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Welcome to the "Elvis Information Network", home to the best news, reviews, interviews & articles about the King of Rock & Roll, Elvis Aaron Presley...
The latest on www.elvisinfonet.com:
EPE Partnering with St. Jude on Thanks and Giving Program for 2007/08 Holiday Season: From November 1, 2007 - January 11, 2008 visitors to both Elvis.com and Graceland will be encouraged to make a difference in the life of a child this holiday season by joining Marlo Thomas, her celebrity friends and St. Jude Children's Research Hospital® for their Thanks and Giving campaign. Elvis' spirit of giving: Elvis’s spirit of giving during the holidays was well known and is still celebrated today. EPE joins Elvis’s fans around the world in continuing that tradition. There are several non-profit organizations that we are spotlighting this year. MIFA’s Presley Place: Presley Place is a 12-unit apartment property, one of several such properties or “campuses” that are part of the outstanding Housing Opportunities Program created and managed by the Metropolitan Inter-faith Association (MIFA) in Memphis. Housing Opportunities provides transitional housing, case management and life skills training for families who are homeless. Also part of this initiative is the Elvis Presley Music Room, where the youngsters of Presley Place and all the other Housing Opportunities campuses may enjoy access to musical instruments and instruction and participate in special music-related programs. You can visit the MIFA web site for more information about contributing to this program and to learn about MIFA’s other programs and services. Click here to donate or for more information. St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital: Your support can help them find cures for pediatric cancers and other deadly diseases. Eighty-five cents of every dollar St. Jude receives goes directly to research and treatment. Beginning Friday, November 23, visitors to Graceland will be encouraged to purchase a Thanks and Giving pinup in exchange for a dollar donation. The vibrant green pinup reflects both holidays and health, and the iconic magnifying glass represents their tireless search for breakthrough discoveries. As each pinup is purchased and signed, they will be placed in the window of the Graceland ticket pavilion. EPE's participation in this campaign will continue through Elvis's birthday celebration. Please join us and as we Give Thanks for the Healthy Kids in our Lives and Give to Those Who are Not. Tennessee Hemophilia Foundation: Every year, the Tennessee Hemophilia Foundation sells poinsettias as a fund-raising campaign during the holiday season. Since 1982, the first Christmas Graceland was open to the public, Elvis fans from around the world have supported this charity each year by purchasing poinsettias to be placed at Graceland as part of the holiday decorations. If you would like support the Tennessee Hemophilia Foundation's campaign by ordering poinsettias to be placed at Graceland during the holiday season, please mail $11.00 (US Funds) per plant to:
This revealing DVD takes you through the history of Elvis from being a poor sharecropper’s son with little more than basic daily subsistence to the most beloved, wealthy and famous entertainer in the world. Even though he reached such great heights, he remained a humble country boy always ready to share his love and treasures with friends, family, and even complete strangers. There are many reasons the world mourned his death back in 1977 and it was more than for the joy he brought to people in live performances, movies and recorded music. Many of the unknown events include the legendary Aloha From Hawaii concert in 1973 that raised more than $75,000 for cancer research and in 1964 Elvis purchased the FDR presidential yacht and donated it to St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital, who in turn raised $55,000 for research upon its sale. People who were the closest to Elvis do in depth interviews on the DVD to tell some now celebrated and new stories of his generous heart.
Contact: Marshall Blonstein Company: Audio Fidelity Address: Telephone: (866) 203-0647 Fax: (805) 648-7552 E-mail: info@audiofidelity.net Website: www.audiofidelity.net Robert Goulet dies: Robert Goulet, the handsome, big-voiced baritone whose Broadway debut in "Camelot" launched an award-winning stage and recording career, has died. He was 73. The singer died Tuesday morning in a Los Angeles hospital while awaiting a lung transplant, said Goulet spokesman Norm Johnson. He had been awaiting a lung transplant at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles after being found last month to have a rare form of pulmonary fibrosis. Goulet had remained in good spirits even as he waited for the transplant, said Vera Goulet, his wife of 25 years. "Just watch my vocal cords," she said he told doctors before they inserted a breathing tube. The Massachusetts-born Goulet, who spent much of his youth in Canada, gained stardom in 1960 with "Camelot," the Lerner and Loewe musical that starred Richard Burton as King Arthur and Julie Andrews as his Queen Guenevere. Goulet played Sir Lancelot, the arrogant French knight who falls in love with Guenevere. He became a hit with American TV viewers with appearances on "The Ed Sullivan Show" and other programs. Sullivan labeled him the "American baritone from Canada," where he had already been a popular star in the 1950s, hosting his own show called "General Electric's Showtime." See our earlier story on Robert Goulet & Elvis dated Wed 24 October 2007 Elvis Fan Day in The Netherlands (Source: It's Elvis Time)
Chart update: On the Dutch Mega Top 100 Singles chart "If I Can Dream" is a new entry at #45. "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck" dropped from #58 to #95. On the Dutch Mega Top 100 Album chart "The Dutch Collection" drops from #69 to #77. (News, Source: Mega Top 100 /Elvis News) Elvis podcast series: Joseph Vella sent EIN this message: I wanted to let you know about an excellent audio podcast series featuring elvis. it is called the elvis presley podcast series. i wanted to see if you could link to this series from your site. it features lots of music and interviews with elvis and guests as well as 2 special episodes featuring actor and elvis-fan billy bob thornton.
Pre-order "New York RCA Studio 1: The Complete Sessions" from HMV UK New Elvis short story: A relatively new feature of Amazon.com is the so-called "Amazon Short." An Amazon Short is a short story, available for download for a very democratic price. Guests at Birthday 2008 Elvis Insiders announced: EPE is excited to announce these special guests will be joining us on Sunday, January 6, 2008 for the Elvis Insiders Graceland Tour and Reception from 6:00 PM – 9:00 PM. This event is exclusively for Elvis Insiders and their guests. It includes a private evening tour of Graceland in all its holiday splendor and a reception across the street in Graceland Plaza with our special guests. The reception is a “progressive” event moving about the plaza area and will include Elvis's airplanes, The Elvis Presley Automobile Museum and the "Elvis Jumpsuits: All Access" exhibit in the Sincerely Elvis Museum. Complimentary hors d'oeuvres and cash bars will be available and everyone wins a door prize. Because of space limitations, Elvis Insiders may purchase only one guest ticket in addition to their own. Tickets are currently selling quickly and we do expect a sell out soon so, if you plan on attending, reserve your tickets today. Admission is $44.00 for adults, $22.00 for children 7-12, and children under seven are free. ADVANCE TICKETS: From all parts of the world call (901) 332-3322 or, from the USA and Canada call toll-free 800-238-2000. E-mail glsales@elvis.com. Parking in the main Graceland parking lot is free beginning at 5:30 PM.
If you want to know about, say, Prince's singles history, "Top Pop Singles" tells you that 51 of his recordings have made the chart, from "Soft and Wet" (No. 92 in 1978) through "Black Sweat" (No. 60 in 2006).
Elvis by the numbers: Elvis Presley may have left the building 30 years ago, but that hasn't stopped the company that owns his name from putting up more buildings. (Spotlight/Sale of Estate, Source: Forbes, Aug 2007) "Rock Back The Clock" says Straight Arrow: The "Straight Arrow" label will release a CD at the end of this year titled "ROCK BACK THE CLOCK" (SA 2007-8-02). It will be a special release of Elvis’ infamous first New Year's Eve show in Pontiac, Michigan. The producers are aware that this concert was previously released from another source but in the case of this release, they were able to obtain an ORIGINAL TAPE recorded by the same person that taped the College Park, MD, 27.09.1974 using the same recorder and microphone. That concert has been released on Straight Arrow's 2006 CD "CHAOS IN COLLEGE PARK". The main reason for this new and ultimate Pontiac '75 release is that the sound quality is excellent for an off-line recording. Since no soundboard recording of this show exists, only audience taped documentation of this historic event is available. Over the last 15 years, three independent audience recordings were collected and on each source there was a major problem: excessive echo caused by the large stadium space. This new source is very clear and most importantly, almost echo-free because the person with recorder was sitting very close to the sound system. The content of the show is well known, with the playlist based on Elvis' previous Las Vegas engagement. Among the Pontiac highlights are powerful performances of "Trying To Get To You", "One Night" and "Heartbreak Hotel" and also the ballads "You Gave Me A Mountain" and "And I Love You So", which were sung with passion. Finally, a thundering performance of "How Great Thou Art" brought the stadium down. The one and only real drawback is an unrehearsed "My Way"; Elvis had problems with the lyrics and he paused the song in the middle for a few seconds. We live in the days when almost every obscure CD label is hyping that their product was "taken directly from the original tape"…is, what else - "professionally remastered" and of course – with "fantastic results". Every new CD seems to contain some "deluxe 16-page full color booklet" with many "unpublished photos" in a "very professional layout". The “Straight Arrow” label does not want to exaggerate. If you have any of the previous “Straight Arrow” CD releases, then you know what to expect in design and sound quality. This new CD will contain a 20 page booklet with approx. 60 photos. Some of them are unpublished, some not, but they all were carefully hand-picked from the almost 150 available shots to give the listener a visual overview of The Event. You will see Elvis before and after the show as well as in both jumpsuits on stage. An unusual photo of the Silverdome stage before the concert is included as well as the review from the local newspaper, original ticket stub and show poster. To make the release even more authentic, sleeve notes were written by a fan that was so happy to be there... The “Straight Arrow” team wishes you a Happy New Year 2008 and hopes that you will enjoy this special New Years Eve release! Tracks: Also Sprach Zarathustra (Theme from "2001 A Space Odyssey") - C. C. Rider - I Got A Woman / Amen (medley) - Monologue (Elvis split his pants) - Love Me - Tryin' To Get To You - And I Love You So - All Shook Up - Teddy Bear / Don't Be Cruel (medley) - Heartbreak Hotel - One Night - You Gave Me A Mountain - Polk Salad Annie - Elvis left the stage to change the jumpsuit - Sweet Sweet Spirit (by J. D Sumner & The Stamps) - Band Introductions - What'd I Say - Drums Solo (Ronnie Tutt) - Bass Solo (Blues - Jerry Scheff) - Piano Solo (Glen D. Hardin - for the last time with Elvis on stage) - Electric Piano Solo (David Briggs) - School Day (Hail Hail Rock'n'Roll) - My Way (with break) - Love Me Tender - Monologue / New Year Countdown - Auld Lang Syne - How Great Thou Art (with last part reprise) - It's Now Or Never - America (The Beautiful) - Elvis thanks / Introduction of Lisa Marie and Vernon Presley - Hound Dog - Wooden Heart (part only) - Can't Help Falling In Love - Closing Vamp. (News, Source: FECC)
Elvis recording on soundtrack of "Fred Claus": This holiday season, Warner Bros. Records will release the soundtrack to the holiday comedy "Fred Claus". The soundtrack is filled with traditional Christmas pop favorites featuring "Santa Claus Is Back In Town" by Elvis Presley. The album will also be available digitally via all online retail outlets on November 13th, a few days after the movie hits theaters on November 9th. 2007. (News, Source: Elvis News) Chart update: On the UK Singles chart "If I Can Dream" is a new entry at #17 this week. (News, Source: Elvis News) Church in the Netherlands celebrate Elvis' gospel music: During 5 special services, the church community of Deventer (The Netherland) will focus on Elvis Presley’s gospel Music. On Saturday was the first Elvis Gospel celebration. Elvis of course, was more than ‘just a rock ‘n’ roll singer’: he believed in God and sang his heart out in his true musical love – Gospels. Other celebrations with Elvis are October 28 (Broederenkerk, 10.30 am), November 10 (Maria Koningin 5 pm), November 17 (Heilig Hart van Jezus, 6.30 pm) and November 18 (Johannes Vianney, 10 am) (News, Source: Elvis Matters)
Hannah Montana the kids' new Elvis: As with any kid sensation, the reaction to Hannah Montana covers the spectrum from worship to cat-call. The kids see her as their very own Elvis Presley. Parents appreciate her wholesome image, self-empowering lyrics and the fact that she wears Spandex underneath those short mini- dresses. And certain critics and naysayers see Montana as the representation of evil Disney and its penchant for the kind of corporate synergy that can only be spelled m-o-n-e-y. ... (News, Source: Ricardo Baca, DEnver Post/Presleys In The Press)
"Elvis Is Alive Museum" for sale: Bill Beeny, operator of the Elvis Is Alive Museum in Missouri and author of a number of books including Elvis' DNA Proves He's Alive sent EIN the following message: "I have a news item and you folks are the first one I am giving it to. After operating the Elvis Is Alive Museum for seventeen years I have decided to close it down As you know I have been a Baptist minister for better than sixty years. I plan on using the museum buildings for a mission for the needy. I will not only Interested buyers can contact Bill for more information about the Museum: office phone is (636) 745-3154, the Email is beeny@yhti.net. Phil Aitcheson leaving the Elvis world: Not only is Bill Beeny moving on to new challenges but so is the former head of The Presley Commission, Phil Aitcheson. Phil circulated this message yesterday: Today, we have many great things as human beings to be grateful for. We have been bestowed with great gifts through friendship and comradery. One such gift has been the loyalty and faith we have had in our lives, in knowing a great human being, Elvis Aron Presley. I am proud of our great work on his behalf, and those who participated in the collection of evidence and information regarding Mr. Presley's personal situation and life. I am proud to have shared with you the aspects of this great mystery. I believe that wherever he truly is, he can smile and know he is loved and respected greatly. We will forever be gratified that whatever he chose for his continuing life from 1977 on, is complimented by the many years of great kindness and talent that will forever be held in our hearts. No matter where each one of us truly stands in the matter of Elvis' leaving in 1977, in whatever fashion it took place, I thank personally each and everyone of you for your participation and involvment. I will never forget you, and I wish happiness for all. Therefore, as of November 1, 2007 I am hereby announcing my retirement from the Elvis Presley case, and although a book may still be completed down the road, concerning matters of his career and life, my direct involvment shall end. For those who have any last minute comments or questions, they should be submitted within 15 days. Your letters of encouragement over the years have been a Godsend, and I am thankful forever for your friendship and assistance. To Elvis, I can only say, "Thank you for everything, my good man, and God bless you...and your many fans, friends, and family members. I am moving on to other business related committments, including running a worldwide company that I own, and intend to operate until my retirement from working altogether. I want to wish all of you the very best and again my heartfelt and sincere thanks. With highest regards, Phil Aitcheson, Former Director & Liaison, The Presley Commission Excerpt from new book "Can't Buy Me Love": Jonathan Gould writes insightfully about Elvis in his new book Can't Buy Me Love: The Beatles, Britain and America.....a book well deserving of our attention: Now, you've got to keep in mind that Elvis Presley was probably, innately, the most introverted person that came into that studio. Because he didn't play with bands. He didn't go to this little club and pick and grin. All he did was sit with his guitar on the side of his bed at home. —Sam Phillips Well since my baby left me ..." The voice, unaccompanied but for the tinny flourish of piano that anchors the end of each line, was somehow bigger and riper with feeling than any voice its young listeners had ever heard. "Well I found a new place to dwell ..." It projected an authority and an insolence that reached beyond the words themselves, and it came from a place beyond the realm of "entertainment" as they had ever conceived of the term. Now joined by a doomstruck bass line, the sound of that voice seemed only to grow larger and more menacing, yet closer and more confiding as well, as if — given the lurching slow-dance tempo of the music — the singer's lips were pressed tight against the ear of the girl he now began to address, his words expressing a vengeful wish to make her feel the same way he was feeling in his room at the Heartbreak Hotel: "So lonely I could die." Though such things had been said for time immemorial in the lives of ordinary people; and though similar expressions of such dire emotion could be found in a growing number of avowedly realistic novels, plays, and films; and though something very much like it had been available for years on the sorts of records that most people never heard (including earlier, more obscure records by this same singer) — the fact remained that no man had ever sounded this way, or spoken this way to a woman, in front of so many millions of listeners before. Elvis Presley was the catalyst, not the originator, of the phenomenon called rock 'n' roll. Three years before he made his first recordings, the term was being promoted by a Cleveland disc jockey named Alan Freed as a race-neutral pseudonym for the black rhythm and blues that Freed began beaming across a wide swath of the North American continent in 1951. In 1954, the year that Freed moved his radio show, "Moondog's Rock 'n' Roll Party," to New York City, a white band singer named Bill Haley (himself a former disc jockey) recorded a pair of songs on the Decca label, one a novelty tune with a snappy tick-tock rhythm called "Rock Around the Clock," the other a sanitized "cover" version of a current rhythm-and-blues hit by Joe Turner called "Shake, Rattle and Roll." "Rock Around the Clock" failed to catch on at first, but Haley's pallid rendition of "Shake, Rattle and Roll" became a hit record, rising into the Billboard Top Ten in the fall of 1954. The following year, "Rock Around the Clock" was featured on the soundtrack of a film called Blackboard Jungle — one of a spate of Hollywood movies designed to exploit the rising tide of public anxiety about juvenile delinquency in America. Placed in a suitably inflammatory context, the song caught fire, reaching number one on the pop charts in the summer of 1955, turning the chubby, thirtyish, tartan-jacketed Haley into the world's first rock-'n'-roll star. In the meantime, legend has it, an eighteen-year-old delivery truck driver named Elvis Aron Presley sauntered into the storefront offices of Sam Phillips's Memphis Recording Service in the summer of 1953 to make an acetate of a song called "My Happiness" as a birthday present for his mom. (That Gladys Presley was born in the spring only burnishes the myth.) Sam Phillips, who operated his studio in conjunction with a small independent record label called Sun, had concerned himself to date with recording such talented Memphis-area bluesmen as Howlin' Wolf and B.B. King. Elvis at first made little impression on him. But Elvis made enough of a pest of himself in the months ahead that Phillips eventually called up an aspiring guitarist he knew named Scotty Moore and asked him to work with the boy. In July of 1954, Presley, Moore, and a bassist named Bill Black came in for a recording test. Sam Phillips asked Elvis what he liked to sing. Elvis, it turned out, liked to sing most anything. He sang country songs in a keening tenor reminiscent of Bill Monroe, and pop ballads in a woozy baritone reminiscent of Dean Martin. Phillips started him out on a ballad, "I Love You Because." The performance, like that of nearly every ballad Presley would ever record, was cloying and overdrawn. Then, during a break in the session, Elvis began to fool around with a blues song he knew called "That's All Right"; Moore and Black fell in behind him, and Phillips rolled the tape. Of the many astonishing things about Elvis Presley, nothing is more astonishing than the fact that Elvis "never did sing anywhere in public" (outside of a couple of high school talent shows) before he started making records with Sam Phillips at Sun. For all its romantic associations with dance halls and honkytonks, rock 'n' roll was born and reared as the child of records and radio. That the prime exponent of this new style of music should be a singer who possessed no prior professional experience was an anomaly; but it was also a telling sign of the way that record-making would change the very nature of music-making in the years ahead. Presley's inexperience was all the more astonishing in light of the opinion held by many of his fans that he would never sound much better on a record than he did on "That's All Right." Not only were most of the mannerisms that would define his vocal style present at the creation — from the sudden swoops in register to the habit, derived from gospel singing, of starting his lines with a throat-clearing "well" that gave whatever followed the feeling of a retort; even more impressive was the extent to which his first professional recording was marked by the trait that has characterized every great popular singer: the absolute assertion of his personality over the song. From this it might be concluded that Presley was simply a "natural." But the truth, as ever, was more complex than that....... As one of the half-dozen major labels that dominated the American record market in 1955, RCA had a country music division based in Nashville. The label turned Elvis over to its Nashville production staff and in January 1956 he recorded "Heartbreak Hotel." Its release was coordinated with a series of appearances on network television shows that exposed the American public to the provocative visual image that complemented Presley's provocative musical style: the infamous pelvic gyrations, the outlandish clothes and pompadoured hair, the hurting eyes and the lopsided grin, poised between a leer and a sneer, that functioned as a kind of generational Rorschach test. The effect of this television exposure was overwhelming. "Heartbreak Hotel" vaulted to the top of the Billboard charts in April and held there throughout the spring. Over the next eighteen months, by never failing to have a record or two in the American Top Ten, Elvis Presley would completely redefine the amount of attention that a twenty-one-year-old white boy from a place like Tupelo, Mississippi, could expect to receive from the world. As a matter of course, RCA offered "Heartbreak Hotel" to EMI, the major British label with which it enjoyed a reciprocal licensing deal. Released in May 1956, the record was an immediate hit in Britain, where its popularity was all the more remarkable for the fact that it received little direct airplay on BBC radio, which preferred to broadcast live renditions of current releases by in-house studio bands. This meant that Presley's performance of "Heartbreak Hotel" — the only performance that mattered — was first heard mainly on the jukeboxes of dance halls and coffee bars and on the nightly English-language broadcasts of Radio Luxembourg, a clear-channel commercial station that provided the youth of Britain with a service comparable to that of Radio Free Europe in reverse. It was five hundred miles from Luxembourg to Liverpool, but on most nights the signal carried tolerably well, accompanied by just enough static to enhance the aura of mystery that surrounded rock 'n' roll. Thirteen years after the release of "Heartbreak Hotel," a leading theorist of mass communications asked a leading practitioner of mass communications how he got his start. "I heard Elvis Presley," John Lennon told Marshall McLuhan. "There were a lot of other things going on, but that was the conversion. I kind of dropped everything." (Book Excerpt, Source: New York Times) Comeback Special & Aloha CD re-issues: The classic soundtracks for Elvis' "'68 Comeback" and "Aloha" specials have been re-issued on CD in the "X2" series from BMG on September 24, 2007. This package was originally released September 4, 2006.
See EIN's comprehensive listing of around 150 Elvis books published in 2007-08 "Elvis - Blue Suede Collection" DVD boxset: This is due for release in the USA on 27 November. The 8 films in the set are: Elvis That's The Way It Is; This Is Elvis; Jailhouse Rock; Viva Las Vegas; Girl Happy; It Happened At The World's Fair; Kissin' Cousins; Live A Little Love A Little. (News, Source: Amazon) Special Editions of Comeback Special & Aloha for release in Japan: The single disc Special Editions of these TV specials will be released by Sony BMG in Japan on 21 November. (News, Source: Elvis World Japan) "Love Me Tender" DVD re-issue in Japan: Fox will re reissue Elvis' first feature film, Love Me Tender, in Japan on 21 December. (News, Source: Elvis World Japan)
The conversion of Tom Petty: In a new retrospective documentary, Runnin' Down a Dream: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Petty talks about the impact (on him) of Elvis and the Beatles: "I must have been 10 or 11 years old," says Petty early in the film. "My aunt came over and said, 'Elvis Presley is making a movie and your uncle's working on the picture, and I thought maybe you'd like to go down one day and watch the filming and see Elvis.' The streets were just packed with hundreds of people. Elvis appeared, like a vision. He didn't look like anything I'd ever seen. And I'm just dumbstruck. "I went home a changed man." Seeing the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show changed Petty further. "I was 13," he says. "In those few minutes ... it all became clear. This is what I'm going to do. This is how you do it. Within 24 hours everything changed." (News, Source: chron.com)
Elvis not the first true rocker: EIN welcomes your views on the following item published in the East African Standard: 'Folks imagine that rock began when Elvis Presley stormed into the scene in 1956, but the first two true rockers were blacks - Chuck Berry and Little Richard. But in the segregated 1950s, many radio stations would not play their songs (just watch 'Dream-Gals' this weekend to catch the drift) So that when white boy Elvis with his duck-a** hairdo and blue suede shoes rolled into the scene, the white World of Radio christened him the "first rock star" and handed over the airwaves to his guitar. That is sort of like Marshall Mathers (Eminem) being declared the "first rap star," with men like 2-Pac and the Notorious BIG's roles totally ignored. Travesty, if not outright tragedy. So the next time you hear a heavy rocker like Marilyn Manson screeching with passion like a man whose mansion is on fire, and raging against "gods who don't exist," don't just say white folks are nuts. Back to the sixties, the British Beatles ran with a new branch of rock called "pop rock" and mesmerized the planet. The Doors, led by singer Jim Morrison described in the Steven Davis biography as a "seer, an adept, a bard and a drunk" opened up the doors to rock as we know it today, although this millennium, rock has become a lot more sanitised (albeit with a few potty-heads like Amy Winehouse, although she isn't really a rocker). In the 1960s, according to Guitar magazine, rock tours were "primitive and disorganised." The pretty groupies gave you herpes and the clap. The drugs and alcohol turned you into a crazy imbecile. Not all Blacks had turned the R&B and soul route after Elvis stole the lyrics from their rock boat. In the 1960s, the greatest rock guitarist was Jimi Hendrix, an original rock and roll rebel with an afro and outrageous tricks like burning a guitar live on stage after humping the amplifier. Of course he died young. At 28! But his antics and genius inspired other rocker guitarists, from the great Eric Clapton to the priceless artiste we know as Prince. In the early 1970s, rock was all about sex and excess, with groups like Led Zepellin taking the lead. From 1975 to 1980, the anarchists of the punk rebel movement ruled and wrecked the rock scene, with groups like Sex Pistols (whose Sid Vicious viciously stabbed his girl to death, then later killed himself in 1979) raging: "God save the Queen, and her Fascist Regime!" (Comment, Source: Tony Mochama And Robert Gicheru, East African Standard)
The Flo Peters Gallery in Hamburg is presenting 40 selected prints for the first time in Germany. Apart from the Elvis pictures, the gallery is showing 100 more great portraits of musicians, for example by Jonathan Mannion, currently the most successful photographer of the US-Rap-scene, Harry Benson, who made himself a name with portraits of the Beatles, Frank Stefanko, Danny Clinch, Herb Snitzer, Don Schlitten, William Gottlieb and Alan Tannenbaum. Exhibition dates: 4 Oct to 17 November 2007. (News, Source: Octuphoto)
Australian TV watch: As we reported on 25 October, Girls! Girls! Girls! screens on parts of the Prime network tomorrow at midday. Also on TV tonight "Featuring the music of Elvis Presley" is the Disney animated feature Lilo and Stitch. Check your local guides. (News, Source: EIN)
FLAMING STAR: In the years after the Civil War, western Texas is an uneasy meeting ground of two cultures: one white, the other Native-American. Elvis stars as Pacer Burton, the son of a white rancher (John McIntire) and his beautiful Kiowa wife (Dolores Del Rio). When fi ghting breaks out between the settlers and natives, Pacer is pulled into the deadly violence despite his peace-making efforts.
"The focus of your programme of course is Elvis the celebrity and soldier, but I see him as Elvis the soldier who, by the way, happened to be a celebrity." Chart update: The Billboard chart listings for the week ending November 3, 2007:
Disc 2: 1. I'm left, you're right, she's gone 2. Baby, let's play house 3. I forgot to remember to forget 4. Mystery train 5. Sincerly 6. Black denim trousers 7. Movie Magg 8. Turn around 9. Gone, gone, gone
Tomorrow on EIN: Tomorrow we will publish messages from two well known identities involved in the Elvis underground/Elvis is alive theory.
In the US, religious groups protested about the film and politicians (notably North Carolina State Senator, Phil Berger) have also expressed concerns about its content. The controversy mirrors that once aroused for the Jodie Foster film, Taxi Driver.
Strangely, a similarly powerful and more explicit rape scene of a young black girl in the film adaptation of the John Grisham novel, A Time To Kill, did not meet with any discernable outcry. This raises a number of questions based around race and increasing conservatism in America today. Critically acclaimed when shown at this year's Sundance Festival, it is unfortunate that a number of controversial scenes have overshadowed the film as a whole. While not the best of its type, hounddog is generally well crafted, but lacks sufficient plot exposition and direction to fully engage the viewer. Overall, it is a missed opportunity to deal with the issue of serious child abuse. From Full Moon Films, Hand Picked Films, Intandem Films. Running time: 98 minutes. (Film Review, Source: EIN)
But EPE didn't stop there, Roberts' attorney argues in a lawsuit filed earlier this year in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee. The corporation that officially conducts and manages Elvis-related business recently tweaked the licensing agreements it has in place with merchandise vendors. CKX Inc. and Robert F.X. Sillerman, which acquired an 85 percent ownership of Elvis Presley Enterprises in February 2005, were not named in the lawsuit. License needed: A change that was inserted now prohibits vendors from selling their Elvis wares to unauthorized retailers within a 5-mile radius of Graceland. "Well, guess who's within a 5-mile radius of Graceland?" said Randy Songstad, the attorney representing Boulevard Souvenirs. "So the vendors said, 'Hey, you can't do that, they do a lot of money with us.' "And (EPE) said, 'If you sell to them, we'll take your license.' So the vendors called us up, one by one, and said, 'It's killing us, but we can't sell to you.'" Earlier this month, one of the federal claims filed on behalf of Boulevard Souvenirs - a claim that EPE and vice president of international licensing Carol Butler were conspiring to eliminate all independently owned retail competitors near Graceland - was dismissed. Why the conspiracy claim wasn't successful is that under the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, a conspiracy involving a business and an employee can't technically be viewed as a conspiracy. A business, in other words, can't conspire with itself. EPE did not respond to requests for an interview and stated in a previous e-mailed response that no comment would be forthcoming. In a motion to dismiss the claims against EPE, Glankler Brown PLLC attorney William Bradley Jr. wrote that the effort was made to amend the vendor license agreements partly in response to an uptick in the proliferation of bootlegged Elvis merchandise around Graceland. "EPE does not want its 'genuine' merchandise sold in a place where bootleg or unauthorized merchandise is also sold," he wrote. EPE has in place more than 200 license agreements with licensees that either manufacture or authorize the manufacture of Elvis-themed collectibles and souvenirs. Big year for business: Graceland, the late singer's famous mansion home, is a tourist mecca that averages about 566,000 visitors each year. Across the street from Graceland sits Graceland Plaza, where EPE operates a number of Elvis-themed museums and attractions and sells related merchandise. This year has been an important year for both EPE and Boulevard Souvenirs, in that it marks the 30th anniversary of the singer's death. Throughout the anniversary year, tourists are expected to descend in droves on the commercial pocket of Whitehaven surrounding Graceland. Boulevard Souvenirs also expected to see an increase in sales this year, according to court documents. Underneath the gift shop's store logo on the sign that's passed by swarms of daily tourists are the words "The Beat Goes On." "If you don't have official EPE merchandise, you get people who come to town, that's what they want - you don't have it, they don't buy from you," Songstad said. "So it's a huge deal in our industry to be able to buy officially licensed Elvis Presley merchandise." Boulevard Souvenirs is preparing its next move in the court action over what EPE sees as an assertion of more control over its signature product line and what the small store sees as a bid by EPE to shut it out of the marketplace inappropriately. Songstad declined to specify what legal options remain available, but insisted the recent dismissal of the conspiracy claim did not close the book on Boulevard's case. (Sale of EPE, Source: Andy Meek, The Daily News) Read more on this case and other developments since the sale of EPE
Video clip from "Protecting The King" by David Stanley - Elvis movie clip Protecting The King" (9.49 min) Read EIN's review of Protecting The King -------------------------------------------------------------------------
(Source: YouTube/EP Gold)
Rare Elvis scripts destroyed in Californian fires: Further to our story on Tuesday about the shocking fires in California: Priceless Elvis Presley scripts and memorabila have been destroyed in the Malibu fires which are now hitting almost one million people. Original film scripts which included hand written notes from Elvis went up in smoke when the mansion of a wealthy socialite was destroyed. Lilly Lawrence only had time to grab The King's army uniform before fleeing the flames that gutted her 10,500-square-foot castle. Also lost to the fires were Presley's original song sheets including all the music for 'Heartbreak Hotel' and 'American Trilogy.' (News, Source: metro.co.uk) USA Elvis TV watch: Thirty years after Elvis has "left the building," TV Land takes an in- depth look at some of the most popularly held mysteries about the King of Rock 'n' Roll and dissects them to separate fact from fiction. Are Oprah Winfrey and Elvis really related? Did he really approach President Nixon in the hopes of becoming a federal drug agent? These, and many other mysteries will be answered in this special edition of TV Land Myths and Legends. TV Land's "Elvis" special airs 28 October at 10pm (check your local guides) (News, Source: CNN) Aussie Elvis TV watch: A number of stations in Australia's Prime TV network have Girls! Girls! Girls! scheduled for midday on Sunday 28 October. Check your local guides.
Rock and roll. And rockabilly. All of the guys were doing it, and Elvis was persistent. And Jackson caved. She thought, "Maybe I should. I was a teenager, and this was my generation of music. And it would be silly not to try to do it." Elvis was right. A string of hard-howling, attitudinal hits followed. "Fujiyama Mama," "Riot in Cell Block #9" and even a song Elvis had done, "Let's Have a Party." She was, as the title of a new documentary suggests, The Sweet Lady With the Nasty Voice. Does Wanda Jackson believe, as many musicologists insist, that she was the first female rock and roller? The 70-year-old born-again Christian pauses for just a moment. "Yes," she says. So it's history Thursday at the German House Theater, with Wanda Jackson backed by the Lustre Kings. As yet another Elvis — Elvis Costello — writes in the liner notes to her 2006 album, I Remember Elvis, "Tell me why this woman isn't in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame." It's not that Jackson has gone unnoticed. She is in the country music and gospel halls of fame. And in 2005, she was a National Endowment for the Arts honoree, which spotlights folk and traditional arts. "There were 12 of us, including a 93-year-old woman who wove Navajo rugs," Jackson says. She did take note of how few female singers had been honored by the organization over the years. "That made it all the more special to me. Here we are, putting our American music all over the world. I've done my very best to make it pure and not make it pop music, in the poorest sense." Hers was an era in which rock and roll "turned it upside down," Jackson says. "Up until Elvis, all of our songs were geared toward an adult audience. But young people were now buying the records." She was quickly accepted into the club. "I often wondered why I was able to work with him," she says of shows where everyone came to see Elvis. "The crowd seemed to accept me; they didn't boo me, like they did some of the other artists." Well, if Elvis was for the girls, Wanda was for the guys. But the songs were always for the guys. "There just wasn't that much material available for a girl, and I wouldn't get first chance at a rock and roll song," she says. "They wanted one of the guys to get first crack at it." While Jackson speaks admiringly of Elvis' encouraging words, it's tough to tell to what degree Elvis was the man in Jackson's life; she doesn't tell tales. But Elvis did give her a ring, which she still has. But soon enough, he went off to Hollywood, and they lost touch. The new man in her life was Wendell Goodman, who also manages her to this day. And, a decade later, another man entered their lives. "Let's Have a Party" gave way to "I Saw the Light." Becoming born-again, Jackson has said over the years, saved her marriage. "We were going down a pretty rocky path with the lifestyle," she says. "We knew that we loved each other, that was never a problem. But the lifestyle was getting to us. We knew there had to be a change." Change may come slow to Jackson, as her move from country to rock did, but it's been a constant in her life. It came again, in 1995, when the spirited Rosie Flores asked her to appear on her Rockabilly Filly album. "We had a gospel ministry for many years," Jackson says of her husband. "When she asked me to do Rockabilly Filly, I said, 'Well, Rosie, do people listen to that kind of music?' I just really didn't know, having been in Christian music for so long. "But it got me a whole renewed generation of fans, and we're gaining fans it seems like every day. Rockabilly Filly and a subsequent tour with Flores (It was the first time Jackson had been in a nightclub in 20 years) kicked off a Jackson revival. Her excellent 2003 album, Heart Trouble, featured appearances by Costello, Dave Alvin, Lee Rocker and the Cramps. In much the same way that Johnny Cash and a handful of other classic performers had experienced a career renaissance, so did Jackson. The older lady, the Christian lady, was cool. And now she's brought another man back into her life. The last time she saw Elvis was in 1964, during a brief meeting in Las Vegas. In I Remember Elvis, she sings some of the King's classic Sun Records-era music. Songs that Elvis got first crack at, like "Good Rockin' Tonight" and "Mystery Train." "I was always a little bit leery of tackling his stuff," she says. "I didn't want it to sound like I was trying to copy him. If Elvis has done a song, it's been done. "I wanted to keep the ambience of his songs. And I wanted to tell the stories the fans seemed to enjoy hearing so much." She remembers he drove off in a pink Cadillac. The guy knew how to make an impression. "I think entertainers are just special anyway. They put their pants on one leg at a time, but there is a magnetism and a charisma about them. Elvis had charisma. Anybody that's ever known him always says the same thing." (News, Source: Jeff Spevak, Democrat & Chronicle) Wanda Jackson live in Rochester tonight: What: Wanda Jackson, with the Lustre Kings. "The King The Musical" review: Over 800 visitors came to see the Belgian premiere of “The King The Musical”, in the Royal Circus in Brussels. The Belgian media didn’t quite know what to think of this concept. Some French speaking reporters were doubting the success, while in the Flemish part of the country, the media reacted with enthusiasm.
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