ELVIS PRESLEY’S FUTURE hung on the decision he made in early 1969 on where he should make his next records. He could return to the comfortable confines of RCA’s Studio B in Nashville, home to most of his big hits of the early ’60s. But then he risked falling back into the patterns that led to the disappointing hits of the past few years. What he needed was a new sound, a new feel! So he chose American Sound Studio in Memphis, which had produced a string of hits for a variety of artists.
In early 1969, Elvis badly needed a hit single and a hit album. His last single (If I Can Dream) and album (ELVIS) were selling well and headed towards the Top 10, something that hadn’t happened since 1965. But both records were from the successful television special from December 1968.
Years of lackluster records from even less lustrous movies had made Elvis an anachronism in the contemporary pop music scene. His music was not reaching the new generation of record buyers. This was a market that was considerably bigger than the one he had played to in his heyday in the ’50s.
Elvis needed an updated sound to compete in the heady music scene of the late ’60s.
Essentially, his career as a major hitmaker was near the end of its line. Unless he made some serious changes, he was headed to that place where pop stars went when no one else wanted them: the casinos of Las Vegas.!
Presley had been aware of what was happening to his career for several years. He had made some changes in the past few years. including working with a new producer, Felton Jarvis. He had also returned to recording studio singles instead of pulling them from movie soundtracks. And, of course, he had committed to making his first-ever television special!
He met director Steve Binder for the first time in May 1968 to discuss working together. Elvis asked Binder a blunt question: “What do you think of my career?”
Binder took a chance and answered bluntly: “I think it’s in the toilet.”
“Finally,” Elvis replied, “somebody’s talking straight to me!”
These are the original front and back covers of FROM MEMPHIS TO VEGAS / FROM VEGAS TO MEMPHIS from October 1969. While the two-record set had the catalog number LSP-6020, the individual records were numbered LSP-4428 and LSP-4429. A year later, the individual records were released as two separate albums with those two catalog numbers (see photo below). 1
Singer presents Elvis
Binder and Presley worked well together and completed the one-man special in a few weeks of concentrated work in June 1968. The show—simply titled Elvis although it’s also referred to as “Singer Presents Elvis,” “the NBC-TV Special,” and the “the ’68 Comeback”—was broadcast on December 3, 1968. It presented Elvis not as an “entertainer” who still had a few good licks left, but as an unstoppable force of nature. Presley captured all the passion and energy of his past and presented it to the world in one amazing performance in the present.
But as cool and humorously ironic as he appeared, most of the music looked back at his past. The only song that sounded like Elvis was paying attention to the world around him was If I Can Dream. Elvis needed a new look and an updated sound to compete in the heady music scene of the late ’60s. 2
Which is why he chose to record in Memphis instead of Nashville. American Sound Studio was owned and operated by producer Chips Moman. In that tiny studio, he and his house band produced a soul-based sound and feel regardless of who the artist was using them. Together, they backed a variety of disparate artists on a slew of hits in the previous years.
Elvis booked the studio for ten days in January and another five in February. He completed thirty-one masters, many of them among the finest recordings of his career. From these two sessions came the following singles (chart positions taken from the Cash Box Top 100):
• In The Ghetto (#1 in June 1969)
• Suspicious Minds (#1 in October 1969)
• Don’t Cry Daddy (#6 in January 1970)
• Kentucky Rain (#10 in March 1970)
The album FROM ELVIS IN MEMPHIS blended rock & roll with both contemporary country and contemporary soul music. It received almost universal praise from critics, including Crawdaddy and Rolling Stone magazines. These reestablished Presley as a presence on the pop charts. 3
Suspicious Minds was still in the Top 10 when FROM MEMPHIS TO VEGAS was released. While the single’s B-side, You’ll Think Of Me, was included on the studio record, the hit single version of Suspicious Minds was not. Instead, a lengthy version recorded on stage in Las Vegas was included on the live record. The ho-hum picture sleeve on top above is what American fans got when we bought the record. Turkish fans got the striking sleeve on the bottom (which features art that looks like it belongs on the cover of a record by the New Vaudeville Band).
On stage in Las Vegas
In July 1969, Elvis returned to performing live regularly for the first time since 1957. He did fifty-seven shows in twenty-nine days in the newly opened showroom of the International Hotel in Las Vegas! These shows were even more successful than the television special. RCA Victor taped several of the shows in hopes of assembling a live album. 4
For the upcoming Christmas season, Colonel Parker, Felton Jarvis, and Elvis mulled over their prospects:
• There were enough high-quality tracks from the American Sound sessions to make a worthy successor to FROM ELVIS IN MEMPHIS.
• There were enough high-quality tracks from the International Hotel performances to make a strong, exciting live album.
So, should they release a studio album featuring the #1 record Suspicious Minds?
Or should they release a live album commemorating Presley’s triumphant return to the stage?
Alas, they chose both.
On March 23, 1956, RCA Victor started shipping three self-titled Elvis Presley albums to record stores simultaneously: a twelve-inch, 33 rpm LP album (LPM-1254, top), a seven-inch, 45 rpm, two-record EP album (EPP-1254, middle), and a seven-inch, 45 rpm, single EP album (EPA-747, bottom). LPM-1254 was the first rock & roll album to top the best-selling LP charts, spending ten weeks at #1 on Billboard. What does it have to do with an article about an Elvis album from 1969? Doncha think it’s time you read the article and found out?
From Memphis to Vegas
In October 1969, RCA shipped a two-record album with the ungainly title of FROM MEMPHIS TO VEGAS / FROM VEGAS TO MEMPHIS. One record contained sides from American Sound Studio while the other featured recordings from the stage of the International Hotel. The album mixed music from the most soulful location in the world with the most soulless showcase in the world!
The two records addressed two entirely different projects and should have been treated as such. While the live record was the more exciting, it was essentially an oldies album. As the TV special soundtrack was also an oldies album, this was a step in the wrong direction. It made the comeback look like it may have been tied in with nostalgia, not with artistic rejuvenation.
While the studio album did feature all-new material, many of the tracks that were selected were relatively tame (if not actually weak). This made it look like there wasn’t enough stuff in the can from the Memphis sessions to fill out a second strong album.
When sequencing an album, the first track on the first side should grab the listener by the lapels and drag him into the record. It should make him want to hear everything that follows on the rest of the record. FROM ELVIS IN MEMPHIS opened with the searing Wearin’ That Loved-On Look. This was the best lapel-grabbing lead-off track on a Presley album since Blue Suede Shoes on his very first album in 1956.
And the sequencing of the tracks was terrible: The first side opened with two of the less interesting tracks, Inherit The Wind and This Is The Story. You had to be an Elvis devotee to wait assume the third one would get any better.
And the fact that there were only ten tracks instead of twelve made it seem like a bit of a rip-off.
This is not what Elvis’ career needed at this time.
This photo was taken during a press conference held on August 1, 1969, at the International Hotel to celebrate Presley’s return to live performing. Elvis hadn’t looked so good since he left for the US Army in 1958.
From Vegas to Memphis
What Elvis needed was a few more singles along the lines of In The Ghetto and Suspicious Minds. And he needed another studio album that demonstrated that FROM ELVIS IN MEMPHIS hadn’t been a fluke.
FROM MEMPHIS TO VEGAS was a good record but it only sold half as many copies as the two previous albums. And it baffled those of his fans who took their rock music seriously as it should have been a superb album, not merely a good one. 5
The new single was Don’t Cry Daddy, a country weeper about a man, his two children, and their deceased mother. Despite Presley’s genuinely moving performance, it was not the kind of record that would move Elvis forward in the new marketplace.
As I mentioned above, the studio part of FROM MEMPHIS TO VEGAS made it appear as though all the good stuff from American Sound had gone into the first album. It gave the impression that Elvis had shot his wad a couple of strong 45s and one fantastic LP. But that was not the case at all: There was enough quality material on the shelf for a second strong Memphis album.
Below is a list of the recordings that were available to Elvis and RCA Victor at the time. These are all recordings from the January-February sessions at American Sound Studio. I assigned each track a grade for overall quality using a simple four-star grading system. Here is what those grades indicate:
✮ ✮ ✮ ✮ Exceptional
✮ ✮ ✮ Very good
✮ ✮ Solid but unexceptional
✮ Camden-bound
Three and four stars should be self-explanatory. Two stars indicate a track that should have only been used when better sides weren’t available. More than one two-star track per side can drag down an otherwise strong album. One star means that the recording should have been set aside for use on a Camden budget album.
January 13-16
You’ll Think Of Me On ✮ ✮ ✮
Don’t Cry Daddy ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮
My Little Friend ✮ ✮
Mama Liked The Roses ✮
Inherit The Wind ✮ ✮
This Is The Story ✮ ✮
A Little Bit Of Green ✮ ✮ ✮
January 20-23
From A Jack To A King ✮ ✮ ✮
Without Love (There Is Nothing) ✮ ✮ ✮
I’ll Be There ✮ ✮ ✮
Hey Jude ✮
Suspicious Minds ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮
Rubberneckin’ ✮ ✮ ✮
February 17-22
This Time / I Can’t Stop Loving You ✮ ✮ ✮
Stranger In My Own Hometown ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮
And The Grass Won’t Pay No Mind ✮ ✮ ✮
Do You Know Who I Am? ✮ ✮ ✮
If I’m A Fool (For Loving You) ✮ ✮ ✮
Who Am I? ✮ ✮ ✮
The Fair Is Moving On ✮ ✮ ✮
Kentucky Rain ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮
By my assessment, there were sixteen tracks that were solid to exceptional recordings. That’s more than enough for one really strong single and an equally strong album! 6
In November 1970, RCA Victor released the two records from the MEMPHIS TO VEGAS album as two separate albums: the first had the cumbersome title of ELVIS IN PERSON AT THE INTERNATIONAL HOTEL LAS VEGAS, NEVADA (LSP-4428) and the second was ELVIS BACK IN MEMPHIS (LSP-4429). Although neither album came close making the Top 100 on the Billboard LP chart, the live album kept selling. In 2011, it received an RIAA Platinum Record Award for sales of one million units (LPs, tapes, and CDs) in the US. 7
The official “Back In Memphis”
When the Memphis record was compiled as part of FROM MEMPHIS TO VEGAS, it appears to have been considered a dumping ground for the leftovers from the American Sound sessions. Instead of putting together the very best album possible, this is the record that was released:
Side 1
Inherit The Wind ✮ ✮
This Is The Story ✮ ✮
Stranger In My Own Hometown ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮
A Little Bit Of Green ✮ ✮ ✮
And The Grass Won’t Pay No Mind ✮ ✮ ✮
Side 2
Do You Know Who I Am? ✮ ✮ ✮
From A Jack To A King ✮ ✮ ✮
The Fair Is Moving On ✮ ✮ ✮
You’ll Think Of Me On ✮ ✮ ✮
Without Love (There Is Nothing) ✮ ✮ ✮
ELVIS BACK IN MEMPHIS opened with This Is The Story, a dirge-like melodrama about a man whose world is falling apart. It didn’t get better with the second track, Inherit The Wind. This was a mini-drama that sounded like something Frankie Laine would have sung as the theme song to a western movie in the ’50s. 8
So the two weakest tracks on the album were sequenced at the beginning of the album! Whenever I played the album for a friend, I skipped over them and placed the needle in the band for the third track. This meant that they heard the pulsing Stranger In My Own Hometown first, followed by two more strong tracks.
Side 2 is solid but poorly sequenced and lacks one exceptional track to make it memorable.
By adding the ten grades together (29) and dividing that number by 10, the album has a grade of 2.9. As a point of reference, using the same four-star system, FROM ELVIS IN MEMPHIS has a grade of 3.7.
Don’t Cry Daddy / Rubberneckin’ was released at the same time as the album but didn’t reach the Top 10 until January 1970 so it was not included on the album. The picture sleeve at the top is typical of the conservative approach to design that marked his sleeves in the late ’60s. The sleeve on the bottom is from Turkey and even though it looks like the work of a talented high school student instead of a professional designer/artist, it certainly is eye-catching!
An alternative “Back In Memphis”
Below find the album that could have assembled in 1969. I did not consider the then-current single, Don’t Cry Daddy and Rubberneckin’, or the recordings set aside for the next single, Kentucky Rain and My Little Friend. Still, using the only the tracks available after these sides were set aside, I came up with this alternative ELVIS BACK IN MEMPHIS:
Side 1
Suspicious Minds ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮
This Time / I Can’t Stop Loving You ✮ ✮ ✮
Do You Know Who I Am? ✮ ✮ ✮
If I’m A Fool (For Loving You) ✮ ✮ ✮
Without Love (There Is Nothing) ✮ ✮ ✮
And The Grass Won’t Pay No Mind ✮ ✮ ✮
Side 2
From A Jack To A King ✮ ✮ ✮
I’ll Be There ✮ ✮ ✮
The Fair Is Moving On ✮ ✮ ✮
A Little Bit Of Green ✮ ✮ ✮
You’ll Think Of Me On ✮ ✮ ✮
Stranger In My Own Hometown ✮ ✮ ✮ ✮
They could have titled this new album SUSPICIOUS MINDS – ELVIS BACK IN MEMPHIS. As a single album titled after a chart-topping single, it might have sold a million units upon release! That is, it might have been his fastest and biggest-selling long-player since BLUE HAWAII in 1961-1962. By adding these twelve grades together (38) and dividing that number by 12, the album has a grade of 3.2, making it a worthy successor to FROM ELVIS IN MEMPHIS.
These are the front and back covers of ELVIS BACK IN MEMPHIS – AMERICAN SOUNDS SESSIONS II. This two-record set was issued on 180-gram vinyl in 2014 by Follow That Dream (LSP-4429-2). It contains various takes of the tracks on the original album plus takes of Suspicious Minds and a medley of This Time and I Can’t Stop Loving You.
This is the story
While Presley, Parker, and RCA were considering how to sell the “new Elvis” in 1969, the market for some genres in the recording business was stagnant (such as classical and country & western) or declining (such as show tunes and novelty recordings). But the market for rock music had grown exponentially since Beatlemania and would explode in the mid-’70s! A successful album’s sales were no longer counted in the hundreds of thousands but in the multi-millions! And this was a global happening.
Elvis never found a permanent place in this new market. With his television special in 1968 and the Memphis record 1969, he got his foot through the door, after which he chose to release a string of Big Ballads as singles. Aside from a few stand-alone events—notably the Madison Square Garden concerts in 1972 and the Burning Love single that followed and the Aloha From Hawaii broadcast of 1973—he never came close to recapturing the success of 1969.
FEATURED IMAGE: The photo at the top of this page was taken on August 1, 1969, at a press conference in Las Vegas held to celebrate Presley’s return to performing on stage. (Note the 1964 print of the painting of Elvis by June Kelly hanging from the edge of the table.) For more on this press conference, refer to “Best Answer Ever Given by Elvis to a Journalist’s Question.”
Finally, this is the second in a series of articles here on Elvis – A Touch Of Gold that will look at albums as they were released during Presley’s life and consider the material that was available and the albums that could have been released instead. The first was “The Alternative Love Letters From Elvis Album.”
FOOTNOTES:
1 I purchased FROM MEMPHIS TO VEGAS in November 1969 at Woolworths (I think) on Public Square in Wilkes-Barre and I only paid $3.99 for it because someone mistakenly priced it as a single record album. I took it home and played the Memphis record first. The record contained only ten tracks instead of the then-standard twelve and I felt like I had been cheated.
2 To say that Elvis was an anachronism in mid-1968 is an understatement. It actually seemed like he was hellbent on digging his own grave and jumping into it gleefully. As much as fans may enjoy viewing movies like Clambake and Speedway today, they were painful to sit through at the time of their release. (And fewer and fewer people were sitting through them as the decade came to a close.)
3 The rock publications of the ’60s were few: Crawdaddy was the first while Rolling Stone was the biggest. Most of the contributors to these magazines were a generation or two younger than Elvis and were more attuned to Dylan and Hendrix and even Johnny Cash than the man who gave them Long Legged Girl (With The Short Dress On).
4 Two things to note here: Live albums were not that popular in the ’60s. There had been a few big sellers but most of those by straight pop singers, such as Harry Belafonte and Judy Garland. Neither were two-record albums a proven commodity. While the Beatles’ self-titled two-record set from 1968 (you know, the “White Album”) had sold 5,000,0o0 copies in the US in the preceding months, other well-known rock & roll doubles (such as The Mothers Of Invention’s FREAK OUT and Bob Dylan’s BLONDE ON BLONDE, both from 1966) had sold only a tenth of that.
5 As it was a two-record set with a retail price twice that of a standard album, it rang up impressive numbers at the cash registers while selling far fewer copies than FROM ELVIS IN MEMPHIS.
6 My subjective response is predicated on the fact that I rarely like grossly sentimental songs (such as Mama Liked The Roses) or lugubrious performances (such as This Is The Story) or bombastically over-the-top performances (none here—I doubt Chips Moman would have let him get away with it—but many followed starting in 1970. I am, on the other hand, a sucker for Elvis when he sounds rawly impassioned, eevn on such minor sides as Just A Little Bit Of Green.
7 In 1970, ELVIS BACK IN MEMPHIS (LSP-4429) spent three weeks on the Billboard best-selling LPs chart, peaking at #183 but ELVIS IN PERSON (LSP-4428) didn’t even reach the Top 200. Yet fifty years later, the latter has sold more than a million copies in the US while the former hasn’t reached the 500,000 mark.
8 And who was responsible for compiling and sequencing this album? Colonel Parker? Felton Jarvis? Joan Deary? Tom Jones?
Well, well, well, if it isn’t another piece from the Master Elvis writer. What makes this the BEST piece the Master writer has written is, it included the two magic words: “TOM JONES!” ThankYa, Master Writer, ThankYaVeryMuch!!
Only prob is, “TJ”, o the Divine Ms. Deary would have never been responsible for compiling that LP! Except for one of the King’s Top 10 tunes ever, “Stranger In My Own Home Town,” they wouldn’t of even let Elvis record the rest as it’s all C-R-A-P!
With All rate one star, with the exceptions of “From A Jack To A King”—maybe a 2 1/2, “This Time” / “Can’t Stop Loving You” a three. If ya wanna know who might be responsible, I’d look to Lennon/McCartney. ;)
D
I liked Ms. Deary quite a lot based on the few phone conversations we had, but I thought most of the posthumous albums she compiled were iffy at best (excepting the brilliant LEGENDARY series).
N
PS: Dod I mention Tom Jones? Musta been before I had my coffee . . .
Hard to argue with you on this but I have to admit I always liked the Back In Memphis album (still do). All tracks. Just a mention on live albums by Elvis: I always felt and still do that there were far too many of them after On Stage. The Madison Square Garden show should have been filmed. Why Elvis On Tour stopped short of it is beyond me.
DG
BACK IN MEMPHIS was a good album (except for the sequencing of the tracks) at a time he needed another great album.
Agreed on the live albums. Had Elvis added just a half-dozen new songs by other artists and a half-dozen oh his own hits he’d never recorded live, H to his stage show every year—which was not a difficult thing to do—RCA could have issued a live album as good as ON STAGE every year! But he didn’t.
The Elvis On Tour movie was fine for its time but it probably would have had a helluvalot more impact had it been sold directly to television than sent to theaters. The only other person I knew who paid to see Elvis On Tour in 1972 was my date and I paid for her ticket.
N
PS: I thought the Madison Square Garden album was less-than-exciting even in 1972.
1. Well then Big N, stop drinkin coffee!! You actually had a moment of Brilliance! ;)
2. Back In Memphis sucked! Period. Worst studio Elvis LP ever! Many of the soundtracks were better! And, like with most soundtrack LPs, BIM contained only one gem & the rest was crap. HUGE disappointment.
I remember as a 14-year-old when it came out, I was thrilled: a followup to From Elvis In Memphis + paired with the live International LP. Played International first and was blown away. Then played BIM and thought, What is this shit? God, I hope this won’t be the Elvis of the future!
If TTWII didn’t come out shortly thereafter, The King mighta lost me as a fan as quick as he got me from ’68 Comeback. BIM was that BAD! You wrote it was the leftovers from the Memphis Sessions. Yep, that’s right… except for “Stranger.” I think they held it back from FEIM, planning to do something with it later cus it was that GOOD!
Unfortunately, they didn’t do anything with it and most the World doesn’t even know the song! A friggin’ King Masterpiece!! Can you imagine “Ghetto,” “Suspicious,” and “Stranger” being back-2-back-2-back singles? Woulda been 3 #1’s!! Hell, throw in “Polk” as the 4th and it might be 4 #1’s!
3. He was doing the material, it just wasn’t getting properly released. Personally, I don’t like “Daddy” and “KT.” Drab ballads (except “KT” live!). Elvis was dismissed as a Rocker cus of crap like that and “I’m Leavin’,” “Until It’s Time,” etc. “Stranger” woulda cemented him as a contemporary Rocker again. Other than “Stranger,” BIM coulda been titled “Elvis Sings The Englebert Sound.” YUK! I’d pull out to play Harum Scarum before BIM!!
4. Last, but not least, MR. N, how could you dare say The Garden LP didn’t kick ass!!?? A top 10 all-time King LP! I know: I was 1 of the 20,000 screaming King fans! :) Remember, it had been 2 years since his last Live LP and all of ’em had been from Vegas. I was really hoping the hype on “Trilogy” 45 p/s was a reality (“Coming Soon Standing Room Only”) cus along with you and your Misses, I and about 10 of my relatives all went to see On Tour in Hartford CT over the T’G weekend! Double feature with Joe Cocker! Talk about Beauty and the Beast! :)
The theater was 1/2 filled. 1/2 were Elvis Rockers, 1/2 were long-haired dope-smokin’ hippies. Quite a culture clash! Rockers were all smokin’ Marlboros. Remember when it was Normal to do that!? And the other 1/2 were all tryin’ to sneak-smoke their dope stix…. like us Normal smokers have to do in today’s BS world!
OMG, look how far we’ve come in nearly 50 yrs! Ya, right and I’m Elvis Tom Jones Presley! Hah! Got TJ’s name in there!! ;)
PS: To other David who happens to like BIM: to each his/her own. Whatever floats your boat and keeps ya a King fan! I’d also add “Rock On” but BIM got NO Rock!
DAVE
Thanks for the comment! It took this long to respond because when you sent it, it went straight to the trash folder and I’m just getting around to looking at such things. Also, I took some liberties with the “design” of your piece so we mere mortals could read and follow it.
1. Thanks but don’t tell Berni because she only allows me one moment of brilliance a year and I was saving that for Christmas this year.
2. Well, I shared your disappointment with BIM back in 1969-1970 but slowly got over most of it. I like most of the material a helluva lot more than you but I agree that it could have been SO SO SO much better—hence my article. And “Stranger” on the radio in 1969-1970 could have done a lot more for EP’s rep with record buyers than “Daddy” and “Kentucky Rain” (which I think was a brilliant recording but a poor choice as a single).
3. “I’m Leavin'” is a fave of mine but it certainly wasn’t a strong single.
4. The live at Madison Square Garden album was okay but equally disappointing at the time. But some people really dig live albums while I think most of them are mere souvenirs. Had Elvis included different songs in each of the five shows and RCA had put an album together like On Stage it could have been fabulastic! But, alas, they didn’t.
Had I been in Hartford in 1972, I woulda been one of the longhaired, dope-smokers, many of whom also smoked coffin-nails. But I smoked Camels—not those wussy filtered cigs like Marlboros! It’s possible I would also have been one of the few there who dug Presley and Cocker. The Mad Dogs & Englishmen documentary was a great concert film and has been under-appreciated for decades.
Why didn’t they ever make a Tom Jones doc movie?
PS: Smoking will make your penis fall off …