Elvis – A Touch of Gold | a blog about elvis presley's music and records

I am writing a new column about records for another blog!

MY NEWEST ENDEAVOR is writing a column for another blog! The blog is Sixties Music Secrets, an informative audio/visual blog with insight-filled conversations between knowledgeable, curious, and nostalgic readers regarding all things musical from the 1960s. The column is “The Avid Record Collector.”

In this column, I will look at records that were mass-produced in the 1960s and subsequently deleted from record company catalogs. [Continue reading]

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. [Continue reading]

the most valuable elvis 45 of the ’70s has been bootlegged!

SOME COPIES OF “BURNING LOVE” may be the most valuable commercially-issued Elvis single of the ’70s! Despite its last sale on eBay for almost a thousand dollars, many collectors are unaware of this record’s value or its origin. This article addresses those facts and warns readers that this rarity has been bootlegged and these counterfeit copies are being sold to unsuspecting fans! [Continue reading]

don’t you think it’s weird that so many people impersonate elvis?

SO I OPEN UP MY EMAIL and there’s a notification telling me that someone requests my answer to a question on Quora. I tend to ignore these questions as many are idiotic and are just a means for the asker to get some attention on Quora. But the question was “Is it weird that so many people impersonate Elvis?” [Continue reading]

Elvis AuburnUniversity March1974 1500 crop red

british pressings of elvis presley’s “my boy” are common in the u.k.

EXPORT-ONLY RECORDS ARE NOT COMMON in the record business. But in 1974, RCA in the US had to manufacture records by several artists to be exported to England for sale in the UK. Why this occurred while there were British pressings of the same records being manufactured at the same time remains a topic of discussion among record collectors. [Continue reading]

A FEW QUOTES

“[Elvis] came to the session, picked the songs, and if something in the arrangement was changed, he was the one to change it. Everything was worked out spontaneously. Nothing was really rehearsed. Consciously or unconsciously, everyone imitated him.” – Bones Howe

“You have no idea how great he is, really you don’t. You have no comprehension, it’s absolutely impossible. I can’t tell you why he’s so great, but he is. He’s sensational.” – Phil Spector

"I don’t think he ripped them off. I think once something has been exposed, anyone can add or take from it if they like. He was just so great, so popular, and so hot, and so anything that he played became a hit.” – B.B. King

“He was an integrator. Elvis was a blessing. They wouldn’t let black music through. He opened the door for black music.” – Little Richard

"Elvis was a great man and did more for civil rights than people know. To say he was a racist is an insult to us all.” – Ernest Withers

"The only white boy that had soul—who could sing as good as any of them—was Elvis When it comes to singing, nobody had everything like Elvis. I’ll tell the world, Elvis was the greatest of all time." – Muhammad Ali

“The first time that I appeared on stage, I really didn’t know what all the yelling was about. I didn’t realize that my body was moving. It’s a natural thing to me. So to the manager backstage I said, ‘What’d I do?’ And he said, 'Whatever it is, go back and do it again.' ” – Elvis Presley

"Elvis is the greatest cultural force in the 20th century. He introduced the beat to everything, music, language, clothes, it’s a whole new social revolution [and] the '60s come from it.” – Leonard Bernstein