elvis and the illuminating turntable

AN ELVIS REISSUE may be one of the rarest and most valu­able Elvis records of the past fifty years. Or, it may be an­other fake col­lectible de­serving no better status than that of a cleverly-made-yet-unnecessary bootleg. And it’s tied in with a fooked-up but very in­ter­esting pic­ture cover and—get this—an il­lu­mi­nating turntable! [Read more] “elvis and the illuminating turntable”

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mae boren axton’s handwritten lyrics to “heartbreak hotel”

THE HAND­WRITTEN LYRICS to Heart­break Hotel by Mae Boren Axton from Oc­tober 1955 were up for sale re­cently. There are few songs in the his­tory of rock & roll that are more im­por­tant to the genre’s de­vel­op­ment as the world’s most pop­ular music during the post-war 20th cen­tury and none have a better origin story. [Read more] “mae boren axton’s handwritten lyrics to “heartbreak hotel””

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the highly collectible elvis presley phonographs of 1956

THE EX­PLOITA­TION OF ELVIS PRESLEY began in 1956. Elvis Presley En­ter­prises was es­tab­lished to au­tho­rize the man­u­fac­turing of nov­elty items about “the most talked about new per­son­ality in the last ten years of recorded music” to be sold to fans. RCA Victor also cap­i­tal­ized on their singer’s pop­u­larity by man­u­fac­turing a pair of Elvis Presley phono­graphs. [Read more] “the highly collectible elvis presley phonographs of 1956”

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probably the biggest year in the history of elvis!

IT’S NOT JUST ELVIS! Jeff Jampol is an es­tate rep­re­sen­ta­tive who han­dles the “brands” and as­sets of such stars as Jim Mor­rison, Janis Joplin, and the Ra­mones. He tells a story of having dinner with friends in their thir­ties and for­ties and asking them to name the ti­tles of three Beatle songs. [Read more] “probably the biggest year in the history of elvis!”

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elvis as don juan, cad, and womanizer (but not a hound dog)

THE PRI­VATE LIVES of other human be­ings rarely in­terest me. This in­cludes the people I deal with every day along with the people I enjoy as artists, ath­letes, en­ter­tainers, and even politi­cians. Con­se­quently, I don’t read many bi­ogra­phies and rarely write about peo­ple’s lifestyles. 1

When I write bi­o­graph­i­cally about a mu­si­cian on my Rather Rare Records blog, their sex lives or the drugs they used only in­terest me to the de­gree that it af­fected their music and cre­ativity. [Read more] “elvis as don juan, cad, and womanizer (but not a hound dog)”

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