Soon Geller and Elvis were investigating astrologyand philosophy.
"Most of the guys didn't want to read a book. They gave Larry a rough time." One day in 1966, staring at clouds, Elvis became overcome with emotion – a cloud had begun looking like Joseph Stalin, then mutated into Jesus. How could he carry on making those dumb movies, he asked Geller, after seeing the face of God? When the story got back to Colonel Parker, he told Elvis to get off his religious kick. A hurt Elvis snarled back: "My life is not a kick."
The Colonel's response was to oust Geller and force his singer to perform the demeaning Yoga is as Yoga Does in his next movie. While girls fell at his feet, Elvis was unlucky in love. He thought he had found the real thing with a young teenager called Priscilla Beaulieu but, just as he promised himself to her, met the actress Ann-Margret on the set of Viva Las Vegas in 1964 and, according to many, discovered what true love was all about. They even discussed marriage. "Elvis wanted the Colonel to manage Ann-Margret," says Ernst Jorgenson, sleevenote writer and the man entrusted with the Elvis tape vaults. "But when the Colonel explained that his time would be split 50-50 between them, Elvis thought it was not such a good idea."
Elvis and Priscilla married in 1967 and divorced in '72. A biographer, Paul Simpson, calls this the "golden age of Elvisness". It included his first (and only significant) refusal to bow to the Colonel's demands, when he made the electrifying 1968 "comeback special" rather than sing a bunch of corny Christmas songs, as well as his return to Memphis to record such classics as In the Ghetto and Suspicious Minds. The divorce, though, seemed to be a tipping point. He began to immerse himself in autobiographical ballads ( Always on my Mind, Separate Ways) and self-pity.
At one of his Vegas shows the spotlight fell on Ann-Margret in the audience. "Leave the light on her, man," mumbled Elvis, "I just want to look at her." While the songs of these twilight years are often dismissed as schmaltz, they are just as much a part of the real Elvis as Jailhouse Rock or Hound Dog. Elvis's taste in music extended way beyond the R&B/hillbilly fusion that made his name. His record collection stretched from Eddy Arnold, Mario Lanza and Judy Garland to the Animals and Otis Redding.
But-gospel remained his music of choice and often brought out his best performances – the fire he poured into mid-Seventies renditions of Hurt and Unchained Melody was normally reserved for numbers such as How Great Thou Art and the show-stopping American Trilogy. Something first touched upon in Albert Goldman's scurrilous biography Elviswas the King's odd relationship with women. In Peter Guralnick's Careless Lovea queue of women tell similar stories of arrested development, openness and naivety. He tells Barbara Leigh "his entire life story, from the first time he wrestled with a girl in the yard and saw her little white panties"; he calls Linda Thompson "Mommy".
Sheila Carter tells Guralnick: "He was into the romance. We would go out onto the balcony and he would sing songs to me. We had sex, but what he liked best was the petting, the kissing. It was adolescent." Priscilla undoubtedly would have received the same treatment. When she left her husband in 1971 for Mike Stone she said publicly that her new beau was "a real man" who treated her "like a woman". Elvis – who gave her the pet name Little – unsurprisingly freaked, and toyed with the idea of taking out a contract on Stone. Maybe this public humiliation explains his distaste for performing one of his biggest latterday hits, I'm just a hunka hunka burning love.
Teddy Bear would have seemed more appropriate. By the Seventies, his obsession with philosophy had morphed into one with karate. He had leading practitioner, Kang Rhee, flown in to Las Vegas for round-the-clock instruction. As the possibility of touring outside the States was continually thwarted by Colonel Parker (an illegal immigrant, as Elvis discovered very late in his career), his frequent Vegas shows became punctuated by weird monologues, karate exhibitions and comedy. Once he rode on stage on the back of the Mafia man Lamar Fike with a toy monkey attached to his neck and sang an X-rated version of Love Me Tender.
In 1970 he even forced a meeting at the White House with Nixon, in which he ranted about the Beatles and gave the President a Colt .45 pistol as a gift. Such incidents laid bare the medication abuse that insiders had known about for years. After the Aloha From Hawaii show, his last real success, broadcast live by satellite to more than a billion people, a combination of pain pills, liquid Demerol and heavy-duty depressants, caused a reaction that led to throat and lung congestion, and so to further medication. Red West once asked: "How do you protect a man from himself?
The wonder was not when he died, but the fact that Elvis could die at all. Only the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, has caused such shock and bewilderment since. Looking at the reissued documentary This is Elvis, his later performances are almost physically painful to watch. The only explanation for why he is performing in public rather than lying in a hospital bed is that no one could entertain the idea of Elvis ever dying. As you hear him struggle through My Way, it seems that Elvis Presley was the only person in the world who was aware of his mortality.
— Jerry Schilling's Me and a Guy Named Elvis is published by Viking. The single Heartbreak Hotel is reissued on August 13 (SonyBMG) (News, Source: Bob Stanley, The Times London/Naveen Verghese)
LIGHTS! CAMERA! ELVIS! Collection: Paramount Home Entertainment / $76.99 - Elvis Presley didn't so much inhabit a character as amble through it. No matter the part, he resolutely portrayed the country kid who made good, his hair a slicked, unyielding coif, his gyrations and self-satisfied sneer irresistible to every woman who crossed his path. The formula is solidly evident in eight Presley movies set for release Tuesday on DVD to commemorate the 30th anniversary of his death: King Creole (1958), G.I. Blues (1960), Blue Hawaii (1961), Roustabout (1964), Girls! Girls! Girls! (1962), Fun in Acapulco (1963), Paradise, Hawaiian Style (1966) and Easy Come, Easy Go (1967). |
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In most of his 31 films, panned at the time but profitable, the ever-cool, photogenic Presley breaks into song at every opportunity, usually backed by a band he has ostensibly just encountered but with which he manages somehow to perform flawlessly.
In King Creole, at least, Presley - playing a poor busboy who gets mixed up with the New Orleans mob - stretches his acting chops, no doubt because of the prodding of director Michael Curtiz (Casablanca).
But in Girls! Girls! Girls!, filmed partly on location in Hawaii and partly - and very obviously - on a well-lighted soundstage, Presley flounders as a fishing-boat captain who spends as much time warbling tunes as he does casting for shrimp and bickering with his two love interests. (There were always at least two.) Special features: There are no special features in this set of movies packaged in a box swathed in faux blue velvet. (News, Source: baltimoresun.com)
Call for "Elvis Underground" to reform: EIN received the following message from Paul Monroe:
Attention Elvis Fans & Elvis Underground, The time has come for everyone to reunite again and become a whole again. As a member of the Elvis Underground I am sending this call out for the Gatheringites and Elvis Underground.First mainly the Gatheringites first. A very dear friend has asked me to gather you guys back up and to ask all of you to bury the hatchet and let the past be the past. This friend of mine has confided in me and is asking the one favor of me.You all know me as Paul Monroe.
I am not the same Paul Monroe as you have seen and heard online. I have turned a new leaf and offer a heart felted apology to each and every person that I have offended or upset over the years and I am asking your forgiveness and I am writing this for the whole Elvis community to see to show that I am being honest and upfront about this. It was been 30 years since that tragic day in Memphis and I the time has come for everyone to come together again for the same common goal.
And that is Elvis Presley and I know there have been many of you who have been hurt by people and people who you thought was friends.I apologize that these people have hurt you and I know there is no way I can fix this for everyone who has been hurt other than to offer my hand in friendship to each and everyone of you. This friend has assured me that all will go as planned.There will be a website coming up soon with the truth as it should be told.
I am not asking for anything other than a few minutes of your time and an open ear and mind.We at one time all shared the same common goal and we all use to talk and share our stories and thoughts and we all use to get along just fine and then people came along and ruined that for us. Now I know there are many of you who are still upset and hurt by the things people have done to you and I dont blame you one bit. I myself was very angry and lashed out at many of you in anger and said things to you and about your families and I deeply and wholeheartedly apologize. And if I could go back and change this or take things back I would do it in a heartbeat.Although I cannot do that all I can so it try to fix things the best way I can and I know it will take some time to for many of you to trust me and trust others.And thats all I ask is for a chance to show that I have turned over a new leaf and outlook at life and at people in general.
Life is too short to be angry at someone who hurt you or upset you. I have learned to take the good with the bad and to not let what others say or thing cloud my judgement about others. Yet I did this in the past and I was so very wrong and had no right saying and doing things that I did. Also my friend who as asked this of me believes me and has been shown that I am doing what I said I have.I have given more than one public and personal apologies to numerous people and many have accepted and many have asked for time to see that I have changed.
As for The Gatheringites this friend will explain everything to you and will set your minds at ease with me and with everything I am asking of you. Gail,Mary,Linda and the rest of you who were Gatheringites please come together for this cause and to give things another chance and if you do this and feel that it is not for you then I will not hold any hard feelings towards you and will completely understand. But all I ask is for you to listen to what this friend has to say and if you dont agree then you are free to walk away.
My email address is paulnkimmonroe@gmail.com and my number is 817-791-9542 & 817-386-0040
I am giving my cell and personal line and emal to show you that I am being very honest about this and to also personally apologize to each and everyone of you who have been hurt,conned or been betrayed by someone in the Elvis world.I believed that people are subject to change and would like to prove to you that it is possible to do so.
Also if you are a Gatheringite or once was one I would like for you to contact me by phone or email so I may tell you where we are going to meetup online and there you will have the chance to listen to someone very special and close to me. This friend will explain things to you as well as giving proof. So please take a few minutes of your time to do this and I will assure you it will not be a waste of time. If you are a Gatheringite or know of one please forward this to them and tell your friends.
I know this will not be easy for some of you but I am come bearing a white flag in hand and an open and changed heart and mind. I would like to thank each and everyone of you for your time reading this and hopefully responding to this and giving it one last go for the Elvis Underground to become 1 again and knock off those negative things that have been tagged to each and everyone of us. If you can find it in your heart to do so I would greatly appreciate it and my special friend also appreciate it. Thank You again and may God Bless each and everyone of you. I can assure you this is no joke and this is no con. I'm just asking for a minute of your time and an open ear and heart for someone who would like to say a few words to each and everyone of you. Thank You, Paul Monroe
Read EIN's interview with Paul Monroe
"The Elvis Effect": Recently finished on BBC Radio 4 is the documentary "The Elvis Effect". David Stafford investigates the phenomenon of the Elvis Presley brand. Thirty years after his death, Elvis is still winning awards, breaking box office records and entertaining an ever-expanding fan base. Academics believe that he is more culturally significant today than when he was alive. Stafford profiles the King and visits some of the key locations in his legendary life. They include the two-roomed shack in Tupelo, Mississippi where he was born, and the famous mansion, Graceland, where he died. Download THE ELVIS EFFECT [part 1] (News, Source: BBC Radio 4 /www.elvis-express.com)
Places in the Elvis world - Tupelo, Mississippi: Population: 35,000
How to get there: Visitors -- 50,000 annually according to the Tupelo Convention and Visitors Bureau folks -- come from the likes of Australia, Canada, Denmark, Scotland, Ireland and 42 states to Tupelo, traveling by bus, plane or car. Some fans fly into Memphis and rent a car, driving one hour south on U.S. 78 to Tupelo. Or if little planes don't freak them out, they fly into Tupelo Regional Airport, serviced by Northwest Airlink and ASA Delta Connection.
Significance in the King's life: Born to Gladys and Vernon Elvis, this is where Elvis Aaron Presley let out his first cry to the world on Jan. 8, 1935, in a quaint two-room house. His twin brother, Jesse Garon, didn't survive. Elvis lived humbly in the $180 house built by his father, grandfather and uncle during the Depression. This also is the town to retrace young Elvis' footsteps, his roots -- where he went to school, praised the Lord, hung out, where he purchased his first guitar and crooned to a record crowd at the Tupelo Fairgrounds in 1956 and 1957.
Don't miss: Eating a barbecue pork sandwich layered with a pickle and mustard and sipping a Coke at Johnnie's Drive-In Bar-B-Q, Elvis' favorite hang out. Take a tour of the Elvis Presley Birthplace. The homeplace features the original home, a museum, a sweet, little memorial chapel filled with the sound of Elvis singing gospel as well as stained glass windows, and memorabilia. "This is quite different than Graceland," says Dick Guyton, executive director of the Elvis Presley Birthplace. "They are portraying the entertainer. We do the little boy Elvis -- the unknown Elvis."
Channel Elvis by: Standing on the "X" where he bought his first guitar at a counter in the Tupelo Hardware Store, run by George Booth Jr. As the story goes, Elvis didn't have guitar playing on his mind. He wanted a .22-caliber rifle, but his mother nixed that idea and told him to buy a guitar. In this instance, a mother did know best.
Events to remember: The annual Elvis Presley Festival in June and Fan Appreciation Day, which will be Saturday. (News, Source: Lisa Lenoir, Sun Times News Group)
Places in the Elvis world - Place: Las Vegas, Nevada: Population: 1.1 million
How to get there: Take to the skies. Chicago is second only to Los Angeles in numbers of flights to the desert city. The convention and visitor's bureau has a wealth of information available, but every hotel concierge or front-desk clerk will be able to assist you with must-see attractions.
Significance in the King's life: This is where Elvis Presley delivered a great deal of his concert performances between 1969 and 1977. His home base was an entire floor of the International Hotel, which later became the Las Vegas Hilton. It was at the International that Presley returned to live concerts on July 31, 1969, with a four-week, 57-show, sold out engagement in the hotel's 1,500-seat showroom (he hadn't performed in concert since 1961). His last Las Vegas performance was Dec. 12, 1976. In all, the King played to more than 2.5 million people on the showroom stage, in 837 sold-out shows over eight years.
Don't miss: The bronze lifesize statue of Elvis in the Hilton's lobby.
Channel Elvis by: Visiting the Little Church of the West, 4617 Las Vegas Blvd. S., (702) 739-7971. The tiny wooden structure was used for the final scene in "Viva Las Vegas" as Presley and Ann-Margret exit the church on their wedding day. It's nicely appointed and used for non-denominational weddings (up to 75 guests can be accommodated; Betty Grable and Harry James were the first Hollywood couple to get hitched there). The church is on the National Registry of Historical Places -- it's the oldest remaining structure on the Strip, constructed in 1942.
Or, you can try to feel the King's presence as you stand on the property that is now Planet Hollywood Las Vegas. It was formerly the site of the Aladdin Hotel where Elvis married Priscilla in 1967. (News, Source: Miriam Di Nunzio, Sun Times News Group)
| Sunday 5 August 2007................the countdown continues............6 days until Elvis Week 2007!!! |
Larry King Live from Graceland: An entire edition of CNN's Larry King Live will emanate live from inside Graceland Mansion at 8:00 PM Eastern on August 15, 2007.
From the CNN site: His guest will be Priscilla Presley. The production values of this editon will far exceed any of the shows King has ever devoted to the King of Rock 'n' Roll, so do not miss it!
Check your local listings in the USA and abroad for the live first run and subsequent rerun that evening. Additional runs in the months ahead are likely.
Want to participate in the program? The producers invite you to e-mail your ideas for questions for Larry King to ask Priscilla. Just go the the Larry King Live homepage look to the right and scroll down to the section with the photo of Elvis to find the link for sending your message. (News, Source: CNN / Charmaine Voisine)
Elvis in Now Dig This: The August edition of Now Dig This magazine features a ten pages feature on Elvis to mark the 30th anniversary of his death. It includes Gordon Minto reflecting on how Elvis was marketed over three decades, people choosing their favourite Elvis records, some photos and an interview with Chuck Wiginton who played just one show with Elvis in 1957. It also has the 3 April 1957 interview in from Ottawa Canada. (News, Source: FECC board) |
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Elvis - The Magnificent Seven (albums)
Elvis - the Lost Roots (Part 1): IT FEELS a little silly to be knocking on the door of an Aberdeenshire council house, when your mission is to track down any remaining traces of an American icon who changed the world.And sure enough, Denis McDonald greets my enquiry with a gentle chortle. Over the years,the building contractor, who has come to the door in his slippers, has fielded plenty of questions from pilgrims who have been blown this far north in their search for an Elvis Presley connection.Now he stands, hands tucked into his boiler suit, surveying the row of one-and-a-half-storey houses.
"Well," he says in a drawling Doric accent. "It isn't Memphis is it?" Lonmay is, indeed, a long way from Graceland. But this parish, it is generally agreed, is where the ancestors of Elvis Presley - the king of rock'n'roll - have their roots. Not that you would know it to look at the place.This small cluster of council houses is a staging post on the way towards the bigger Aberdeenshire towns of Fraserburgh and Peterhead. The settlement itself is an artifice, a combination of farm buildings and modern bungalows that took the name from a railway stop. But while the last train from Lonmay left several years ago, thanks to some determined genealogical research and the chance pattern of emigration, it has now been woven into the mythology that surrounds the name of Elvis.
From time to time, drivers can be seen pulling over on the busy A90 to have their picture taken next to the road sign. Otherwise, there is little for a rock'n'roll pilgrim to find in Lonmay. There was a flurry of publicity a few years ago, when it was firmly established that the Pressleys of Lonmay were the same as the Presleys of Tupelo. Since then, says McDonald, the fuss has died down.The real touchstone for Elvis fans can be found about a mile away, in a graveyard down a country lane, past the old manse. Even here, there is little to see among the rows of lichen-covered headstones.
There are certainly no Presley names; the original family would have been too poor to afford tombstones. But here, beneath the seal-grey clouds and cornfields, can be found the roots of the musician who became the biggest cultural icon of the 20th century.The centrepiece of the walled graveyard is the free-standing archway that contained the door of the16thcenturyparishchurch. Beside it is a section of mortared wall that would have been part of the original building.
It was on this spot on August 27, 1713, that, according to the parish register, Andrew Presley and Elspeth Leg exchanged marriage vows. Nine of their children were recorded in the register, but it is generally accepted that there was a 10th son, Andrew, born about 1720, who made his living as a blacksmith and left Lonmay for the New World, ending up in Anson County, North Carolina, in 1745.Like most graveyards, Lonmay's is a place that lends itself to poignant reflection on the lives of the people who lie there, and the conditions that might have led their descendants to leave the land of their birth. The Presleys' is a classic emigration story: from rags to untold riches, within six generations.
In America, Andrew had a son, also called Andrew, born around 1765, and his lineage can be traced forward over 200 years to a shack in Tupelo, Mississippi, where Elvis Aaron Presley was born to Vernon and Gladys Presley on January 8, 1935. Elvis Presley, the king of rock'n'roll, has Scottish cousins.Elvis was actually born the second of identical twins - his brother was stillborn and given the names Jesse Garon. Elvis grew up as an only child, closely bonded to his mother with whom he lived, just above the poverty line, in Tupelo and later Memphis.
From July 1954 - when he recorded That's All Right (Mama) in Sun Studios as a dedication to his mother - until his death at Graceland mansion on August16,1977, Elvis Presley shone brighter than any other star humanity has produced.Thirty years on from his death at the age of 42, he remains a potent force. As the first global superstar he became the most recognisable name and image on the planet. For those too young to remember him at the height of his powers, it is hard to imagine the impact of young Elvis's arrival. He was the first musician to marry the blues of the black south, the gospel sounds of his childhood and the country influences of America's European settlers. He was a white boy singing the blues laced with country and tinged with gospel, and he did it all with a hip-swivelling sexuality that set an agenda for a musical and cultural revolution.
Commercially he was the most successful recording artist of all time, selling over a billion records worldwide. In 2005, his estate grossed $45 million, making him the highest-earning deceased celebrity (the spot was filled by Nirvana's Kurt Cobain the following year). Thousands of fans still flock to Graceland annually. They will be there in their thousands this month for the 30th anniversary of his death. But here in Lonmay, things are strangely quiet.The original connection between the Elvis Presley family tree and Scotland was established several years ago by the writer Allan Morrison, who melded established knowledge about the singer's ancestral roots with research conducted by genealogical enthusiasts and family members in the northeast.
Previously, it had been claimed that Elvis's people hailed from Paisley, but this was never substantiated. Ireland, Wales and Germany all had claims on him before Morrison settled the dispute.Ironically, Elvis Presley only once set foot once in the land of his forefathers, during a very short stop at Prestwick airport in 1960 on his return from military service in Germany. During his lifetime, he left America just twice. In the northeast of Scotland, there are plenty of Pressleys, Preslys and others known by variations of that name. But only one of them, former Scottish golfer Jack Pressley, comes forward to say that he has made a definitive connection to the King.
The sprightly 91-year-old is a musician himself. He played saxophone and clarinet in big bands in Glasgow during the second world war, before returning to Fraserburgh to open a sports shop and concentrate on golf, one of his many passions.On the mantelpiece in Pressley's Fraserburgh living-room, there is a wedding photograph of his grandson, Steven Pressley, the Celtic defender. In front of him are several large sheets of paper, the size of sea charts, which trace his own family history back to the crossroads with the Presleys of Tupelo.
"I had this thing all rigged up but I never thought for a minute that we were connected to Elvis," he says. "Because with him spelling his name differently I assumed we were different Presleys." But when journalists turned up at his door carrying the Elvis family tree, it was a simple matter to cross-reference the Andrews in each one. Jack, though, is convinced that the researchers identified the wrong Andrew as the crucial link, and that the official story is a generation out.
"I'm sure it was the wrong Andrew they've got. It was a nephew of the Andrew that got married at Lonmay who went to America," he says, his fingers tracing the line through hundreds of years. "See here - Vernon Elvis's father and me were born in the same month in 1916 so I could be Elvis's father," says Jack, referring to parallel family lines.But while he might share genetic heritage with the King, Jack Pressley has little respect for his distant cousin's music.
"The guitar's a great instrument, Segovia and all that, but not in the hands of these idiots," says Pressley, an undoubted musical purist. "A couple of guitars and a drum, this rubbish that Elvis came out with bores me to tears. Berry, Goodman, Duke Ellington, all of them are perfect but this business with the guitars and The Beatles and all that is just gruesome stuff. There's no tone or colour, you see. They're not listening to each other." It seems rock'n'roll never made it to Fraserburgh.
LOST in genealogy, if not lost in music, Jack Pressley's own family is a testament to the continuing story of emigration from the northeast. He is expecting his eldest son, also Jack, to come home from Charlotte, North Carolina, in a few days' time. "When he moved abroad I said there wouldn't be many Pressleys there but he said there was a page-and-a-half of them in the phone book. They must have been busy, these relatives of Elvis." (this article is continued further below)
"Christmas Peace" slider pack edition: Due for release on September 25 2007 is the sliderpack budget edition of the "Christmas Peace" compilation. (News, Source: Bol.com /Elvis News)
"The King is Dood": August 16th will be a very special day for Elvis fans worldwide. ElvisMatters celebrates the music and legacy of Elvis in a special way at the Elvis shop in Turnhout (Belgium - 98 Otterstraat). Every customer will receive a special free map with the historic front pages of August 17 and 18 1977, as printed in Belgium and The Netherlands. How did the Belgian and Dutch press react to Elvis's death, how did they portray Elvis in 1977? All and more in the special ElvisMatters map, free on August 16th, 2007. (News, Source: ElvisMatters/Elvis News) |
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Elvis - the Lost Roots (Part 2): A little further south, in Old Meldrum, there are a few Preslys - a different spelling - but those I speak to show little enthusiasm for the Memphis connection. "I'm no exactly sure that I'm related to him," says Jim Presly, of the Meldrum Heritage Society and a man with a keen interest in history.
"You'd really have to DNA the old man to find that out but I know the Preslys are all related in some way." When pressed, he says that his sister, who lives in Houston, is more interested in the subject than he is. One local man who knows his stuff about Elvis's Scottish ancestry turns out to be a fan of the King. Jack Pressley may have his charts, but Stuart West has the tomes on family records.
On Aberdeen's appropriately named King Street, buried in the rooms of the North East Historical Society, West has all the genealogical information he can lay hands on. West, a wanderer in his younger days, discovered that the further he travelled from Scotland, the more he became interested in Scottishness. "I came to the same conclusion as Allan Morrison way back in 1995 and 1996, by a process of deduction," says West, opening his files.
"There is lots of circumstantial evidence, although Andrew is missing from the parish register. It is very unusual for a father not to give his own name to his first son. I reckon it was just missed off the register, but he is the one.""People come in here wanting to be related to Robert the Bruce and they're a bit disappointed when they're not," adds West. But he too is somewhat taken aback by the extent to which the Scottish branch of the Presley family is underwhelmed by their connection to fame. Aberdeenshire, it seems, is more than physically distant from the hype generated by the Elvis industry.
But there is at least one local entrepreneur who has seen the value in Presley's Scottish roots. Not far from the Historical Society's headquarters, on another Aberdeen street, you will find Philip King kiltmakers, whose proprietor, Mike King, produced a special Presley Of Lonmay tartan when that parish's Elvis connection first came to light.The colours are subtle, reflecting the grey sky, green grass and yellow cornfields of the northeast. King only has a few yards of the tartan left in his shop, but in preparation for the anniversary of Elvis's death he has designed a whole new pattern.
And while Presley Of Lonmay was reflective of the place itself, Presley Modern - which is being woven as we speak - is much more of a rock'n'roll cloth."Elvis's favourite colours were black, baby blue pink and gold," says King, "so I've combined them all in the pattern."
Patiently, he explains how this unlikely combination will work: the black and blue background accentuated by a light blue overpattern and a tiny pink stripe with gold guttering. The cloth is being made in a lightweight tweed, which will bring the price of a kilt to below £300. Naturally, the outfit would not be complete without the King-designed gold sporran, which is decorated with a Scottish thistle and an American eagle. There is even a skean-dhu to match.The overall effect might be more Las Vegas than Lonmay: especially if teamed up with a pair of blue suede brogues. But if you're going to wear the Elvis Presley tartan then you have to have a certain swagger about you. A kilted Elvis is in reality no more emblematic than one in lederhosen. Elvis was of German, Scottish, Jewish and Cherokee ancestry. Everyone wants a bite of him - except, it seems, the population of rural Aberdeenshire.
Perhaps the reason that the story of Elvis's Scottish roots doesn't cause much of a stir in Lonmay is that his is just another chapter in the epic story of emigration that continues to this day. After all, everyone has to come from somewhere and it is very easy to be cut adrift from family and from roots. Stuart West spent a large part of his life abroad, Jack Pressley is waiting in Fraserburgh for his son to come home, Jim Presly is separated from his sister by the Atlantic. Sometimes, though, your relatives turn out to be closer than you think.
In Lonmay's Ban Car Hotel, Janis Joplin is coming through the loudspeakers, silver darlings (herring rolled in oatmeal) are on the menu and, in tribute to Elvis, a tailor's dummy has been decked out in Mike King's full dress Presley Of Lonmay tartan. There is a framed dedication from Glasgow fan club, The Elvis Touch, to whom the hotel plays host on alternate years. "This year they're all going to Memphis so we won't see them,"explains co-owner, Tina Gibbins.Recognising my Hebridean accent, Gibbins tells me that although she grew up on military bases around the world, her family are from the islands. Her mother came from Stornoway.
This is hardly unusual, but Gibbins seems eager to give me more information about her family.Her mother is Margaret Davies, nee McDonald, who was from Lewis. She has an 80-year-old second cousin who lives in Wellington, New Zealand.Oh, that's interesting, I say nonchalantly, noting another pinprick on the map of the Scottish diaspora and the Elvis story. But Gibbins continues: "Her cousin's name is Annie. Annie Crichton and her father, Alasdair, was from the village of Swordale on Lewis." Does that ring any bells, she asks? Of course it does.All day, I have been knocking on doors in Lonmay, searching for the lost relatives of Elvis Presley. And I have ended up finding my own. "Hello, cousin," I say. (News, Source: Sunday Herald)
| Saturday 4 August 2007................the countdown continues............7 days until Elvis Week 2007!!! |
Invasion USA...Aussie style!: In the 1980's martial arts icon, Chuck Norris, was able to single-handedly save America from a terrorist attack. In 2007 EIN is not as sure that Chuck or anyone else can save the USA from what is about to hit its shores. EIN's tour group is now in the air and due to touch down in Los Angeles tomorrow. The Aussies are certain to shake up 'things Elvis' as Elvis Week approaches.
EIN recommends US fans watch out for Aussie t-shirts, flying boomerangs, and a group of fans very excited to be commemorating Elvis Week with other fans from around the world.. And if you see us please say hi!
Chart update: U.S. Billboard Elvis Chart listings for the week of August 11, 2007:
Top Country Catalog Albums - Ultimate Gospel - down 4 to #21 Top Country Catalog Albums - Elvis 30 #1 Hits - up 1 to #11 (sg)
Top Music Video - Elvis Lives - 25th Anniversary Concert - remains at #18
Top Music Video - Elvis: 68 Comeback Special - up 13 to #20Top Comprehensive Music Video - Elvis: 68 Comeback Special - up 13 to #21Top Music Video - Elvis: Aloha from Hawaii - up 14 to #16
Top Comprehensive Music Video - Elvis: Aloha from Hawaii - up 14 to #17 (News, Source: Elvis International Fan Club)
| Friday 3 August 2007................the countdown continues............8 days until Elvis Week 2007!!! |
"Presleyana VI" now available: The latest edition of the Jerry Osborne's acclaimed discography & price guide, Presleyana - The Elvis Presley Record, CD & Memorabilia Price Guide (Sixth Edition), is now available.Presleyana documents his music and memorabilia in much greater detail than any other book — including all speeds and formats of records, CDs, Tapes, and Non-Recorded Memorabilia to this new Edition. Presleyana VI is completely revised from cover to cover! Included in its 344 pages are MANY never-before published photos — over 90% being new. Perhaps you have already noticed the gorgeous Elvis photo, standing in front of Graceland in 1960, as one you have never seen before. It is in print here for the very first time ever! Price: $34.95. No charge for postage and handling on USA orders. (News, Source: Dan Martin) |
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More "A Legendary Performer" volumes: Just released are the volumes 10 and 11 in the "Legendary Performer" series. Originally this series was started by RCA in the seventies. A few years ago the Madison label produced an additional four quality volumes after which the Wolf Call label took over with volume 9, containing material copied from other releases. Now volumes 10 and 11 have been added. |
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Track listing "A Legendary Performer" volume 10: All That I Am (Take 2)/Any Day Now (Take 1)/Big Boss Man (Take 2)/Blueberry Hill/Lawdy Miss Clawdy (Live 23/2-70)/Bridge Over Troubled Water (Take 2)/Bringing It Back (Take 1)/Chesay (SP take)/City By Night (Alternate take)/Just Pretend (Take 2)/Kentucky Rain (Live laughing version)/Let’s Be Friends (Solo)/Let Yourself Go (Duet with The Blossoms)/Love Letters (Live 14/12-76)/Loving You (Take 3)/One Night (Live 23/2-70)/Rags To Riches (Live 31/12-76)/Shoppin’ Around//Such A Night (Live 25/3-60)/Suspicion (Without Jordaniares)/This Is The Story (Take 2)/The Girl Of My Best Friend (Take 3)/The Love Machine (Take 6)/Welcome To My World (Live 16/8-02)/What Now My Love (Live 16/8-02)
You Don’t Know Me (Movie version)
Track listing "A Legendary Performer" volume 11: A House Of Sand (SP take)/A Little Bit Of Green (Remaster long version)/A Mess Of Blues (SP take)/Adam And Evil (SP take)/C. C. Rider (Live 19/2-70)/Could I Fall In Love (Alternate harmony)/Earth Boy (SP take)/Fools Rush In (Take 9)/His Latest Flame (Take 9)/I Miss You (Take 1)/I’ve Lost You (Take 1)/Life (Take 10)/Lonely Man (Solo take 1)/Power Of My Love (Remix)/ Rubberneckin’ (Extended mix)/So Close, Yet So Far (From Paradise) (Take 1)/Solitaire (Take 3)/Summer Kisses, Winter Tears (Take 2)/That’s All Right (Live 10/8-70)/Where Do I Go From Here (Take 5 extended)
Where No One Stands Alone (Take 1)/Working On The Building (Take 4)/You’ll Be Gone (Take 1) (News, Source: Elvis News)
Thousands of visitors from all over the world are expected to descend on the adjacent town of Friedberg when the event gets under way with a gospel concert on August 16, the day of his death in 1977. There will also be an open-air rock 'n' roll night, guided tours and showings of the King's films said Klaus Ruppert, vice president of the Elvis Presley Society.
Elvis served with the US 3rd Armoured Division from 1958-1960 in Freiburg, but lived off base in nearby Bad Nauheim. (News, Source: Charmaine Voisine)
New budget releases: Several new titles have or will be released by various (until now unknown) labels in France:
July 12, 2007: "24 Original Recordings of 1956" on the Delta music label.
August 10, 2007: "250 Golden Hits", a 10 CD set on an unknown label.
August 20, 2007: "The Birth Of The King" on an unknown label.
August 21, 2007: La Legende Du King on an unknown label. (News, Source: Amazon France/Elvis News)
| Ed Bonja in Europe: The expo 'I Shot Elvis' from Ed Bonja is for the first time 'on tour' outside the USA. A collection of 80 pictures, made by Elvis' official tour photographer during the 70s is displayed from august 4 to September 16 in Finland. After this the expo travels to Germany and Ireland. Bonja also tells that he will release his picture book 'Viva Vegas' in September. Although Bonja stayed with Elvis untill 1977, his last pictures dates from June 1975. Ed would not take pictures of an overweight Elvis and waited for the right moment...unfortunately it never came. (News, Source: Elvis Matters) |  |
| New edition of "Essential Elvis" CD in France: Released in France is a French edition of the "Essential Elvis" compilation. This release comes in a slipcase with completely different tracklisting, the same as the U.K and German "The King" compilation, from the standard edition of this "Essential Elvis". |
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CD 1:1. Suspicious Minds 2. Blue Suede Shoes 3. Jailhouse Rock 4. Love Me Tender 5. Don'T Be Cruel 6. King Creole 7. Hard Headed Woman 8. All Shook Up 9. Hound Dog 10. Too Much 11. Heartbreak Hotel 12. (Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear 13. (Let'S Have A) Party 14. That'S All Right 15. One Night 16. (Now And Then There'S) A Fool Such As I 17. A Big Hunk O'Love 18. Wear My Ring Around Your Neck 19. Crying In The Chapel 20. Stuck On You 21. Wooden Heart 22. Viva Las Vegas 23. (You'Re The) Devil In Disguise 24. Guitar Man 25. A Little Less Conversation (Jxl Single version) 26. Welcome To My World (Bonus Track)
CD 2: 1. In The Ghetto 2. Burning Love 3. Always On My Mind 4. The Wonder Of You 5. I Just Can'T Help Believin' 6. There Goes My Everything 7. You Don'T Have To Say You Love Me 8. An American Trilogy 9. Are You Lonesome Tonight ? 10. My Boy 11. Green Green Grass Of Home 12. Can'T Help Falling In Love 13. Rock A Hula Baby 14. Return To Sender 15. Don't 16. (Marie'S The Name) His Latest Flame 17. Good Luck Charm
18. Surrender 19. She'S Not You 20. A Mess Of Blues 21. It'S Now Or Never 22. Fever 23. Moody Blue 24. Way Down 25. My Way 26. If I Can Dream (Bonus Track) (News, Source: Elvis Corner/Elvis News)
Elvis Week notes: BETTY HARPER's Elvis art exhibit will be at the Elvis After Dark location in Graceland Crossing 1-5 p.m. 11 August; 10-2 12th; then at the Elvis Expo later on 12th, all day 13th, and to noon 14th.
| "Vegas Variety" released: The Rainbow Records label release " Vegas Variety" has been released. This 2 CD contains Elvis’ 90 minutes dinner show from September 1, 1974 as recorded in Las Vegas and bonus material. |
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CD 1: 01 - Also Sprach Zarathustra (Strauss) 02 - See See Rider ( Traditional ) 03 - I Got A Woman / Amen (Charles / Traditional) 04 - Talking About GI BLues (Elvis talks) 05 - Love Me ( Leiber / Stoller) 06 - If You Love Me (Rostill) 07 - It's Midnight (Wheeler - Chesnut) 08 - Big Boss Man (Reed) 09 - Fever (Porter) 10 - I'm Leavin' (Jarrett - Charles) 11 - Softly As I Leave You (deVita - Sharper) 12 - Hound Dog (Leiber - Stoller) 13 - Polk Salad Annie (White) 14 - Band Introductions (traditional) 15 - Monologue (Elvis talks) 16 - If You Talk In Your Sleep (West - Christopher)
CD 2:01 - Karate Monologe (Elvis talks) 02 - Help Me (Gatlin) 03 - Why Me Lord (Kristofferson) 04 - Let Me Be There (Rostill) 05 - Bridge Over Troubled Water (Simon) 06 - Hawaiian Wedding Song (King - Hoffman - Manning) 07 - Can't help Falling In Love (Weiss - Peretti - Creatore) 08 - Closing Vamp (Traditional) 09 - Voice & Elvis - I Couldn't Live Without You (Hallin) 10 - Voice & Elvis - Bringin' It Back (Gordon) 11 - Voice & Elvis - Aubrey (Gates - Griffin) 12 - Strung Out Monologue (Elvis Talks) 13 - Strung Out Mix (Elvis Talks) 14 - Karate Monologue15 - Ed Parker Talks About Elvis (News, Source: Elvis News)
| Sonny West visiting UK fans: UK fans commemorate the 30th anniversary of Elvis Presley's death at Pride Park Football Stadium, with Elvis Presley's bodyguard Sonny West as a special guest. Elvis.co.uk are proud to announce that Elvis' bodyguard Sonny West will be their special guest at Elvis: Party In The Park on Saturday August 18, 2007 in Derby. Sonny will be talking to fans about his time with Elvis and signing copies of his new book: Elvis Still Taking Care Of Business. Sonny West was Elvis Presley's close friend and bodyguard for nearly two decades. He witnessed Elvis's triumphant comeback in Las Vegas, was by his side throughout his gruelling concert tours in the seventies and even accompanied his boss when he made a surprise visit to President Nixon at the Whitehouse.
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An Elvis party to remember - Elvis: Party In The Park is held at Pride Park Football Stadium and hosted by Dave Richards, with an all-Elvis disco, cooked buffet dinner and live rock 'n' roll from the Hayriders. Elvis.co.uk is Europe's busiest Elvis fan site, achieving over 1 million hits per month and providing Elvis news, features, special events and an online shop with official Elvis Presley merchandise, and collectors items for fans such as the highly acclaimed Follow That Dream Collectors label. Photographs of Elvis with Sonny are also available for use. For more details, please visit http://www.elvis.co.uk (News, Source: earthtimes.org)
| Thursday August 2 2007................the countdown continues............9 days until Elvis Week 2007!!! |
| 'Tupelo's Own Elvis Presley' DVD version out now: Containing the sensational recently discovered LIVE footage of Elvis' 1956 Tupelo concert, the DVD-only version has just been released. The DVD also includes further unseen footage backstage, evening show, parade and many more. Plus a never before released Elvis interview at the 1957 Tupelo show. The DVD Audio section contains 21 tracks of the two shows from Tupelo 1956 concerts. Region 0, plays worldwide. Go here for EIN's in-depth review of the DVD/Book. (News, Source; MRS) |  |
'That's The Way It Is' 2-DVD 2007 Edition: The new 'special edition' 2007 version of TTWII is not quite as special as some fans would have hoped for. Disc 1 is the same as the TTWII SE 2000 version, and somewhat disappointingly the original TTWII film on Disc 2 is in mono. The extra "outtakes" on disc 2 run around 40 minutes and are also in mono. The added bonus tracks are; You Don't Have To Say You Love Me, Eating sequence, Cattle Call/Baby Let's Play House/Don't, Farther Along, Oh Happy Day, I Just Can't Help Believin', Walk A Mile in My Shoes, I've Lost You, Sweet Caroline, Little Sister, Stranger in The Crowd, After-show party. Priced at around $16 it still seems good value for money. (News, Source; EIN/FECC) |
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| 'Elvis: The Biography' 2007 reissue: Jerry Hopkins' book 'Elvis: The Biography' will be republished in September. The publicity notes, "Elvis Presley is the biggest single entertainment personality in the history of American popular culture. Thirty years after his death in August 1977, he remains the undisputed King of Rock'n'Roll. His talent, charisma, and good humour endeared him to millions. Known the world over by his first name alone, he remains the foremost iconic figure in popular music. Jerry Hopkins has interviewed all those who were close to Elvis; from high school teachers, classmates, old girlfriends, movie directors, agents, recording engineers and disc jockeys; to close friends, bodyguards, sidemen, karate instructors, his doctor, dentist and personal jeweller, to present a comprehensive portrait of this iconic super-celebrity. "Elvis: The Biography" recounts the complete story of Elvis' rise, fall and posthumous legacy; from his poverty-stricken childhood in Tupelo, Mississippi, through his musical development and emergence as the first pop superstar, to his ultimate ascension to the throne of rock'n'roll. This work explores Elvis' unique appeal, his massive influence on contemporary popular culture and recounts many anecdotes and events that combine to provide a matchless impression of an artist who was - and remains - a genuine legend."(News, Source; Amazon) |  |
'Elvis' 40 Greatest' re-released on Import: Here's an image that will be familiar to most Elvis fans and should also bring back some fond memories. Doing the rounds on the bootleg circuit is this CD reissue of the classic UK Arcade chart-topping compilation "Elvis' 40 Greatest". The new cover is a stylish mini double-album slipcase, with the CDs resembling the original two vinyl discs. (News, Source; EIN/e-mail) |
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| Elvis Managers plan major Graceland Overhaul - 'Heartbreak Hotel' to be replaced: The thousands of Elvis Presley fans descending on Memphis for the 30th anniversary of his death Aug. 16 won't see much sign of it, but plans are moving along for big-time changes at Graceland. Managers of Presley's famous home want to overhaul its tourist complex - with a new visitors center bigger than a football field, a convention hotel and high-tech museum displays that can give a new, digital life to the King himself. All it will take to bring about those wonders is $250 million or so; the total reorganization of CKX Inc., the New York-based company that controls all things Elvis; and a publicly supported facelift for Graceland's struggling neighborhood. |  |
The obstacles are far from small, but the people behind the plans, led by CKX Chairman Robert F.X. Sillerman (photo above right, outside Graceland), have a history of putting together big deals and making money for investors. Sillerman, a multimillionaire dealer in media and entertainment assets, took over Graceland in 2005 when he bought the rights to Elvis' name and image from daughter Lisa Marie, Presley's sole heir. When Presley died, his finances were in sad shape. Led by his ex-wife Priscilla Presley, the estate formed EPE, opened Graceland to the public and solidified the legal rights to make money on Elvis' name and image. Last year, Graceland took in $27 million in revenue, and the overall Elvis business brings in more than $40 million a year. That made him the second-highest grossing dead celebrity in 2006, behind only Nirvana's Kurt Cobain, according to Forbes. Lisa Marie Presley still owns her father's house and 15 percent of EPE, but CKX controls Graceland and its sprawling complex of souvenir shops and memorabilia museums. "As great as it is," Sillerman said after a recent visit to Graceland, "it can be so much better." The big, white-columned house Presley bought in 1957 for just over $100,000 draws close to 600,000 visitors a year, and for a week around the anniversary of his death on Aug. 16, 1977, it attracts legions of his still-adoring fans. Graceland's current visitors center, souvenir shops and museums were cobbled together by renovating a small strip mall across the street from what the Elvis faithful affectionately call "the mansion." The new plans call for leveling all that and building a 80,000-square-foot visitors center designed from the ground up for handling big crowds and high-tech exhibits. "To put that in perspective, that's about six or seven times the size of the mansion," Sillerman said. The center will be equipped for the kind of technical wizardry that allowed singer Celine Dion to recently perform what appeared to be a live duet with Elvis on the "American Idol" TV show, which CKX also owns. "People will actually think Elvis is there," Sillerman said. "It's going to be, 'Oh, wow,' I can tell you that." For years EPE has been buying land for expansion and has put together 100-acres needed for the renovation, which would move the tourist center to the same side of Elvis Presley Boulevard as Graceland. "We've continued all these years to be a major destination attraction with a busy, pretty unattractive street running right through the middle of it," said Jack Soden, EPE's top executive and a major player in opening Graceland to the public in 1982. Graceland's 128-room Heartbreak Hotel, also on the wrong side of the four-lane street, is to be replaced by a convention hotel, on the better side, with up to 500 rooms. No timeline for the expansion has been set, Soden said. "But moving straight ahead, with every intention of keeping the ball moving, we're probably looking at something in the neighborhood of a three-year process," he said. (News, Source; EIN/AP) |
| Wednesday August 1 2007................the countdown continues............10 days until Elvis Week 2007!!! |
Dennis Roberts, Elvis sunglasses supplier, dies: Dennis Roberts, who made glasses from Elton John to Elvis has passed away. Roberts who was diabetic unfortunately developed pneumonia. He will be laid to rest in Las Vegas, NV. During the 1970s Roberts made spectacles and jewellery for Elvis (he did not make the original TCB pendants) and was one Elvis personality featured in the 2005 DVD, 'Altered By Elvis' where in one of the better scenes he told how he became Elvis' glasses provider. Here is Roberts' story about how he met Elvis; "It was in 1970 when I was driving one morning on Sunset Boulevard. I was going to deliver some eyeglasses I just made to Elton John. I was stopped at a traffic light at Sunset and La Cienega when I looked over my right shoulder and saw Elvis Presley driving a black 1969 Cadillac Limousine. Elvis had his head out of the window and I said to him, "Elvis, you look like shit" and he said "I feel like shit". I told him that he needed sunglasses and he agreed. I got out of my car and told him that I had a optical shop just down the street and gave him my business card. I also told him that I had just made eyeglasses for Steve McQueen, Sammy Davis, Jr., Elton John and the Beatles. He said "I'll be in to see you". The rest is Rock & Roll history! Visit his Celebrity Sunglasses website here. (News, Source; Various) |
'In The Spirit of Elvis' - Sydney commemorates Elvis' 30th Anniversary: Thirty years on and still The King... Sydney Australia will be celebrating Elvis' life with a special concert on Friday August 17th. Mick Gerace will present his special 'In The Spirit Of Elvis' show with his band plus a 10-piece orchestra. Hosting the concert will be special guest Steve Christopher - 'Elvis On Air' DJ and Elvis expert. Steve Christopher is officially endorsed by Elvis Presley Enterprises and his radio program is broadcast by over 40 stations in the USA. During the concert Mick Gerace will feature his excellent new BMG single 'Feelin' In My Body'. Taking place at the Harbour's Edge, Darling Harbour, Sydney, the concert starts at 8.30pm and will be followed by a Dance Party to keep the spirit going. And keeping in the spirit of Elvis a portion of the ticket sales will go to charity. For more information go to www.MickGerace.com (News, Source; EIN/Mick Gerace) |
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| SHE IS THE KING new Elvis single: 'Edge Of Reality/If I Can Dream' the new single from Australia's SHE IS THE KING will be released on August 7th. SHE IS THE KING is the only female Elvis Presley interpreter to have been invited to compete in the first-ever EPE sponsored Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist Competition. She will perform at Graceland Crossing this August 2007 to commemorate 30 years since Elvis' passing. The second single from her highly anticipated album - "EDGE OF REALITY" - is being released to coincide with this milestone anniversary. The album will be out October 2007. Go here for more information. (News, Source;EIN/SITK) |  |
'Growing Up In The Shadow Of A King' new book. Released July 16, 2007 is a book from Roger Loyd, son of the late Harold Loyd who was a security guard at the gates of Graceland from the early sixties until he retired in the early 90's. The book is entitled "Growing Up In The Shadow Of A King". From the press release: "My fathers mother and Elvis' mother were sisters. Dad spent most of his life growing up with Elvis and his parents in Tupelo before they all moved to Memphis. Needless to say they were very close. Elvis was even the best man when my parents were married. The book contains many great stories about Elvis that have never been told. Stories such as: The time my mom hit Elvis in the head while they were picking cotton, The time when an older Elvis broke a gumball machine in downtown Memphis, then ran to my dads aprtment to switch clothes, or visiting with Elvis at Graceland while he was watching the gameshow "The Price is Right". There are too many wonderful stories to fit in this one letter, but I know you will enjoy all of them. I titled my book "Growing Up In The Shadow of a King". It also contains never before seen family photos at Graceland and at Elvis' ranch. (News, Source;ElvisNews) |
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New Elvis documentaries on BBC Radio 2: The BBC are featuring three special Elvis documentaries to help commemorate the 30th anniversary of the death of Elvis Presley on 16 August.
ELVIS AND ME: Sat 11 Aug; 2000-2100
This programme features a selection of people talking about their memories of Elvis. Presenter Suzi Quatro describes herself as Elvis' Number One fan, although many would challenge her for that title! She has written a still unreleased tribute song called 'Singing With Angels', which she recorded with James Burton and the Jordanaires. In addition to Elvis admirers Robert Plant, Tim Rice and Cliff Richard, there are stories and reflections from those who worked with him such as James Burton, Jerry Leiber & Mike Stoller and Ray Walker of the Jordanaires.
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ELVIS - 68 COMEBACK: Tues 14 Aug; 2230-2330 A one hour documentary explores the amazing impact and legacy of a TV special filmed for NBC called 'Elvis', now better know as Elvis's '68 Comeback special'. It stands as one of the great television moments in rock music history and a stunningly brilliant milestone in Elvis Presley's career. By 1968 it had been more than seven years since Elvis had appeared on stage in front of a live audience. In this television special, Elvis played his greatest role - simply being himself.
DON'T START ME TALKING - ABOUT ELVIS: Wed 15 Aug; 2300-2330 Making its BBC Radio 2 return, the groundbreaking oral history programme Don't Start Me Talking gets the public talking about their love of 'The King'. (News, Source; BBC)
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| EPE licenses an Elvis branded debit card: The Elvis Presley Prepaid Visa is being created by EDP Technologies Corp. and released by subsidiary EDP Licensing. The company says the Elvis card will be among the first celebrity-branded debit cards. "We are excited to bring the Elvis legend to our innovative card product line and believe that this marks a milestone in the prepaid card industry," said EDP CEO Paul Cleveland in a statement. The company plans to introduce a series of the cards with different images of Presley, and the company is promoting the cards as collectible items. EPE already licenses an Elvis Presley Visa credit card. (News, Source;EPE) |
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Larry Geller's new website now on-line: From 1964 until the very final days Larry Geller was a close friend to Elvis. Larry's own website is now on-line featuring information about his new book 'Leaves of Elvis' Garden', photos, book excerpts, contact details and much more. As Larry Geller was a vegetarian and nutritionalist perhaps Elvis might have lived longer had he paid more attention to Geller's healthy life-style. Go here to see Larry Geller's new website. Click here to read EIN's recent interview with Larry. (News, Source: Larry Geller) |
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Celebrate Elvis' life with Essential Elvis in Memphis on August 15th: While many fans will be commemorating Elvis' untimely death with the popular Candlelit Vigil, Essential Elvis will be close-by celebrating Elvis' life with several of Elvis' close friends. Elvis' cousin Billy Smith will be there along with Jo Smith, Marty & Patsy Lacker, Sam Thompson, Jeanne LeMay Dumas, Dr Nick and Dean Nichopoulos, Joe Tunzi and Susan Henning. Music will be provided by Shayne Driscoll and Colin Paul and a percentage of the proceeds will be donated to charity. The event takes place at Vernon Presley's former home on Dolan Drive. As this celebration of Elvis gathering is in a residential area numbers will be limited. Please go to the Essential Elvis website for more information. (News, Source:Andrew Hearn). |
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'PEZ Elvis Gift Set: New on the market is this 3-track Promo CD which is only available with the 'ELVIS GIFT SET' from PEZ Candy in the US. Presented in a smartly designed tin-can, this is well-worth searching out as it is sure to be a collector's item in the future. (News, Source; EIN/Ron Lacourse) |
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| Elvis features in new US National Archive: More than 6 million film and recording artefacts, including footage of Elvis' gyrations, have a new home on a hillside in this town southwest of Washington, D.C. The National Audio-Visual Conservation Center was officially turned over to the Library of Congress on Thursday. The three-building complex brings together all the library's scattered recordings and conservation staff in a specially equipped center for the first time. "It assures the permanent storage and preservation and heightened access to the audiovisual heritage of the last 110 years," said James H. Billington, the librarian of Congress. A $155 million gift from David Woodley Packard, son of the co-founder of Hewlett-Packard Co. helped make the center a reality. Congress appropriated $82 million for the project. The trove of 6.3 million items includes footage of Elvis' 1964 movie Viva Las Vegas, the complete set of Ed Sullivan's variety shows and footage of President Franklin D.Roosevelt's speech after the Pearl Harbor attack. The oldest moving image in the collection is a five-second kinetoscope movie of a sneeze, made by Thomas Edison in 1894. The oldest sounds are on two wax cylinders produced by Chichester Bell and Charles Sumner Tainter |
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| in 1889. The library receives 120,000 gifts of film and round a year. Mitch Miller, for example, just sent 200 boxes of 16mm copies of his TV program from the 1960s. A key mission of the center is to transfer unique historical images and sounds from fragile cylinders, tapes or films to digital files, which are less apt to deteriorate. (News, Source; The Washington Post) |