Elvis Presley - The Albums and Singles Thread pt2 The Sixties

I like Roustabout
I think I liked Girl Happy, but I need a couple more listens
One of the car racing sounding ones seemed to be sitting in the memory as good

 

Oh yeah, Spinout was a major uptick in the general decline. Roustabout and Girl Happy at least had Elvis in good form. But I HATE that they sped up the title track on Girl Happy by about 8% and a few others around 3-4%. The normal speed outtakes of the song Girl Happy is much better.

 

I haven't been receiving notifications even though I am "watching" this thread. I am all caught up now and hope to contribute more to the discussion.

 

G'day ... I have been having that problem with a few threads

 

Yeah I like Spinout quite a bit actually, but we aren't there yet. (1966)

 

Yep, 1965 was Elvis' absolute low point as a recording artist. Those two albums (plus Paradise Hawaiian Style) have both the worst material and the worst recording/mixing of any of his releases.

 

I actually prefer Harum Scarum to Kissin' Cousins. But that's really the lesser of two evils.

 

Aha, you are correct. But Kissin' Cousins was the first time an entire session was done that way. On LMT and Jailhouse Rock it was just a few stray tracks that had vocal overdubs.

 

Sonically, Kissin' Cousins sounds pretty good to me. There's some hiss on tracks like Tender Feeling and One Boy..., but other than that, I've never had any issues with the sound. It certainly sounds better than the LMT tracks, not to mention the "let's push Elvis' voice as far up in the mix as humanly possible" approach of later soundtracks.

 

Re: the Kissin' Cousins FTD, does anyone know why they didn't include more of Elvis' vocal tracks? It seems odd that they'd include the backing tracks but not the overdubbed vocals. Do they no longer exist in isolation from the backing tracks (did they ever exist that way)?

 

I prefer that alternate Kissin' Cousins album cover quite a bit. The music quality is certainly getting worse for his soundtrack material.

Harum Scarum in its original mix is terrible and unlistenable. The '90s remix is a vast improvement since they bring the instruments up in the mix and I think is the only way to listen to the album, although the material is still weak. I highly suggest seeking out the remix to appreciate that music to whatever degree it can be appreciated (still a low bar). With that in mind, Double Trouble gets my vote for the worst of the worst and is the one that always kills any remaining patience I have when I try to listen to Elvis chronologically.

 

To be honest, I'm not sure if i have listened to double trouble yet.
It has been a lot of albums to get through, and i kind of approached it a little randomly

 

When I finally heard a correct-speed take of GIRL HAPPY on some bootleg (maybe it was GIRL HAPPY AT THE WORLD'S FAIR), it suddenly became one of my favorite soundtrack songs and still is. However, the sped-up original was awful. I didn't know it was sped-up originally....I just thought they had Elvis singing in a key that was too high for him or whatever and that the song was taken at too fast of a tempo, so I didn't really like it.

 

If you accept that the soundtracks have to be judged by a different standard than his regular studio recordings (I think they do), I must say that I enjoyed both Harum Scarum and Frankie And Johnny over the years because they had Elvis singing music that was a bit different (the way that Fun In Acapulco introduced a faux-Latin sound)----the former with a kind of exotica flavor, the latter with a Dixieland flavor. I must like both of these a lot because I have both the FTD releases of them AND the bootleg 3-cd box sets. I also enjoy both films. HARUM is meant to be a parody, and on that level I find it entertaining (Elvis was supposedly a fan of Rudolph Valentino), and there's just something infectious about FRANKIE for me. It certainly has a great supporting cast and a lot of good cheer about it (even though it has TV-movie level production quality).
For me, PARADISE HAWAIIAN STYLE is probably the weakest of the soundtracks that had an LP released, but even that entertains me when I'm in the right mood. I guess I have a weakness for the soundtracks...compared with some Elvis fans.

 

Kissin' Cousins no.2
Written By :
Bernie Baum, Bill Giant & Florence Kaye

Recorded :
RCA's Studio B, Nashville, September 29-30, and MGM Studios, Culver City, October 10, 1963 : October 10, 1963. take 4

This isn't a terrible song ... I'll be honest and say I think the subject matter is just plain weird, and I am just not sure on why they went with that angle with all the hundreds of ideas they could forward for a move/song theme, borderline incest seems a strange choice.

 

Smokey Mountain Boy
Written By :
Lenore Rosenblatt & Victor Millrose

Recorded :
RCA's Studio B, Nashville, September 29-30, and MGM Studios, Culver City, October 10, 1963 : October 10, 1963. take 3

We start here with some whistling and a faux military march beat. When the other instruments enter, we get some banjo and the track almost has a George Formby kind of feel about it. The song in itself works reasonably well.

 

I like Kissin Cousins #2 more than #1.

 

"Kissin' Cousins," along with the 1965's "Girl Happy" and "Harum Scarum" and 1966's "Frankie And Johnny" and "Paradise, Hawaiian Style," are the worst soundtrack recordings of his career. As @czeskleba noted, 1965 was the low point in Elvis' recording career. It is difficult to find any redeeming recordings from those soundtracks (I can think of about 3 or 4 total that are tolerable).

 

And his voice was especially off with Harum Scarum, Frankie And Johnny and Paradise Hawaiian Style.

 

There's Gold In The Mountains
Written By :
Bernie Baum, Bill Giant & Florence Kaye

Recorded :
RCA's Studio B, Nashville, September 29-30, and MGM Studios, Culver City, October 10, 1963 : October 10, 1963. take 3

So we have a bouncy little song here that is essentially saying that the pretty girls in the mountains are the gold that he is looking for. It is actually a cool little song. We get some nice instrumentation and the arrangement is fun also.