September 16, 2002

Lisa Marie: The Day She Gave Up Drugs

Fresh from her nuptials with actor (and occasional ELVIS impersonator) NICOLAS CAGE, LISA MARIE PRESLEY opens up about her drug use and life as The King's daughter in the new A&E Biography about her mother, "PRISCILLA PRESLEY: Keeper of a Dream." Tonight on ET, get a sneak peek at this revealing interview!

Airing tonight at 8 on A&E, this Presley special delves deeply into Elvis and Priscilla's storybook marriage. He could have had anyone he wanted, but in 1959 he chose ninth-grader Priscilla. What followed was a stormy and bizarre relationship that would force her into the role of reluctant celebrity -- and happy mother of Lisa Marie.

When Elvis died of a drug overdose in 1977, Priscilla was shocked to learn how small his estate was. She decided to make their home, Graceland, into a museum, a choice that would boost the value of Elvis Presley Enterprises to approximately $100 million. As an adult, Lisa Marie became chairman of the company and finally learned to step outside of her father's shadow.

But her private life was made more difficult by some very public break-ups, including one with her first husband, musician DANNY KEOUGH, in 1994, and with her second husband, the King of Pop, MICHAEL JACKSON, in 1996. In the A&E special, Lisa Marie talks candidly about her drug use during these troubling times and what made her stop.

"In the end it was my decision just to stop it," says Lisa Marie. "I can't do this anymore. I was tired and done with it."

Tonight on ET, discover more about Priscilla and Lisa Marie's life under the microscope, plus get the scoop on Lisa Marie's new marriage with Nic!

Source : Entertainment Tonight Online

September 15, 2002

A whole new Graceland

LOS ANGELES: Nicolas Cage wants to build his bride Lisa Marie Presley a replica of Graceland – the house where she grew up.

The actor will spend $26 million creating Graceland West, which will be built in California after Lisa Marie failed to take a shine to his three homes in the Los Angeles area.

The couple wed in secret in Hawaii a few days before the 25th anniversary of her father's death last month.

Cage, an Elvis fanatic, had courted Lisa Marie for years after they met at a party and had even taken to wearing blue suede shoes.

A friend of the couple said yesterday: "Lisa's happiest days were with her dad at Graceland in Memphis."


Source: The Australian Daily Telegraph

September 14, 2002

THE KING IS NO. 1 AGAIN
   By James Adams, Toronto Globe and Mail - September 14, 2002

Comparisons between Elvis Presley and the Beatles have always had an apples-and-oranges flavour to them, but, of course, this hasn't stopped them. Get set for a round of comparisons 10 days from now when Elv1s 30 #1 Hits is released around the world. RCA Records/BMG Entertainment in Canada is set to ship 100,000 units of the single CD set to retailers on Sept. 24.

It's all part of a big push to make Elvis "relevant" again, in this, the 25th anniversary year of his death. As a BMG executive said recently, "Elvis is a brand that needs to be resurfaced, resuscitated and re-energized in the public's mindset, especially among the 12-to-34-year-old demographic."

The assault began earlier in the summer when RCA, along with the Presley estate, released, for the first time, a remixed version of an Elvis song, 1968's A Little Less Conversation. Included as the soundtrack to a $100-million marketing campaign by Nike pegged to the World Cup, the Conversation remix scored major airplay in Europe and England, eventually earning chart positions in 25 countries. Perhaps unsurprisingly, when the song went to "the toppermost of the poppermost" in the British charts in late June, RCA gloated that Elvis had "finally" broken the decades-old deadlock between the Beatles and the King, in which each act had had 17 No.1 hits in Britain.

In releasing E1, as the industry is already calling it, RCA/BMG is clearly emulatingthe Beatles 1 retrospective that EMI issued in November, 2000. That single CD set proved a huge hit -- numero uno in 30 countries within four weeks of release! -- and is still on the Billboard Top 200 album chart two years later, with international sales topping more than 25 million. RCA clearly hopes the similarities carry over on the sales side; just to goose things along, it's appending A Little Less Conversation to E1 as a "bonus single." The Beatles, by the way, had only 27 songs that went to No. 1 in both Britain and the U.S. For the arithmetically challenged, that's three less than E. A. Presley.

September 14, 2002

A&E "Biography - Priscilla Presley" Premieres on September 17
   ----------------------------------------------------------------- EPE

The A&E television channel's very popular Biography series has produced Biography - Priscilla Presley. It will premiere on Tuesday, September 17 (8PM Eastern/7PM Central). Check the Biography series' section of the A&E web site for more. No information yet about any airings outside North America.

Priscilla Presley: Keeper of a Dream
  


At the age of 14, Priscilla Ann Beaulieu met a young serviceman named Currie Grant, who invited her to meet the world's most famous G.I., Elvis Presley. Priscilla's Air Force stepfather was also stationed in Wiesbaden, Germany with the young rock 'n' roll phenom. Priscilla counted herself among his legion of fans and convinced her parents to allow her to accompany Grant to Presley's home. Biography: Priscilla Presley: Keeper of a Dream recalls that despite their age difference, Elvis and Priscilla quickly fell in love. Six months later, Elvis left Germany and the two spent hours talking over the transatlantic cable. On May 1, 1967, Priscilla and Elvis married and soon Priscilla was pregnant. Lisa Marie Presley was born in 1968. But five years later the couple divorced and Priscilla was on her own.

Biography: Priscilla Presley: Keeper of a Dream reports that Priscilla was stunned by Elvis's death in 1977. And when she became executor of Elvis's estate, she was shocked to learn how small it was. She decided to open Elvis's home as a museum - a move that eventually brought the value of Elvis Presley Enterprises to $100 million. Priscilla began to develop her repertoire as an actress and landed roles in several popular films. In 1985, Priscilla published Elvis and Me, which became a bestseller and was made into a TV movie. Today, Lisa Marie is chairman of Elvis Presley Enterprises, and Priscilla has finally stepped out of Elvis's long shadow. Highlights include never-before-seen home movies of Elvis and Priscilla; rare early photos of Priscilla; and interviews with Priscilla, Lisa Marie, Priscilla's parents, actors Larry Hagman and Leslie Nielsen, and others within Elvis's inner circle.

Source: A&E Biography

September 13, 2002

McCartney, Lennon & More Featured On New Elvis Tribute Album
   By Gary Graff Detroit - Yahoo! News

Paul McCartney and John Lennon are among the artists featured on A Tribute To The King, an Elvis Presley covers collection due out October 22.

Drawn from the EMI Records vaults, the 13-track album includes Lennon's in-concert rendition of "Hound Dog," McCartney's version of "All Shook Up," Roxy Music frontman Bryan Ferry's "Are You Lonesome Tonight?", and Canned Heat's boogiefied version of "That's All Right Mama."

Other notable tracks come from Jerry Lee Lewis ("Jailhouse Rock"), Del Shannon ("(Marie's The Name) His Latest Flame"), Eddie Cochran ("Blue Suede Shoes"), Lou Rawls ("Now And Then There's) A Fool Such As I," and the Smithereens, who join forces with Presley songwriter Otis Blackwell for a live version of "Don't Be Cruel."

"All Shook Up" - Paul McCartney
"Blue Suede Shoes" - Eddie Cochran
"Heartbreak Hotel" - Willie Nelson & Leon Russell
"Are You Lonesome Tonight?" - Bryan Ferry
"In The Ghetto" - Candi Staton
"Jailhouse Rock" - Jerry Lee Lewis
"That's All Right Mama" - Canned Heat
"Don't Be Cruel" (live) - Smithereens w/Otis Blackwell
"(Marie's The Name) His Latest Flame" - Del Shannon
"Love Me Tender" - Kenny Rogers
"(Now And Then There's) A Fool Such As I" - Lou Rawls
"Suspicious Minds" - Fine Young Cannibals
"Hound Dog" (live) - John Lennon

September 12, 2002

Stern Magazine + Promo CD (4 track)

Thanks to Peter Haan of It's Elvis Time

September 11, 2002

Elvis Fans Remember September 11
  ----------------------------------- EPE


Post Your Thoughts in Remembrance of the Tragic Events of September 11, 2001 at elvis.com


Every one of the thousands of people who perished too suddenly has left behind a legacy in their friends and families. For the millions who bear witness to their memory, life will never be the same. Twelve months doesn't erase the pain of last September 11. No amount of time will ever fade it from our memories.


Beginning now, you can post a message communicating your thoughts on remembering those lost in the tragedies of September 11.

Go to: http://www.elvis.com/memorial/show_messages.asp

"There must be peace and understanding.... sometime... Strong winds of promise that will blow away the doubt and fear..."

... from "If I Can Dream"

September 10, 2002

Elvis is alive and well in London

An exhibition of restored, never-before-seen photographs of Elvis Presley has inaugurated a new gallery area at Angelprints, in London's Islington district.

The pictures were taken by amateur photographer Arthur Armstrong in January 1960 while he was serving in the Royal Army Pay Corps in Munchengladbach, Germany.

The processed films were stored for more than 40 years before being discovered by Armstrong when moving house. He took the films, by now in a poor condition, to digital specialist lab Angelprints in the hope that something could be rescued from them. Such was the success of the restoration that the pictures now serve as the first exhibition at the Angelprints gallery.

Source : BJP (British Journal Of Photography)

September 09, 2002

Reinventing Elvis
   By Fred Goodman, The RollingStone Magazine

Can the King rise again?

There are not yet tumbleweeds blowing down Elvis Presley Boulevard in Memphis. But with Presley's original fans headed for retirement homes instead of record stores, the King's domain is shrinking. Fast.

The graying of his core followers has raised alarms at his label, RCA, and with his estate's managers, Elvis Presley Enterprises: Last year, total sales of Presley's catalog were just below 1.5 million units; attendance at Graceland dropped fifteen percent from the year before.

Enter the marketers. With the twenty-fifth anniversary of Presley's death on August 16th, now is the moment to recrown the King for a new generation of subjects. Steps one and two came courtesy of Nike and Disney, both of which were recently granted licenses to Presley songs with the hopes of getting his music in front of a younger demographic. Step three is the September release of Elvis: 30 #1 Hits, a single-CD package that RCA hopes will do for Presley what the 1 package did for the Beatles.

RCA is putting $10 million behind those hopes. The marketing campaign includes contests, Internet tie-ins, radio, TV and print ads, a Las Vegas launch party, and Presley's face plastered on billboards, phone booths and bus shelters from coast to coast. There is little doubt as to who all this advertising is aimed at. If you go to the Web site for 30 #1 Hits (Elvisnumberones.com), a voice solemnly intones, "Do you know why television has censors? Do you know why women throw their panties up onstage? Do you know why Britney played Las Vegas? Elvis is why. . . . Before anyone did anything, Elvis did everything!"

With eighty gold and forty-three platinum albums to his credit, Presley remains the undisputed monarch of sales for RCA and its parent, BMG. But last year, amid 8.2 million sales of the Beatles' 1, the compilation of chart-toppers, Presley was bottoming out: All his albums combined sold a paltry 1.4 million copies during the same period. Presley had eight titles on the Billboard catalog chart in 2001, but five of those were Christmas CDs. Even his combined total makes the King look like a peasant alongside more contemporary catalog-chart acts such as the Eagles. The problems were obvious: The titles were stale, and younger buyers just don't have much interest or emotional connection to Presley. "We had to stretch the demographics" to reach fans of all ages, says Joe DiMuro, senior vice president of strategic marketing for BMG.

DiMuro isn't ignoring Presley's old-school fans -- as with 1, 30 #1 Hits will be available for direct order through TV ads six weeks before the album's street date, a strategy generally aimed at older buyers who don't frequent record stores. But the marketing campaign is designed mainly to reel in younger fans by convincing them of Presley's enduring hipness. Some of the efforts seem, in keeping with his Seventies image, somewhat bizarre: Elvis Presley Enterprises will stage a Memphis concert that will pair Presley's video image with live backing from some of his musicians from back in the olden days. But the Nike and Disney tie-ins have already offered a tremendous boost to RCA's efforts to revitalize the Presley catalog.

In the case of Nike, the traditionally conservative EPE agreed to a remix of an obscure Presley movie soundtrack song, "A Little Less Conversation," which Nike used as part of a worldwide ad campaign that aired during the World Cup in June. (EPE did insist that Tom Holkenborg, the Dutch DJ who did the remix and goes by the name of Junkie XL, identify himself only as JXL.) "Nike selected this relatively unknown song, and the remix was something everyone loved -- including us, with all of our history of reservations," says Jack Soden, president and chief executive of EPE. The fact that Nike was putting $100 million behind the campaign, which also featured sophisticated spots directed by Terry Gilliam, likely didn't hurt.

The real bonus came when Holkenborg's remix proved so catchy that it was subsequently released as a single. To date it has gone to Number One in nine countries, including England. "A Little Less Conversation" even earned cheap bragging rights in the U.S., going to Number One on Billboard's singles chart by selling just 26,500 copies; still, it has remained there for three weeks and continues to sell and garner radio play. The track has been added to 30 #1 Hits, and the cautious Soden -- a new convert to the power of updating Presley -- predicts there will be more remixes in the future.

But if the goal is to introduce Elvis to a new generation of fans, the real bonanza may be Disney's new animated film Lilo and Stitch. The plot centers around a five-year-old girl, Lilo, who happens to be a huge Elvis fan. Six Presley songs are used on the soundtrack, which has already sold 242,000 copies and is Number One on the Billboard soundtrack chart. That's a steady stream of royalties for RCA, and nearly a quarter of a million six- to twelve-year-olds who could be getting 30 # 1 Hits for Christma

And then, of course, there are the Disney tie-in Happy Meals and coloring books that RCA's DiMuro is excited about. His reasoning is simple: RCA hopes Disney is creating future Presley customers. And in that regard, Happy Meals are just small potatoes. In coming decades, Lilo and Stitch, and its video and CD, may prove to be Elvis 101 for succeeding generations, keeping Presley alive through the unlikely media of kiddie video. "Sometimes you just get lucky as anything," says Soden.

"Back in '88-'89, we licensed some of the [Presley] '68 performance and 'Aloha From Hawaii' to the Disney Channel at, frankly, a fraction of what we would normally expect for it," he adds. "And it was done with this same clear thought in mind. We're thoroughly enjoying the joint efforts with BMG, but, honestly, the notion of introducing Elvis to a new audience is more of a new focus for BMG -- it's been part of our philosophy for a long, long time. In a way, I guess, it's working. When we talk to the twentysomethings, they remember sitting in front of the TV and encountering this great-looking guy with this great music. And now they're visitors at Graceland. But I don't think we really need to recast Elvis. I think our mission is, don't screw it up."

September 07, 2002

Sergeant Presley

 Click here to enlarge image and more photos

September 06, 2002

Donna Presley Photos Archives ... Donna with Elvis

   Donna Presley with Elvis - These 2 pictures (right) were taken when Elvis got married on May 1, 1967.
   Donna was just 17 years old!
 

Source : Donna Presley

September 06, 2002

Pictures ... Priscilla with Lisa and Nicolas Cage

   Priscilla with Lisa and Nicolas Cage in Memphis - August 16, 2002.

Source : Priscilla Presley Archives

September 05, 2002

  Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup (CD)



In remembering Elvis Presley, Document Records is pleased to put on Promotion for the month of September the complete pre-war recordings of Arthur 'Big Boy' Crudup.


Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup will forever be known as the author of "That's All Right (Mama)," the first song Elvis Presley recorded. Released on the Sun label in 1954, the record helped launch Presley's phenomenal career and linked blues with early rock & roll. Crudup wrote other blues classics, including "Rock Me Mama", "Mean Ol' Frisco" and "My Baby Left Me" which have been covered by artists such as B.B. King, Big Mama Thornton, and Bobby "Blue" Bland.




1. "Arthur Crudup - The Essential" - Document CBL-200025 (2 CD)
2. "Arthur Big Boy Crudup Vol. 1 1941 - 1946" - Document DOCD-5201
3. "Arthur Big Boy Crudup Vol. 2 1946 - 1949" - Document DOCD-5202
4. "Arthur Big Boy Crudup Vol. 3 1949 - 1952" - Document DOCD-5203
5. "Arthur Big Boy Crudup Vol. 4 1952 - 1954" - Document DOCD-5204

Source: Document Records

September 05, 2002

Graceland's grandiose tone is fit for the King - Forever Elvis
   By Catherine Fitzpatrick, The Milwaukee Journal - September 01, 2002


It is hardly just another famous house.

It is, and ever shall be, the immortal Graceland.

Elvis Presley's family home in Memphis is "full of the same joys, laughter, sorrows and tears experienced in your own home," the official Graceland Guidebook tells visitors.

But it's a safe bet most folks don't have an indoor waterfall wall, a gold-leaf grand piano, or a game room upholstered stem to stern with 400 yards of gosh-awful Sixties-era fabric.

When Elvis was a boy he told his parents he would make a ton of money some day and buy them the finest house in town. In the spring of 1957, when he was just 22 years old, he made good on that promise with the purchase of Graceland Mansion.

The King of Rock 'n Roll did not grow up in a palace. In fact, Elvis Aaron Presley began life in the humblest of circumstances.

He was born to Vernon Elvis Presley and Gladys Love Smith Presley, the second boy in a set of identical twins. The first, Jesse Garon, was stillborn.

Vernon built the family's two-room house himself, on a quiet street in Tupelo, Miss. He had borrowed $180 for the materials. The white frame house had linoleum floors and a simple wood high chair for baby Elvis.

The family lived in several houses in Tupelo over the years, as Vernon and Gladys moved from job to job. In 1948, they packed all their belongings into a trunk, strapped it on top of their car and drove to Memphis. Elvis brought along his guitar.

Through much of his school years, Elvis and his parents lived in public housing in the poor neighborhoods of north Memphis. It was there, mainly on Beale St., that he absorbed the black R&B and gospel music that would fuel his meteoric rise to the world's most popular entertainer.

Hit leads to mansion

In 1957, a year after his first gold record, "Heartbreak Hotel" hit No. 1 on Billboard's pop singles chart, he bought the 14-acre estate known as Graceland. He paid $100,000.

For a poor kid from Tupelo, buying the gracious stone mansion and sprawling, hilly spread represented a part of the American Dream.

Graceland had been platted years earlier as a 500-acre family farm. In 1939, a Southern colonial mansion was built on the property, situated in a grove of towering oaks. A reporter for the Memphis Commercial Appeal once said the estate had a "general feeling of aristocratic kindliness and tranquility."

That was before Elvis and his kin moved in and slathered over-the-top decor all over the place.

Elvis was Graceland's original tour guide - he loved showing people his home. But The Pelvis spent money wantonly. At his death, Presley's estate was in danger of losing the property.

Facing serious financial problems, Priscilla Presley decided to open Graceland to the public, and set about overseeing a massive renovation project that returned the botched-up decor to the cobalt blues and whites of Sixties Hip. Today, Elvis presides posthumously over an estate that is one of the top tourist magnets in Memphis.

Thanks to Priscilla Presley's business savvy, and that of Lisa Marie, her daughter with Elvis, Graceland is the crown jewel in the $37 million per year Presley empire.

Enduring story

More than 750,000 casual tourists and die-hard devotees will make the pilgrimage to Graceland this year - many of them on return visits. They'll be traipsing through the home, ogling its kitschy contents, mooning over the grave sites, and brushing up on one of America's most enduring rags-to-riches stories.

The whole deal might be slick, self-absorbed and overbearingly marketed. It might be nothing more than a shrink-wrapped, prepackaged, Elvis-as-icon experience. But for those paying homage to the King in the 25th anniversary year of his death, few places on Earth thrill as does Graceland.

Pass through the grandiose, wrought iron gates, roll up the long drive, and it doesn't take much imagination to feel the King's presence. He's there (well, sort of) under the gaudy chandeliers, in the blue velvet inner sanctums and the faux-exoticism of the Jungle Room.

And certainly in the Meditation Garden, out yonder.

"Hi! This is Elvis Presley," a disembodied voice announces. It is the King himself, piped in through headphones passed out by staffers. "The happiest times I've ever had have been with my family at. . . ."

Graceland's tram deposits the faithful on Elvis' doorstep, and in a wink they're standing at the cusp of the King's living room.

With its 15-foot white sofa (custom made), the living room is gracious and formal. A sunburst clock ticks away on a mirror wall over the mantel. A framed photo of Vernon and Gladys rests in a place of honor on a side table.

Beyond two huge stained glass peacock panels is the intimate music room, where many a night Elvis and friends sang their fave tunes. Over the years, the instruments in this room included a beautiful ebony Story & Clark baby grand, and a gold-leafed grand piano.

A sweeping staircase leads to the second floor, but a glimpse of royal blue silk draperies is all visitors see. That part of Graceland is forever closed to the public. Not even the tour guides have been there.

Across the foyer, the dining room beckons. Under its glittering chandelier, Elvis and his ever-present entourage crowded around the eight-foot table for platters of Southern cooking and a little low-stakes poker.

Breakfronts hold a pirate's treasure of silver, and a vintage TV set in a corner is topped with a huge silver punch bowl.

Stop. Think about that. Mutton Chop Sideburns Elvis in the sweaty jumpsuit era . . . sipping punch from a dainty silver cup?

The dining room table is set with Noritake china in the pattern selected by Priscilla and Elvis at the time of their marriage. The flatware is original, but Priscilla and Lisa Marie took the original Noritake stuff.

On a side table are more black-and-white photos - Priscilla with major eyeliner issues, little Lisa Marie in a pout.

Down-home basics

Graceland's avocado and harvest gold kitchen once swirled with activity, but the cooks rarely delved into the realm of fancy food. Elvis liked down-home Southern cooking.

By command of the King, the kitchen was stocked with fresh ground beef and all the fixings to make the giant cheeseburgers he loved. Case upon case of Pepsi - and two flavors of ice cream - were kept in stock at all times.

At home or on the road, Elvis' favorite dish was the infamous fried peanut butter and banana sandwich. He also had a passion for biscuits like his momma made; the Graceland refrigerator always contained ready-made biscuit dough.

Occasionally, craziness erupted among the pots and pans. Once, when Elvis and the boys were playing with fireworks, a whistling chaser landed smack in the middle of a cake and exploded.

The decor gets a little more outrageous in the basement.

At the bottom of a weird mirrored staircase, a yellow and black mirrored bar/soda fountain comes into view. Beyond that is the TV Room, richly appointed in '70s hip mode: sectional sofa, chrome, mirrored ceiling, super-graphics paint job.

Elvis had three built-in televisions installed after he learned President Johnson liked to watch all three major network news shows simultaneously. But the King's favorite shows were "I Love Lucy" and "The Dick Van Dyke Show."

The Pool Room saw plenty of action over the years, and plenty of design eccentricities. A mix of European, Asian and American styles of various eras contributes to the eclectic result: Louis XV style chairs in red leather, a brass and wood trunk on an Oriental stand, nostalgic art prints and bric-a-brac.

A massive pool table dominates the room. The rip in the felt top occurred sometime in the mid-'70s when a friend tried a trick shot that didn't quite pan out.

An estimated 400 yards of pleated fabric cover the Pool Room's walls and ceiling. A decorating crew worked 10 days to cut, piece and hang the fabric.

We're not done. On to the Jungle Room.

Here was a typical American room until the mid-1960s, when Elvis had a custom stone waterfall wall installed, complete with dripping vines. Ten years later, the King walked into a Memphis store and in about a half hour selected a suite of fake-fur furniture and tree-trunk tables for the room. It reminded Elvis of Hawaii.

Impromptu studio

Soon, the entertainer realized the green shag rug he had had crews affix to the Jungle Room's walls and ceiling absorbed sound rather nicely. This made the Jungle Room ideal for jam sessions and recording. In 1976, in that very room, Elvis and his band and back-up singers recorded all of the album "From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee."

The highlight of the tour is Elvis' Trophy Building, containing his enormous collection of gold records and awards, along with an extensive display of stage costumes and jewelry.

Under clear plastic is Elvis' 1977 gold lame suit, the iconic stage costume created at the suggestion of Col. Tom Parker by Nudie's of Hollywood.

Also there: the green Army fatigues worn by Elvis during his 18-month stint in Germany, where Pvt. Presley met little Priscilla Beaulieu, an Air Force general's daughter.

There is the white fedora Elvis wore in "Trouble With Girls." The blue plaid blazer from "Viva Las Vegas." Leather-bound movie scripts from "Fun in Acapulco" and "Girl Happy."

An old smokehouse stands off to the side of the mansion. Through their headphones, tour participants learn the story:

"These bullets and casings were swept from the floor and dug out of the woodwork of this room, remains from a brief period in the '60s when Elvis and the boys used this room as a firing range."

Pasture and garden

Elsewhere on the property, a thoroughbred nibbles grass in an idyllic pasture ringed with white fencing, reminiscent of the days when Elvis' favorite horse - a palomino named Rising Sun - resided at Graceland.

No trip to Graceland would be complete without a visit to the Meditation Garden. Elvis is interred there, out back, behind the house. So is Minnie Mae, his grandmother. And Vernon and Gladys, his parents. A marker notes the passing of his twin brother.

Pilgrims leave tiny stuffed animals, plastic flowers and flags near the Meditation Garden's Italian statues, its Grecian-inspired columns inlaid with stained glass from Spain, its spouting fountain.

"Whatever he emanated on stage was what he was off," says Lisa Marie, through the tour group headphones. "He touches the spirit. His spirit came through."

Californians Patricia and Kenneth Thompson pay their respects in the garden, and walk back toward the shuttle. They have dedicated a day of their honeymoon to a tour of Graceland.

"I grew up seeing Elvis," Patricia says. "As a teenager, he was it."

"I think he gave the American people a lot to remember," Kenneth adds.

Each year on Aug. 15, the eve of the anniversary of his death, the gates of Graceland Mansion open at 9 p.m. for a candlelight vigil. Anyone who wishes to walk up the drive to Elvis' grave site in quiet respect may do so.

Elvis died at his beloved home 25 years ago, on Aug. 16, 1977. At the time of his death, his career was on the wane, his fortunes spent, his body bloated. But he had accomplished something few entertainers dream of: eternal status as one of the most important figures of popular culture.

Shuttle back to shop

A shuttle takes visitors back down the hill, across Elvis Presley Blvd. to Graceland Plaza.

There, they are encouraged to purchase souvenirs ranging from ink pens and CDs to leather bomber jackets, posters, cologne and upscale art pieces. Encouraged to enjoy Southern-style plate lunches and world-famous Memphis barbecue at the Chrome Grille. Or cheeseburgers, hot dogs and pizza at Rockabilly's Diner.

They may purchase tickets to see Elvis' airplanes and automobiles - remember that pink 1955 Cadillac? Or the Sincerely Elvis museum, where mementos reflect the private side of the legend - his offstage wardrobe, home movies, some of his mother's clothing, Priscilla's wedding ensemble, childhood items of Lisa Marie.

Seated on the shuttle, heading toward the Plaza, two recent visitors assessed their Graceland experience.

"I'm in awe. I had goose bumps," said Angela Radeljic, 30, of Indianapolis. "I went in thinking it was going to be tacky, but. . . ."

Her companion finished the thought.

"Well, it was tacky, in a certain valid '70s way," said Jonathan Pye, 28, "but the tour gave the impression that Elvis was a really nice guy."

September 03, 2002

How Elvis shook up Nashville
   (The News Letter/UK)


Elvis Presley, who tragically died on this day 25 years ago, may be best remembered as a rock ‘n’ roll star. But he was essentially “a good ole country boy” who maintained a strong connection with the Nashville sound throughout his career.

Indeed, the singing style, repertoire and myth of Elvis had as big an impact on American country music as it did on pop and rock.

However, in the very conservative confines of country music in the mid-1950s, Elvis was not an instant hit, and when he made a trial appearance at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville in October, 1954, the audience was not taken by a hopped-up, bodily gyrating version of Bill Monroe’s classic bluegrass song Blue Moon of Kentucky.

The Nashville appearance was not considered one of Presley’s greatest triumphs and folklore has it that the then Opry manager Jim Denny advised the 19-year-old from Tupelo, Mississippi, not to give up his day job as a delivery truck driver with the Crown Electric Company.

Elvis moved to the Louisiana Hayride, another renowned country show which cradled stars like Hank Williams, Faron Young, Jim Reeves, Webb Pierce and Johnny Cash, and there for a year, with the backing of the DJs, he developed his own distinctive rhythm and blues style of country music.

At the time, Elvis was touring the States on country roadshows, in the company of singers like Patsy Cline, Hank Snow, Jim Reeves and a very young George Hamilton IV.

Elvis borrowed from the legendary Hank Snow a much-requested country-folk parody Old Shep – a song about an aged dying dog – and he turned it into a big hit.

Other contemporaries of Presley in the country field at the time who combined black styles with their own indigenous rockabilly music were Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Charlie Rich and Conway Twitty, but, while they eventually became stars in their own right, they never reached the heady heights of Elvis.

Born the son of a southern white sharecropper, Elvis’s earliest musical influences were the white Pentecostal church and the black workers in the cotton fields. While growing up, he was tuned to the music of Jimmie Rodgers-style country blues and Hank Williams-style honky tonk.

Other favourites of Presley were movie-pop singing star Dean Martin, who recorded several fine country albums; Kentucky balladeer Red Foley; blues singer BB King; gospel group the Blackwood Brothers and the high octave-voiced country-rock star Roy Orbison, who Elvis once described as the finest singer he had ever heard.

Presley’s manager Colonel Tom Parker had previously managed Hank Snow and at RCA Records his initial recordings were produced by guitar maestro Chet Atkins, who used some of the techniques which he later used in the early 1960s to develop his famed Nashville Sound.

The Jordanaires, a popular white gospel group with authentic country attachments, were back-up singers on all of Elvis’s early recordings at RCA, including All Shook Up, A Fool Such As I, Don’t Be Cruel, It’s Now Or Never and Are You Lonesome Tonight?

Elvis’s gospel records are standard country works, with inspirational tracks Peace in the Valley and Just A Closer Walk With Thee having a special resonance. Throughout his life, he maintained a love of gospel music, a throwback to his southern Pentecostal church roots.

Two of Elvis’s later hits – In The Ghetto and Suspicious Minds – were in the country rock mould, but, in truth, so diverse and eclectic were his recordings over the 23-year professional singing career that his musical categorisation was so difficult to define.

The country influences, however, undoubtedly played a big part in creating the legend that was Elvis.

September 02, 2002

 Country Music Magazine 

In this issue ...
Elvis Presley - 25 Years After His Death, Nashville Re-Examines Its Often Conflicted Relationship With The King Of Rock 'n' Roll.

... and more

COUNTRY AND THE KING

 


Elvis Presley Loved Country Music - Though It Didn't Always Love Him Back


In the early hours of Aug. 16, 1977, Elvis Presley sat down at the piano in the lounge of the Graceland racquetball building to sing “Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain,” the Fred Rose classic Willie Nelson had included on his landmark Red Headed Stranger album two years earlier. It was the last song Presley would ever perform. Within hours, he would be dead at 42, a victim of bad habits, self-indulgence and unfulfilled dreams.

The fact that Elvis Presley ended as he began – with country music on his mind and in his lungs – was not especially remarkable. Still, the misconception lingers that Presley appreciated country only in his youth and in the earliest period of his recording career, and that he cast this love affair aside once he left Sun Records for RCA. In truth, aside from the early-to-mid-’60s, when the bulk of his recorded material came from the songs written for the soundtracks of his films, Elvis frequently recorded country tunes.

From childhood on, hillbilly, folk and Western music formed the roots of Elvis’ musical experience. Like many poor Southerners, the Presley family listened to the Grand Ole Opry on Saturday nights; Presley once remarked that the venerable radio program was probably the first music he ever heard. “Country music was always a part of the influence on my type of music,” he said in 1970. “It’s a combination of country music, and gospel, and rhythm and blues.”

Along with Pentecostal church hymns and white gospel – and the black music that he heard in the Tupelo community of Shake Rag, not far from his own Mississippi home – the young Presley found inspiration on Tupelo’s radio station WELO. Mississippi Slim, the host of the noon-time program Singin’ And Pickin’ Hillbilly, became Elvis’ first true role model.

As an 11-year-old, Presley frequented the station, working up the nerve to perform one day on a Saturday afternoon amateur show called WELO Jamboree. By that time, he’d already performed Red Foley’s “Old Shep” without accompaniment in front of an audience of several hundred at the annual Mississippi-Alabama State Fair and Dairy Show in Tupelo – standing on a chair so he could reach the microphone, and winning fifth place in the Children’s Day talent contest. He continued to sing the weeper about man’s best friend throughout the early years of his professional career.

As Elvis matured into a teenager, he listened not only to Foley, but also to Jimmie Rodgers, Bill Monroe, Ernest Tubb, Roy Acuff and Hank Williams, whom he would later come close to playing in a ’60s movie based on the doomed singer’s tragic life and death. He came to the music naturally, absorbing his mother’s interests. Gladys Presley was most definitely a country music fan.

Of course, Elvis’ love of country music was evident from his first recordings. His first single featured a fired-up R&B song, Arthur Crudup’s “That’s All Right (Mama)” on the A-side and Bill Monroe’s “Blue Moon Of Kentucky” on the B-side, which Elvis and producer Sam Phillips transformed from an elegant waltz to a rockabilly firecracker charged with the slurred vibrato that became Presley’s vocal trademark.

The details behind Elvis' rise to stardom and relationship with country await YOU in the current "NEWSSTAND ISSUE" of Country Music Magazine!

Source : Country Music Magazine

September 02, 2002

Elvis In Hollywood (VCD)



2 VCD
65 Mins Approx.
Format : NTSC

Source : VCD Video

September 01, 2002

(RDJ) ELVIS PRESLEY 30 #1 HITS PROMO CD + PRESS KIT


          

 
Elvis Presley - 30 #1 Hits Press Sampler (RCA RDJ-60593-2) 2002 promo only 5 track CD sampler plus a press kit which consists of 8 pages of bio and a custom folder.

Source : e-mail/ebay.com

August 31, 2002

  Elvis Magazine



Remembering The King Of Rock 'n Roll - 25th Anniversary Magazine
Perhaps the rarest & certainly the most beautiful of the 25th Anniversary Elvis tribute magazines.
This is actually the quality of an oversized coffee table book; cardboard cover, 100 lb. coated paper,
a fantastic collectors photo gallery featuring many never before & rarely seen exclusive photographs.
These beautiful color & black/white pictures are mostly full page portraits.

Source : Elvis Unique

August 31, 2002

American Journal: Was Presley A Racist?
   By Alexander Cockburn

On the occasion of the recent 25th anniversary of Elvis Presley's death I read a truly stupid piece in the London Guardian, "He Wasn't My King" by Helen Kolawole, to the effect that Elvis stole songs like Hound Dog from black folks, that Willie Mae (Big Mama) Thornton wrote Hound Dog and sang it better and that anyway Elvis was a racist, noted for having said, The only thing Negro people can do for me is to buy my records and shine my shoes.

Wrong on every count. Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller, white men, wrote Hound Dog and Big Mama Thornton's version is markedly inferior to Presley's, made three years after her's. Peter Guralnick, in his Last Train to Memphis, The Rise of Elvis Presley (1994), cites a good story that appeared in Jet magazine on August 1, 1957.

"Tracing that rumored racial slur to its source was like running a gopher to earth", Jet wrote. Some said Presley had said it in in Boston, which Elvis had never visited. Some said it was on Edward Murrow's on which Elvis had never appeared. Jet sent Louie Robinson to the set of Jailhouse Rock "When asked if he ever made the remark, Missisissippi-born Elvis declared: 'I never said anything like that, and people who know me know I wouldn't have said it ."

Robinson then spoke to people "who were (itals) in a position to know" and heard from Dr W. A Zuber, "a Negro physician in Tupelo" that Elvis Presley used to "go round to Negro 'sanctified meetings'; from pianist Dudley Brooks that he "faces everybody as a man" and from Presley himself that he had gone to colored churches as a kid, like Reverend Brewster's and that "he could honestly never hope to equal the musical achievemets of Fats Domino or the Inkspot's Bill Kenny." "To Elvis," Jet concluded in its Aug 1 1957 issue, "people are people regardless of race, color or creed."

Visiting Memphis, Ivory Joe Hunter was invited by Presley to visitiwithhim in Graceland and Ivory Joe was worried about the stories of prejudice that had been circulating about Elvis through the spring of 12957. Presley received him with warmth and admiration, sang his composition "I almost lost my mind" with him, and they hung out for the day singing. Hunter said later, "He showed me every courtesy and I think he's one of the greatest." (Jimmy T-99 Nelson told Jeffrey St Clair the other day that Ivory Joe had the biggest feet he'd ever seen. Bigger than Howlin' Wolf's, Jeffrey asked. Bigger by far, said Nelson. When Ivory Joe stamped, the whole stage shook.)

If you want to look at some great photographs of Elvis in black locales and with black musicians in Memphis in the 1950s, get Daniel Wolff's wonderful edition of Ernest Withers' photos, The Memphis Blues Again.

When my daughter Daisy was around 12, in the course of a couple of chance encounters, I was able to get Lieber to play her Hound Dog and Yip Harburg to sing her "Somewhere Over the Rainbow", all in one summer. Oh, just something any Dad would do.

Source : CounterPunch

August 30, 2002

 Crest SpinBrush Uncovers American Women's Views on The Most Coveted Celebrity Smiles




The male category "Smile Icons" Elvis Presley on Top the List
Throughout history, Hollywood has celebrated smiles that could melt anyone's heart.
Marilyn Monroe's trademark smile was the voted the most legendary with 42 percent,
while 29 percent thought Lucille Ball's smile was the most memorable. As for the male
icons, Elvis Presley may have left the building, but not America's hearts. Elvis
came in first place with 37 percent of the vote while James Dean garnered 19 percent.

Source : PR Newswire

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