October 01, 2002

ELVIS LIVES! HE'S THE KING OF THE CHARTS ALL OVER AGAIN
   By Bill Hoffmann, New York Post Online


October 1, 2002 -- And the hits just keep on comin' for Elvis Presley, whose new record debuts tomorrow at No. 1 on the charts - even though he's been dead for 25 years.
"Elv1s: 30 No. 1 Hits," released one week ago, has sold nearly 500,000 copies in the United States alone, making it the hottest CD in the nation, according to SoundScan, which tracks sales in record stores.

The disc also has the European market all shook up - it's No. 1 in England and Ireland, and is on top of the Canadian charts as well.

"We're thrilled. Elvis' legacy transcends time and generations," said Richard Sanders, executive vice president of RCA Records, which released the CD. The King died on Aug. 17, 1977 at the age of 42.

October 01, 2002

Songwriter Mickey Newbury dies at 62

Newbury recorded for several record labels during his career, most successfully for Elektra, which released "An American Trilogy" in 1971 and scored a Top 40 hit. The innovative arrangement of "Dixie," "Battle Hymn of the Republic" and "All My Trials" became a staple of Presley's show ... Full article

Source : CNN

October 01, 2002

A remix of Elvis for a new generation
   By Jim Abbott, Sun-Sentinel


Tell us, children, everything you know about Elvis Presley.

"He died on the toilet," says Jesse Edwards, 15, a freshman at Orlando's Edgewater High School. "He was 300 pounds."

The girls standing next to him giggle in genuine disbelief.

"Jesse! Did he really?" exclaims classmate Ruth Milcarsz, 14. "He is dead. I know that."

"A lot of people say he's still alive," offers Brittany Dunn, 15. "I know that his daughter was really pretty."

"She married Nicolas Cage," Edwards adds. Milcarsz raises her eyebrows in astonishment: "Jesse! How do you know that?"

In the four decades that have passed between Ed Sullivan and Eminem, the King no longer reigns in the target demographic. In the midst of a $10 million publicity push for the new Elvis 30 #1 Hits, in stores last week, he's a fuzzy historical character to the nation's most coveted music buyers, like Amelia Earhart or Buffalo Bob.

"Most of the kids come in with the impression that Elvis was some sort of clown," says Bill McKeen, rock historian, author and chairman of the journalism department at the University of Florida. McKeen challenges that perception in an honors program class in rock history that he teaches annually. His weapon is the music.

"Images of thin Elvis and fat Elvis have dominated the pop culture," McKeen says. "When they hear the music of thin Elvis, they realize why fat Elvis has stayed around so long."

Now, there's a new image of Elvis being crafted by RCA and Elvis Presley Enterprises (EPE), the company that manages his estate. They want to connect with younger listeners with the music and by putting his cultural impact into perspective.

"Do you know why television has censors?" a voice intones on elvisnumberones.com, the album's Web site. "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!"

He never did a dance remix, which is what EPE commissioned this summer when the company agreed to license A Little Less Conversation, an obscure 1968 soundtrack song to Nike for a $100 million international ad campaign that debuted during World Cup soccer.

Dutch DJ JXL's remix was a smashing success, transcending the commercials to become a chart-topping hit in nine countries, including England and the United States. It also spawned an underground tribute song that incorporated Eminem's Without Me into the track. That song became a favorite on Top 40 stations.

In addition to Nike, the traditionally conservative EPE also has successfully hitched its wagon to the Walt Disney Co., licensing six songs to the animated hit Lilo & Stitch, in which one of the lead characters happens to be a diehard Elvis fan. The soundtrack sold more than 300,000 copies and inspired Happy Meals and an avalanche of other spin-off products. Lilo & Stitch characters were invited to participate in the opening celebration for Elvis Week last month in Memphis, Tenn.

The new greatest-hits album also will be showcased among more trendy nu-metal and hip-hop acts at FYE stores, a chain of 600 stores at malls nationwide. FYE also is sponsoring a Mobile Graceland exhibit, featuring items from Elvis' Memphis, Tenn., mansion and museum. It will tour nationally in coming months.

"We're just as vigilant as we ever were," says Jennifer Burgess, marketing director for Elvis Presley Enterprises, which has guarded the King's legacy valiantly over the years. "Just because we're putting Elvis on products that might appeal to a younger demographic, we're still very careful with what it looks like."

There are plans to lend Presley's image to a new portable disc player designed for children and to a line of stuffed collectibles from the Vermont Teddy Bear Co.

"As far as licensing revenue and interest in Elvis as a product and property, it's been phenomenal for at least the last five years," Burgess says. "It has really not waned."

At least one Elvis fan says using bean-counters to measure the King is absurd.

"Elvis isn't going anywhere," says Dave Marsh, noted rock critic and author. "It's so weird to me that people think Elvis vanishes between marketing projects that I don't know how to respond to it. It's like if a Bible publisher were putting out a new edition of the Bible and people were saying, `What do you think will happen to Jesus' reputation if it failed?' It really is like that."

But will the next generation keep that faith? Even the King's caretakers have met doubters.

"My daughter is almost 16, and she has never been an Elvis fan," admits Burgess, who works at Graceland. There was a conversion, however, when Burgess took the girl to see Lilo & Stitch.

"She left the theater humming Devil in Disguise, and now she's doing a term paper on Elvis," Burgess says. "It's on his impact on pop culture and TV censorship."

"It's cool now if you're a kid to like Elvis," Burgess says, "and that's great."

October 01, 2002

Elvis is back on top
  
DEAD rock star Elvis Presley is back at the top of the charts.

As expected, his new compilation 30 Number One Hits debuts at No. 1 in Australia.
Over 150,000 copies were shipped to record stores last week, one of the year's highest pre-orders.

The Lilo and Stitch soundtrack, featuring original Presley songs and several Elvis cover versions, is No. 12 on the charts.

Source : Herald Sun

September 30, 2002

Elvis 30 #1's : Doing the Colonel Proud
   By Bryan Gruszka



Ok, let me share a story with all of you. This is a story so odd, so unusual, so strange, that I wouldn't be surprised at all if I was accused of making it up. But it happened to me, and it was one of my proudest moments in all of my years as an Elvis fan. What was it? Well, here goes …

As everyone knows, Elvis #1's was released in the US this past Tuesday, September 24th. Another Elvis release? How many more can there be? Well, this is true, but this one was different. For the first time in my memory, BMG actually had promoted, and I mean really promoted, an Elvis release, so much so, in fact, that even non Elvis fans were talking about it. The fact that this promotion paid off with the masses was brought home to me in a most unexpected and exciting way this weekend.

Picture this … I'm shopping in my local mall, which is in a predominately Hispanic area. This mall caters to mostly Hispanic and African-American shoppers and is not the place that you'd expect to see an Elvis presence. Well, I was shopping in Bachrach, a rather trendy men's clothing store and what do I hear over the speakers? Heartbreak Hotel. Yep, that's right. And not just Heartbreak Hotel, but the entire Elvis #'1s release. One of the employees had put it on. Not only that, but the customers were listening, singing and even dancing along to it. Needless to say, it made my shopping experience wonderful. But it also made me think. The bigger picture was this. here I was, in a trendy store with young, non-Caucasian employees and customers, and Elvis Presley was being played. And not only was Elvis being played, but Elvis music was SELECTED purposely by one of the employees. What did this mean? Well, it meant that Elvis was suddenly cool to people that you'd never expect him to be cool with. That got me thinking as to how this happened.

Like many Elvis fans, I had an unrequited dream, almost a fantasy, really. It was that, some day, through aggressive marketing and a firm believe in product, that Elvis would actually become "Hip" again. Did I think it would ever happen? Absolutely not, especially given the fact that, without fail, every US Elvis release languished and died at the very bottom of the album charts, despite all the supposed "promotion" from BMG.

I'm sure many of you know how frustrating it is as an Elvis fan to go into a record store on the day of a new Elvis release only to be greeted with absolutely no indication that there is anything new coming out and to get that quizzical look for the store clerk when you ask about the new release. For me, this experience has become increasingly frustrating in recent years, especially given my growing realization that anyone can become "hip" again given the right marketing. Take the Beatles releases of the 1990's. I have mentioned this point to anyone who would listen, and even to some who wouldn't - whether you liked the Beatles or not, or were dying for the new Beatles releases or couldn't care less, they were EVERYWHERE. Commercials, posters, ads and announcements for the Beatles Anthology series and for "1" were ubiquitous. One couldn't avoid them if one tried. The result? The Beatles had more success in the 1990's than they did during their career as a group, and racked up four number one albums. And how did Elvis compare during this period? Of all of the major BMG releases, including the 50's Masters, which was perhaps the most promoted of Elvis' 90's releases, only one release, 1997's "Platinum", even scratched the Top 100 in the album charts, reaching number 80, something that BMG heralded as a major success…not to belabor this point, but that, my friends, is simply pathetic. While the Beatles were racking up their best album sales ever, BMG was scrounging through old sales figures in a desperate attempt to prop up Elvis' officially certified sales.

Part of the problem, as we all know, has been BMG's "quantity over quality" approach, which saturated the market with multiple album releases every year. In a 1997 interview, Mike Omansky, former VP in charge of Elvis' releases at BMG, mentioned that BMg expected each new Elvis release to sell 100,000 copies, implying that that was a "good" number for Elvis. Therein lies the problem, folks. After all, how much marketing needs to go into a product that is only expected to sell 100,000 copies on its initial release?

Given the above, one can imagine my trepidation when BMG decided to trot its #1's compilation. Looking at BMG's track record with marketing, and given the fact that it already had been done with the Beatles compilation, it seemed to be a case of "monkey see, monkey do" on the part of BMG, and I naturally feared that this compilation would simply come and go like so many other Elvis releases and, not only that, but that it would be compared unfavorably to the Beatles 1's release once the abysmal sales figures were tallied.

I'll be the first to admit that I was wrong about that. But at the same time, I can hardly contain my excitement at the fact that my long held theory that marketing Elvis properly would ensure success has been proven correct in a huge way. The reason? Well, it's simple - Elvis has actually been promoted, and not "promoted" as BMG claims to have promoted Elvis in the past - with little fanfare - Elvis is literally everywhere, and it's paying off.

Naturally when BMG launched the Elvis #1's campaign I was skeptical. After all, BMG has launched a big campaign for "Artist of the Century", which of course turned out to be nothing. However, as the days and weeks went by, and I actually managed to see more and more ads for Elvis #1's, my skepticism abated somewhat. However, being the cynical jaded Elvis fan that I am, I told myself that all the promos I saw were in Memphis during Elvis Week, which is only to be expected. It remained to be seen, however, if any of that promotion would translate elsewhere.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I saw ads for Elvis #1's on VH-1 and MTV. Elvis? On MTV? How'd that happen? Then, to my even bigger surprise, I visited a local mall and not one, not two, but all three of the record stores I visited had Elvis displays up. Yes, you heard right, Elvis displays…I asked myself when was the last time I saw an Elvis display in the store. The answer? 1992, when I saw a small stand up display for the 50's Masters in one store. This time, however, there were banners, signs, displays, and yes, Elvis was even on the "Coming Soon" wall, something I have NEVER experienced in my 25 years of collecting Elvis' music. In addition, the local Wal-Mart had Elvis displays, as did my local Best Buy. To top it off, I visited other local record stores and, without exception, all had Elvis displays. And I'm not talking one little poster, either. To a non-Elvis fan, Elvis was, to all extents and purposes THE big upcoming release. And that's not even including the internet marketing and aggressive pre-order campaigns that BMG was waging, and the cross-promotions with Yahoo, CompuServe, AOL, and a host of other companies.

What was going on? I asked myself. Dare I hope that Elvis was being promoted? What was truly amazing was that Elvis was being promoted as if he were a real artist. I know that sounds ridiculous, as of course Elvis was a real artist, but it is a sad fact that Elvis has never been promoted as he should have been. My theory was that if BMG hyped a new Elvis released they would overcome resistance by record retailers and such, and it looks as though it was true. I always said to myself that I wished that all new Elvis releases would stop and that BMG would put a huge budget into marketing just one release, just to see if Elvis would ever make the top 40 the charts. Heck, I wasn't even shooting for #1. I just wanted to see Elvis in the Top 40 again. Number one was a position that I had assumed Elvis would never again reach. However, with each day my hopes began to rise a bit. With pre-orders being counted in first week sales, the prospects for the new release seemed even better. Was BMG actually hoping to give Elvis a #1 album?

Well, now comes the news that Elvis #1's is EXPECTED to debut at #1 in the US…What? Am I hearing this correctly? Elvis Presley debuting at number one? How could this happen? He's dead, for crying out loud! And not only that, it's Elvis! He's not supposed to be contemporary, or cool, or anything like that. He's just some old, dead fat guy that your grandparents listened to, some guy who did bad movies and wore jumpsuits. Did he even record music? Of course I am hyperbolizing here, but those of you reading this will no doubt understand what I'm trying to say. For years Elvis has been a case of style over substance, being reduced to simply an image, with no "good" music to back up the contention that Elvis was actually a substantive artist, deserving of as much credit and respect as any of the other rock legends out there. But now it seems that something is different. The question is, of course, why is it different and how did it happen?

The answer to the first question is rather obvious, yet for some reason it wasn't obvious to BMG for years - promote Elvis like he's a vital, vibrant, popular artist (dare I say the King of Rock and Roll?) and promote him like you mean it and people will jump on the Elvis bandwagon. After all, if you really believe that Elvis is the most important artist of the 20th Century then treat him like that. Think about it. If every newcomer to the music scene can have a million selling debut album or debut at the top of the charts why can't Elvis? At least try it and see.

Well, BMG did try it and it's paying off. Of course I'm no BMG strategist, but it appears to me that they were not only trying to sell the Elvis #'1s release, but that they were A) actually trying to get it to debut at #1 and B) trying to make this a longer-term strategy to keep sales going strong through the Christmas season, where Elvis has traditionally been a big seller. The results of this strategy will hopefully be far reaching and long-lasting. What are they?

Well, some of the immediate benefits are A) lots of record sales - over 600,000 in first week sales in the US according to some sources; B) An expanded presence for Elvis and lots o' revenues for BMG and C) The possibility of Elvis' first official Diamond award for sales of 10 million copies.

But the long-term benefits could be even greater. Some of these benefits include A) The idea that Elvis Presley albums can sell in big numbers, which will make record retailers actually want to promote the release, reducing the pressure on BMG to force feed subsequent releases to record stores; B) The idea that Elvis is a hip, trendy force in music, an artist that will help bring customers into record stores, which will also help to convince record retailers to promote subsequent releases; C) The dispelling of the notion that Elvis is all style and no substance, which will, in an ideal situation, help sway critics and perhaps even more of the mass opinion; D) Newer and bigger marketing ideas, including cross-promotion with additional big companies and E) The subtle changing of public opinion, some of which has already been happening, from the view that Elvis is some type of campy, clownish buffoon to the view that Elvis was and is a powerful artist deserving of the title of King of Rock and Roll.

Will any of these things happen? Who knows? But for the first time in my lifetime they seem attainable, and even plausible. That was much more than I could have ever hoped for to happen and it all came about because of something that seems so simple, something that everyone else does - promotion. Simple promotion. The Colonel would be proud.

September 30, 2002

The Official UK ALBUMS CHART




Elvis Presley reinforced his seemingly infinite appeal, years after his death, by nailing the top spot in the album chart.

His compilation, ELV1S - 30 Number 1 Hits, follows up the single, "A Little Less Conversation", which gave him the record for British number one singles.

September 29, 2002

King dead for reel
   By Chris Campling - The Times

Viewpoint: Plans by Hollywood to remake an Elvis film leave our correspondent all shook up

There is something surreal about Paramount Pictures’ plan to remake the Elvis Presley film King Creole. Only in Hollywood, as they say. In fact, it is possible to imagine the scene when this stunning idea took shape (especially if you’ve seen as many movies as we all have about the way they make movies).

Picture big fat Hollywood mogul sitting behind desk the size of Wembley Stadium. Out of sight are several starlets ministering to his every need.

In runs Man With Idea. “Boss,” he shouts,“ I have an idea.”

“Run it by me one time, son-in-law,” quoth mogul.

“The idea is we remake Elvis Presley’s movies — he’s hotter than ever these days, OK so he’s been a bit quiet publicity wise — but . . . and here’s the switch, you’re gonna love this, we make ’em without Elvis.”

Brilliant. During his decades in the hands of the bad, possibly mad, and definitely dangerous to know Colonel Tom Parker, Elvis was obliged to appear in some of the worst films ever to disgrace celluloid. Just check out the characters he played: in King Creole itself, for example, he played a singer in a lowlife New Orleans dive. In GI Blues he was a guitar-playing gunner with the US Army. In Love Me Tender he was a singing ghost. In Blue Hawaii he played a singing soldier turned beachcomber (two cheap characters for the price of one! Bargain!). In only one drama did he adopt a non-singing persona, and that was in Charro!, which, in the words of Eric Cartman, sucked donkey barf.

True, there was some wheat among the chaff, but that was generally because Elvis put it there. He had charisma to burn, and a nice way with a self-deprecating line. He also possessed, according to the writer Nic Cohn, one of the two great American faces of the 20th century (Marlon Brando had the other). Bigger acting careers have been built on less.

Thus it was that certain of his films were a bit better than dire — one thinks immediately of Flaming Star (“more than its fair share of good moments,” the critics raved). And Jailhouse Rock (“reasonably competent”).

And Frankie and Johnny (“mildly amusing”) . . . the plaudits went on and on.

Still, what should we expect? When Elvis was in his heyday as Parker’s most successful dancing chicken (the colonel had once turned a dishonest penny by taking a live chicken, bunging it on a hotplate, and inviting the public to watch it “dance”) he was making movies in his sleep — three in 1964, four the following year, three the year after that.

The good thing was it kept him thin — only when he stopped making flicks did he turn into King Burger. The bad thing was it possibly made him embrace corpulence as a way of not having to humiliate himself on a regular basis.

And now someone is actively considering taking the good bits of Elvis’s films — Elvis — and, for obvious reasons, chucking them away in favour of filming the bad bits. Crazy, man, crazy.

Now if it had been Cliff Richard’s films they were thinking of remaking without Cliff one could understand. Just imagine a remade Summer Holiday — the Shadows, Una Stubbs and, in the middle of the screen, a sort of vague, amorphous silhouette shape. Just like the original, in fact.

September 29, 2002

Don’t be cruel
   By Bobbi Murray

Special to the Los Angeles Times
   Murray is a Los Angeles-based writer.

On Tuesday a compilation of 30 No. 1 Elvis Presley hits was released, thus marketing him to another generation of listeners, the same way “The Beatles 1” was aimed at people who thought the group was Paul McCartney’s backup band.

Elvis has plenty of image baggage to overcome with the folks in his new target market. But Lord knows it’s not all his fault. The real trouble is those Elvis impersonators. This may infuriate what we’ll call here “the Elvis impersonator community,” but they make Elvis look like a geek and give the rest of us the creeps. There are an estimated 35,000 Elvis impersonators worldwide and, sad to say, they seem to overwhelmingly skew toward the dumpy. Just because there was once such a thing as a chunky Elvis doesn’t mean that any sideburned pudgy guy wedged into a white jumpsuit should feel like he can be the King.

Poor Elvis didn’t balloon like that until the very last few years of his life. It caused him such consternation that he once ditched his regular doctor for a quack in Las Vegas who put him under for a week as a weight-loss scheme. Imagine the chagrin of the once visually stunning Elvis if he knew now that 35,000 chubby guys insist on imitating him at his physical nadir.

Now you are thinking: “Uh-oh, another deranged Elvis fan.” Elvis fans do creep people out. Those guys who are not full-fledged impersonators but still affect a weird ducktail? -- unnerving. And I will admit that recently at Graceland I talked with a guy from Illinois about his plans to stay over in his uncle’s double-wide trailer.

I can claim some authority on the issue of Elvis fans after, I’m sorry to report, standing with 35,000 of them in a gusting, driving, hourlong thunderstorm outside Graceland on August 15 for the vigil that marked the 25th anniversary of Elvis’s death. So here’s the bulletin: Most Elvis fans don’t believe that he is still alive and buying Little Debbie cakes at the 7-Eleven in Akron, Ohio. They know and regret that he shuffled off this mortal coil in a sudden and undignified manner.

Fan factoid No. 2: Many, many Elvis fans are not from Westbyjeeminy, Mississippi. Vigil participants included Swedes for Elvis, Danes for Elvis and, like everywhere else, herds of French with no discernible alliance. I admit it crossed my mind, as I approached my seventh hour in line, that there’s no annual vigil of this scale for Martin Luther King Jr. or Cesar Chavez, or probably even Gandhi. Not to mention that I’ve never waited in line so long to see a guy who was still alive.

You remember when Chris Rock made endless fun of Jennifer Lopez’s rear end? Girlfriend ran right out and whittled it to such enviable proportions that women now ask their plastic surgeons for a J. Lo butt.

Elvis happened before all that star self-awareness. As the first huge multimedia star, he didn’t know to hide when he looked unseemly. These days, Elvis would know what to do; hell, even “Colonel” Tom Parker would get himself a little lipo.

Why rehab Elvis’s image? It’s not that I care about Elvis CD sales; it’s just annoying when so many writers take cheap shots at him, as creative as making fun of the fat kid in class. I rejected Elvis for years because of the way he made hits covering black artists’ music. The story of how black artists were used up and discarded is an old and ugly one; Elvis’s early Sun Records recordings certainly owe a debt to Little Junior Parker, Smiley Lewis and Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton. Elvis owes them, but he also owes Bill Monroe and Hank Williams -- Blue Moon of Kentucky, Good Rockin’ Tonight, even That’s All Right, Mama are all loaded with the sound once snidely called hillbilly.

Peter Guralnick, Elvis’s biographer, calls the mix “vernacular music,” the music of the scorned, and points out that without Elvis, the American mainstream would never have heard the genius of either Muddy Waters or Hank Williams.

Elvis took American music, made it something different, made us appreciate it. So let him speak for himself and give him a listen. Don’t worry, it doesn’t mean that you’ll suddenly become a ducktailed sucker for Elvis. If you do, book your flight to the next vigil now; it’s cheaper that way.

Source : ABS CBN News

September 28, 2002

The King still holds ’em in awe

LOS ANGELES - RCA vice president David Bendeth spent a year uncovering hidden tones in original Elvis recordings to produce a richer “less distant” sound.

He was awe-struck. “Imagine mixing the King!” said Bendeth, whose work Elvis 30 #1 Hits is now in record stores everywhere. “Everyone said, ‘Can you make this better?’” Bendeth recalled. “People were hesitant to touch them.”

The tapes, some recorded over 45 years ago, included “Heartbreak Hotel,” “Jailhouse Rock,” “Are You Lonesome Tonight” and “Can’t Help Falling in Love.”

He and partner, Ray Bardoni, heard each song over 1,000 times as they worked to enhance them. “I tried to think what Elvis wanted. I had to imagine he was in the room with me,” said Bendeth. Then some weird things happened. The horns disappeared from “Suspicious Minds.” The original piano music vanished from “It’s Now or Never.”

In each case, Bendeth found the music and was able to integrate it back in. “It was,” he said, “like someone was leading me.”

Source : ABS CBN News

September 26, 2002

Stars And 'Idols' Celebrate The King
   (Billboard)

Country star Travis Tritt and "American Idol" contestants Justin Guarini and Tamyra Gray were among those present at last night's (Sept. 24) New York launch party for the new Elvis Presley hits compilation "Elvis 30 #1 Hits" (RCA/BMG). Also on hand was the King's former wife, Priscilla Presley, his former drummer, DJ Fontana, and Broadway star Heather Headley.

Before each musician joined a house band to perform an Elvis song, Priscilla spoke briefly to the crowd at the Hard Rock Cafe, marveling at how the icon's popularity today seems to have eclipsed the interest in Elvis at the time of his death in 1977. The singer, she said, would often ask, "What am I gonna do onstage with a guitar" after his 40th birthday.

Sharply dressed in a dark suit and turquoise shirt that matched his drumsticks, Fontana joined the house band for gritty versions of "Heartbreak Hotel," "Hound Dog," and "Jailhouse Rock." Tritt followed, performing a spirited take on "Burning Love."

After Headley -- who will make her recorded debut Oct. 8 with "This Is Who I Am" on RCA -- performed an impassioned version of "Can't Help Falling in Love," Guarini and Gray followed with their covers of Elvis' "She's Not You" and "Don't," respectively.

While the "American Idol" contestants received the loudest applause, the night's highlight arguably arrived when mix engineers David Bendeth of RCA and Ray Bardani played the before and after versions of a few songs on the new album. While the difference was enormous -- the new versions were brighter, fuller, and louder -- it was their recent discovery of a snippet of Elvis dialogue that evoked a wave of laughs and applause.

Bendeth and Bardani unveiled an outtake on which Elvis was singing backing vocals while listening to a tape of his lead vocals. As he listened to himself truly belt out a particular line, he says under his breath, "Sing it, man," in his unmistakable "Thank-ya-very much" Southern drawl.

Released yesterday, "Elvis 30 #1 Hits" compiles some of the King's best known songs, including "All Shook Up," "Hard Headed Woman," and "It's Now or Never." The collection also includes the recent remix of "A Little Less Conversation" by Elvis vs. JXL.

-- Wes Orshoski, N.Y.

September 25, 2002

New CD will make Elvis King again
   By Hugh Dougherty, The London Evening Standard - September 25, 2002



Twenty five years after his death, Elvis Presley is about to rule once more as the King of Rock'n'Roll.

His widow Priscilla Presley is launching a compilation of all 30 of his No 1 hits in an album predicted to be the year's top-seller.

From Heartbreak Hotel to A Little Less Conversation - the surprise hit of last summer - the 80 minutes of Elvis music is the first new album featuring the star since his death.

Priscilla launched the album at the Hard Rock Cafe in New York, flanked by two of his guitars, in a room dominated by a picture taken in the Fifties of the young man who had just become the world's biggest star.

For Priscilla, who has watched her late husband's legacy grow over the years, it was a rare public appearance, but once the album hits the shops, it will be Elvis who will do all the talking - or singing.

The only comparison music industry analysts have drawn is with the album Beatles 1 - a compilation-of all their No 1 UK and US hits, which was a best-seller around the world - and boosted the surviving band members' coffers by millions as they received the royalties.

Priscilla and her daughter, Lisa-Marie, can expect a similar massive increase in their wealth as a result of the Elvis album.

Not only will it be bought by diehard fans who have kept the King's memory alive, but it is expected to gain a new audience among people born after Elvis's death, many of whom made the remixed A Little Less Conversation a number one.

The album cover features Elvis's name in lights on a gold background, and a package of pictures inside designed to emphasise his status as an icon: close-ups of the pelvis, the quiff, the wooden guitar and the gold lamČ suit.

The album is the latest part of the celebrations of the 25th anniversary of Elvis's death, which saw 70,000 people flock to his home, Graceland, to mark his death at 42 on the bathroom floor of the mansion.

The anniversary will see a substantial boost in the takings of his estate, which were L24 million last year, and which according to an American financial magazine have made Elvis "the richest dead celebrity", well ahead of other music legends including John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix and Bob Marley.

Elvis has already sold more than one billion records worldwide, the equivalent of one in six of the world's population owning one of his records.

But the top-selling albums of all time do not yet include any of Elvis's work, a situation his record company RCA will hope to change.

Elvis's estate does not just depend on his music. Each year Graceland has an average of 600,000 visitors - a figure expected to be easily exceeded this year - while it has stakes in restaurants and hotels in Memphis.

September 25, 2002

Elvis Fans Say It Rocks; Unquestionably, It Rolls
   By Michael Wilson, The New York Times - September 25, 2002


There is black, like the night sky or a dark hole, and there is black, like what the desk clerk wears down at the end of Lonely Street. This room is the second black.

All you can see, walking in from the bright sunshine, is something big and white on the wall. In the split second it takes the human eye to adjust, comprehend and transmit to a shocked brain, it could almost be an angel, but for its adorned pelvis.

The jumpsuit.

Elvis Presley is touring again. Mobile Graceland rolled into Midtown Manhattan yesterday, like some kind of rock 'n' roll bookmobile in a big, black 18-wheeler. The jumpsuit is one of several Elvis artifacts in the exhibit.

Yesterday, it was outside a record store on West 51st Street. Today it plays Broadway, in Times Square. It is free, and is expected to draw a large crowd, larger than its well-received swing through the South this summer, larger even than the crowd that gathers round an angry young man, face down in the street with a gun in his hand, in the ghetto.

Just inside the door, there is one of Elvis's first guitars, a 1956 Gibson. There is a shirt from "Jailhouse Rock." There is his third-grade report card from East Tupelo School in Mississippi. There is a comb, its teeth seeming to still glisten with hair oil and butch wax.

Towering over it all is the jumpsuit. "The Spectrum Suit," says a reverent Shawn Fahy, a guide on the truck who seems to materialize out of the darkness. "One time, this woman came in and dropped to her knees and just started crying, right in front of it."

In the jumpsuit bandwidth, the Spectrum is a relatively minimalist ensemble. No floor-length cape, no big sunglasses, it was modeled after Mr. Presley's desire for something "simple, easy and masculine," according to the literature. All the sweaty scarves went to the screaming women that night, Nov. 8, 1971, when Elvis played before 16,601 fans at the Spectrum in Philadelphia. The fabric looks surprisingly comfortable, tailored to give a little for the karate moves.

The traveling collection, like the man, starts out simple — a childhood box of crayons, his Army jacket — and runs to the bizarre. A sampling of his collection of police badges shines beside one of the King's favorite pistols, a turquoise-handled Colt .45 monogrammed with an "E" on one side and a "P" on the other.

Beside the famous photograph of a bleary-eyed Elvis standing next to President Richard M. Nixon is Mr. Nixon's thank-you note for "your thoughtfulness in giving me the commemorative World War II Colt .45 pistol, enclosed in the handsome wooden chest."

The Mobile Graceland tour is part of an orchestrated barrage of all things Elvis this year, 25 years after his death. Yesterday's arrival in Manhattan coincided with the release of a compact disc featuring remastered versions of classics like "Heartbreak Hotel," "Return to Sender," "A Big Hunk O' Love," "In the Ghetto," and a modern, ramped-up version of "A Little Less Conversation."

Mr. Fahy, 37, of Albany, walks visitors through the 53-foot trailer, pausing to share a gun story or a jumpsuit tidbit with the air of one who has just heard it himself. A marketing manager by trade, his enthusiasm for Elvis began last month, when he got this assignment through the record store chain FYE, a sponsor of the tour.

"I went to Elvis school," he said of the training at Graceland. "It was pretty intense. I didn't really become a fan until I learned about his life and his effect on people."

"When people hear you're with Elvis, casinos treat you like rock stars. `Oh, you're with Elvis,' and doors open up," Mr. Fahy said. "They don't talk about him in the past tense. It's insane." He paused to invite two women to an Elvis party at the Hard Rock Cafe later.

There is a small gift shop area in the corner, but loitering is discouraged. Mr. Fahy gently keeps things moving, especially on busy days. A little less conversation, a little more action, please.

Barbara Mazor Bart, director of the Walt Whitman museum in Huntington Station, N.Y., dropped by the West 51st Street location to see.

"The curator must have had a very difficult decision as to what artifacts to put here," she said, standing near a briefcase version of a car phone, one of Mr. Presley's prized gadgets. "I think it's a brilliant idea, to put Graceland on the road to attract a younger audience. It's pure genius."

The tour will continue into December and perhaps beyond. "We close up and leave town and go to another place," Mr. Fahy said. "We bring a little bit of Memphis to everybody."

Mobile Graceland closes its New York showing at 10 tonight. Tomorrow will be too late. It's now or never, the truck won't wait.

September 24, 2002

Elvis lives on in all-hits CD
   By Kieran Grant, Toronto Sun

Elvis lives!

Well, not literally. But a new CD Elvis -- 30 #1 Hits does its best to bring the King back to life.

As the title suggests, the disc, out in stores today, compiles in chronological order all the Elvis Presley chart-toppers RCA released between January 1956 and July 1977.

The original recordings have been digitally remastered, clearing away natural studio noise -- particularly on the earlier cuts -- boosting Elvis' voice, and defining the separation between the backing instruments.

The release of 30 #1 Hits is part of a renewed focus on Elvis following the 25th anniversary of his death, and is expected to be a Christmas top-seller. It also comes on the heels of the JXL Remix version of A Little Less Conversation, which recently flung Presley to the top of the charts in Canada and 17 other countries around the world.

The updated song, which samples the original against an electronic backdrop, is included as a bonus track on the new disc.

"It's like taking a painting at the Sistine Chapel and peeling away the film and gunk that's been on it for years," says Red Robinson, veteran Vancouver deejay who, in 1954, gave Elvis some of his first airplay in Canada.

"These new remasters do that for your ears."

It's a common selling point for retrospective albums to be subjected to some sort of remastering process, with the differences often negligible to all but the strictest audiophiles.

There's no question as to the clear changes on 30 #1. The recordings sound vivid, and the treatment is best suited to post-1960 tunes such as It's Now Or Never, (Marie's The Name) His Latest Flame, and Suspicious Minds.

Then there's Robinson's favourite: The 1958 version of the lurid One Night, the title of which had to be shortened from One Night Of Sin as not to offend sensibilities of the era.

The CD also boasts frank and useful notes for each track -- ie., RCA almost rejected Heartbreak Hotel when it didn't replicate the echoey sound of Elvis' early singles on the Sun label; Elvis insisted on 28 takes of Don't Be Cruel before getting the song's desired offhand feel.

Of course, some purists who prefer the grit of the originals are bound to chafe at the redux.

"I'm not in that camp and I don't think Elvis would be either," Robinson says. "Even then he didn't think he had the right technology. He was always at the forefront."

Robinson was a high school student with his own radio show when, with a 1954 phone call to Memphis deejay Dewey Phillips, he landed copies of Elvis' early Sun singles.

"The first one happened to be (a cover of) Roy Brown's Good Rockin' Tonight. I didn't know whether I was listening to a black guy singing country or a country boy singing black music. I played it and got an unbelievable response."

Robinson was ultimately tapped to emcee Elvis' concert at Empire Stadium in Vancouver in front of 25,000 people.

"My knees shook like Elvis' did, but for a different reason," he says. "He'd become such a monstrous success he could rent stadiums."

As for how the updated A Little Less Conversation went down with Elvis' old camp?

"RCA took (original guitarist) Scotty Moore, and (former drummer) DJ Fontana, and a few of us into a room and played it for us," says Robinson.

"Fontana felt it was appropriate because Elvis always wanted to be relevant. This maybe isn't what he would do, but it was something new to represent the times."

September 24, 2002

Elvis v The Beatles

IT'S ELVIS PRESLEY's great chance this week to prove he's bigger than THE BEATLES.

Elv1s — a collection of all his 30 worldwide hits — was released yesterday.

Record bosses reckon it will prove once and for all that he is the king of pop.

But everyone is watching to see if it can beat The Beatles' 1, the fastest-selling album of all time which sold 22million copies.

Charlie Stanford, boss of Elvis's BMG label, said: "Elv1s will show just what a great and important artist he was. Elvis was the first pop idol — even JOHN LENNON acknowledged that."

  Source : The Sun - September 24, 2002

Archive : Elvis News! - July 07, 2002  Elvis & The Beatles No. 1 singles in the history of the British pop charts

September 24, 2002

Paramount reheats "King Creole"
   By Dave McNary, Reuters - September 24, 2002

HOLLYWOOD (Variety) - Paramount Pictures is looking to bring back more of Elvis Presley, whose disc of 30 No. 1 hits debuts Tuesday.

The studio is developing an updated version of its 1958 Presley starrer "King Creole," which revolved around a delinquent who takes a job as a dishwasher in a New Orleans nightclub and gets the chance to perform one night.

"King Creole," directed by Michael Curtiz and featuring Carolyn Jones, Walter Matthau and Dean Jagger, was Presley's last feature before his Army service and is regarded by critics as one of his better films. The picture was based on the Harold Robbins novel "A Stone for Danny Fisher,"

The current project will tap into the source material while being set in contemporary New Orleans with the lead actor striving to become a rock star. Grant Morris has been hired to write the script; he has also been attached to Miramax's remake of "Everybody's Famous."

September 22, 2002

ELV1S
   30 #1 Hits - Album Sampler

   ELV1S
   30 #1 Hits
   Album Sampler (CD)
   BMG 74321 961332

   Track List:
   1. Burning Love
   2. Suspicious Minds
   3. Can't Help Falling In Love
   4. In The Ghetto
   5. Love Me Tender

September 22, 2002

Video Clip
   ELV1S 30 #1 HITS Click here

Source : BMG

Download Macromedia Flash 6 here

September 21, 2002

Hot Sounds: 'Elv1s: 30 #1 Hits'
   By Bill Ellis, The Commercial Appeal - September 21, 2002

'Elv1s: 30 #1 Hits'

Had enough of Elvis? I didn't think so. Neither does his record label RCA, which gave us a boxed set, "Today, Tomorrow & Forever," in time for Elvis Week and now offers "Elv1s: 30 #1 Hits," in stores on Tuesday.

Marketed along similar lines as the Beatles' million-selling compilation "1," this Kingly selection also has platinum stars in its eyes.

There is a difference. The Beatles were a more consistent act. Buying a record of Presley chart toppers doesn't necessarily mean buying the best music the man made, just his best-selling songs at any given time (and if pop culture were judged solely on what sells the most, we'd still be singing the praises of Debby Boone). For a better representation of Presley's many musical highs, I still prefer RCA's three-CD box, "Artist of the Century," or the Reader's Digest four-CD collection, "Elvis! His Greatest Hits."

But "Elv1s: 30 #1 Hits" - which includes No. 1s from both the U.S. and U.K. charts - has a lot going for it. Almost two-thirds of the tracks are from 1956-1960, when Elvis was at his commercial and artistic peak. While the Sun material isn't here (and that remains the greatest music he ever made, even if it charted only regionally in its day), no one can fault such timeless performances as Heartbreak Hotel, All Shook Up, Jailhouse Rock and A Big Hunk O' Love.

Yet reaching No. 1 doesn't redeem the lameness of certain '60s recordings, including his melodramatic stabs at Neapolitan balladry - It's Now or Never and Surrender - the empty Good Luck Charm or the truly awful Wooden Heart (it didn't chart in America but, alas, spent six weeks at No. 1 in England).

However, the disc's remastered sound is a key selling point, and Presley has rarely sounded better sonically than here. Listen to the extra bite in the bowed bass on the opening to In the Ghetto or to the triumphant presence of the vocal on Suspicious Minds, on which it heretofore had been buried.

The remix hit A Little Less Conversation - a global No. 1 this summer by Dutch deejay JXL - is the persuasive bonus track. If RCA hopes to induct a new generation of Elvis fans, this just may do the trick.

September 20, 2002

Elvis's first guitar to star in auction
   By Michael Lollar, The Commercial Appeal - September 19, 2002


It wasn't the kind of transportation 11-year-old Elvis Presley had in mind. He wanted a bicycle, but the $12.95 guitar he got put him on the road to virtual immortality.

That first guitar, bought at Tupelo Hardware Co. in 1946, is among hundreds of celebrity items being auctioned next month as part of what New York auctioneer Arlan Ettinger calls "the best auction ever held."

Three other Elvis guitars also will go on the block Oct. 12-13 through Guernsey's Auction House, where Ettinger, president of the company, predicts Elvis items could be the stars of an all-star show. Also on the block will be items from Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, Lucille Ball, Madonna, Tom Cruise and Greta Garbo, among others.

Ettinger says the Elvis guitars are among about 50 guitars in the auction, including a 16th Century instrument believed to be the oldest known guitar. "Guitars have become a pretty hot commodity among collectors. Three months ago we held an auction with material from the Grateful Dead with featured items including two Jerry Garcia guitars, which brought close to $1 million apiece. The previous record was about $450,000 for a guitar played by Eric Clapton."

Ettinger, who conducted the 1999 Graceland auction in Las Vegas, said the first Elvis guitar is the only Elvis item with a minimum reserve bid, meaning it can be withdrawn from the auction if it fails to meet the minimum. He declined to reveal that minimum, but said, "One could make an argument that it should be worth more than the two Jerry Garcia guitars that we sold. No one is more important in the scheme of things than Elvis Presley."

Ettinger's version of the first Elvis guitar is different from the official version in Graceland's Presley biography. Ettinger says the young Elvis had wanted a shotgun, but was told it cost too much. Instead, his mother, Gladys Presley, bought the guitar for him for $7.75, says the auctioneer. The Graceland version is that Elvis wanted a bicycle in 1946, but Gladys talked him into a $12.95 guitar until she was able to afford the bicycle for Christmas in 1947.

Graceland spokesman Todd Morgan says he has seen "several versions" of the story about the first Elvis guitar. There has been some speculation among Elvis biographers that the guitar "no longer exists," he says. But Ettinger says the guitar "was passed by Elvis to a close friend." That friend gave the guitar to one of his friends. When he died, it remained in his family until now, says the auctioneer.

The other Elvis guitars come with stories, too. One, which Ettinger describes as a Gibson J200, is "a black-bodied guitar with a karate sticker on it." Ettinger says Elvis was playing the guitar at a 1975 concert in Springfield, Mass., when a string broke. "Elvis turned around, took the guitar and hurled it in the direction of the backstage area." He says a couple sitting in that area shot a photograph just as Elvis tossed the guitar, then dropped the camera just in time to catch the guitar in flight.

In a 1977 concert, one of Elvis's last, he was playing a blond-colored guitar when the strap broke. The guitar fell to the stage. "At which point Elvis yelled out to the audience, 'Which of you people waited the longest to see me here tonight?' " In the end, Elvis handed the guitar to a young woman who had waited all night in a lawn chair to be among the first admitted to the show.

The fourth "Elvis" guitar was actually a metal-bodied guitar owned by Uncle Jim and the Westones, a group that met Elvis early in his career while singing with him at country fairs in the Memphis area. Ettinger says Elvis signed their guitar. "He pressed so hard it looks like an engraving in the neck of the guitar," says Ettinger.

Ettinger says the two-day auction in New York's Altman Building will be divided between music and movie star memorabilia. Other musical instruments included in that phase of the auction will include guitars from John Entwistle of The Who, B.B. King, Waylon Jennings, The Doobie Brothers and Chet Atkins. There will be a trombone played by Tommy Dorsey, a player piano once owned by Elvis, a grand piano once owned by Motown Records Recording Studio and used by Marvin Gaye, The Supremes and The Temptations, and a concert grand piano built for Liberace and used by Elton John and Billy Joel.

Among movie star memorabilia will be a dress and jewelry from Marilyn Monroe, Charlie Chaplin's cane, and movie posters and other possessions from John Wayne, Madonna, Cruise and Garbo.

For auction catalogs ($30) or other information, call Guernsey's in New York at (212) 794-2280, E-mail Guernsey's at auctions@guernseys.com or visit the Web site www.guernseys.com.

Elvis First Guitar >> Page

September 18, 2002

ELVIS-THE CONCERT Adds Two USA Tour Dates

Elvis-The Concert has added two dates to its 2002 tour schedule for the USA. The show will play at Harrah's in St. Louis, MO on October 11 and Harrah's in Shreveport, LA on October 18.

Source : EPE

September 18, 2002

Actor James Gregory Dies in Arizona

SEDONA, Ariz. (AP) — Character actor James Gregory, who played Inspector Lugar for eight seasons on television's "Barney Miller,'' died Monday of an undisclosed illness. He was 90.

In the late 70's and early 80's, Gregory was well known for his role as Inspector Lugar during eight seasons on the "Barney Miller'' series.

Gregory also appeared in 25 Broadway shows, including a stint as Biff in "Death of a Salesman.''

Among the actor's 30 film credits were the Elvis Presley vehicle "Clambake'' in 1967 and the 1965 western "Sons of Katie Elder'' with John Wayne and Dean Martin. In 1962, Gregory played Sen. John Iselin in the acclaimed ``The Manchurian Candidate.''

September 17, 2002

Memphis Human Society Campaign
   ---------------------------------------- EPE


The local chapter of the Humane Society has began a campaign against animal cruelty and the education for its prevention. In a one-of-a-kind licensing agreement, Elvis Presley Enterprises has given the Memphis Shelby County Humane Society permission to use the image of Elvis Presley, along with his song title, "Don't Be Cruel" to kick off the fund raising efforts of their anti-cruelty campaign.

"This is a wonderful opportunity for us," says Executive Director Kathy Simonetti. "It allows us to place the spotlight on a serious issue in an upbeat, non-confrontational manner. We want to create awareness about the problem of animal cruelty and to put out the message that it's not cool to be cruel."

The Memphis Humane Society is using a rare archival photo of Elvis with two dogs on a T-shirt designed by Champion Awards. The caption reads: "Don't be cruel to animals. Help stop animal cruelty now." The shirts are 100% cotton and come in all sizes.

"The shirt is great," says Simonetti. "Many Elvis fans are animals lovers, and many animal lovers think the Elvis connection is fun and unique. We're hoping it will become a collectors item that will sell from coast to coast."

This week in Memphis over 75,000 fans worldwide have come to celebrate the legacy of Elvis. The appeal, it would seem, is stronger than ever.

T-shirts can be bought at the Memphis Humane Society at 2238 Central Ave. or the Beale Street Visitors Center at 200 Beale, or ordered online from their website.

September 17, 2002

     POSTER 
 ELV1S 30 # 1 HITS  

Source : Bob Hayden

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