Elvis Presley - The Albums and Singles Thread pt2 The Sixties

Puppet on a string is a nice track, great melody. I also like the piano part and backing vocals. The only fault I have is Elvis' voice is mixed way too upfront. I have a feeling he'd agree.

Do The Clam. Hmmmm this is a tough one. The lyrics are absurd, but that's part of its appeal (well, to me anyways). But it's about a minute too long. Boots Randolph's sax solo is right out of Yakety Sax, and in the 'looped' 2nd half there's a very notable drop in sound quality. They should have just gone with the guitar solo and edit out the sax solo entirely, which would have brought it to a more tolerable 2:30 or so.

I find it ironic that they extended Do The Clam but other songs are sped up!

 

that exactly what went through my head
three and a half minutes for one of the weakest songs, and one and a half minutes for the stronger songs lol

 

I prefer hearing any lead vocal dry and upfront like that. These 1964-1965 mixes have been disparaged then and to this day. For some of the reasons I agree, but NOT for the main reason of Elvis' vocals being dry and upfront.

 

When Elvis' voice is too upfront it makes it sound like he's singing along with a transistor radio rather than a live band. The entire track is emasculated. These problems get much worse on the next record.

Puppet on a String is one of the better songs. As noted, the good songs on this record are the ballads. The uptempo, "rock" songs do not work.

Case in point is Do the Clam. Like Rock a Hula Baby, it comes across not as rock and roll, but as a parody of rock and roll written by someone who had no knowledge or affinity for the genre. Which is essentially what it is. Sad to see Elvis reduced to self parody.

 

Well I agree with that, a lot of the rock music written for Elvis in the 60s soundtracks have no basis in Rhythm & Blues, Country and Gospel etc, so they sound like unreasonable facsimiles of rock and roll. Leiber/Stoller and Pomus/Shuman could at least write well in the rock genre, but they are long gone now.
And your comment also holds true for Rockahula Baby, but for some reason I really like that song.

 

Girl Happy is one of those Elvis movies that looks good, but the fun seems to stop there. It seems as if the director had the idea of getting Elvis to wear the most vivid colour of shirts that they could find. The music seems to go from the good (Puppet on a String) through to the abysmal (Wolf Call, Startin' Tonight). But for me the most interesting and appealing songs are Cross My Heart, Hope to Die and Fort Lauderdale Chamber of Commerce. Cross My Heart sounds like a kind of precursor to City By Night, with its late-night jazz club vibe, while Fort Lauderdale is the sort of attractive nonsense which Elvis seemed to sometimes find worthy of effort during the movie years. The words are nonsense, but like Song of the Shrimp, it's hard to imagine it sung any better, and it's a shame it's not developed into something a bit more substantial.

 

Haven't seen the movie, but I would come pretty close to agreeing with your assessment of the songs.
I like Fort Lauderdale Chamber Of Commerce a surprisingly large amount

 

My stepfather was an arsehole. He tried his best to prevent us from watching Elvis movies on TV. If we DID watch he ridiculed the movie and Elvis all the way through making us feel miserable in the process. If I get the chance to see an Elvis movie now and then these days, I REALLY enjoy them. They are such whimsical and happy go lucky movies that bring out the kid in me.

 

Me too.
Me thinks stepfather was just a jealous guy

 

The strangest thing to me is Elvis' (apparent) refusal to appear shirtless, even in the water skiing scene. I wonder what was up with that? I can understand his reluctance in subsequent films after he'd put on some weight, but he doesn't appear too chubby in this film.

I'm a fan of City By Night also, despite its horrible mix/sound. And Who Are You (Who Am I). His jazzy excursions were better than his rock and roll in this period.

 

I've only seen Girl Happy once, but I had a blast watching it. It falls squarely into the "so corny it's great" category. Most Elvis movies are pretty boring, but Girl Happy hit all the right notes for me. I really need to watch it again...

I completely and unironically adore Do The Clam, from that bass riff to the cheesy "Yeah! Yeah! Yeah" bits to the way that Elvis really brings it home after the instrumental parts ("Everybody's got that beat!"). It's like a mashup of Barefoot Ballad/The Yellow Rose Of Texas/Do The Vega, and though I can fully understand why most people would absolutely hate that result, I've always found it to be a gas.

Puppet On A String is absolutely gorgeous, and I don't mind the mix. It's entirely appropriate to have Elvis' vocal so prominent on a gentle song like this. If you want to hear a terribly mixed version of this song, check out the outtake on Out In Hollywood; part of the problem is the lousy mastering, but more than that, Elvis really does sound like he's recording in a different room.

 

Yes, I've noticed that before, too. Doesn't he appear shirtless in Live a Little, Love a Little - but only then while he is in the shower, I think? In the early 1960s, there was barely a film where he kept his shirt on for the entire duration. I started work on a book once about how Elvis was slowly robbed of his masculinity in Hollywood - how he went from being chased by too many girls to not being able to get one at all, and how he went from Jailhouse Rock to appearing in what is essentially an MGM (female) chorus line in He's Your Uncle Not Your Dad. But I lost interest and the book never got written.

 

Well could it have anything to do with chest hair?

 

I just rewatched the relevant scene on youtube to refresh my memory. He's shirtless but stays behind a translucent shower door, so you don't see anything from the neck down.

How so? Elvis appears shirtless frequently in films up to and including Fun in Acapulco, but after that he stops. The likely guess is that he was self-conscious about having gained weight, since he was overweight throughout much of 1965-67. But Girl Happy is an anomaly, because (to my eyes anyway) he doesn't look like he's gained any weight yet. But since it's a beach party movie with a water-skiing scene and frequent poolside scenes, the fact that he's always got a shirt on (a long sleeve shirt, no less) seems odd.

 

I believe they did this intentionally to make Elvis sound younger.

 

Well I never noticed any chest hair in the movies where he takes off his shirt. Did he have to shave for those scenes? If so, maybe he just refused to shave anymore. Maybe it was considered bad for his image to have chest hair showing in the movies. Just a theory.

 

Possible. But I don't think he had much chest hair, period. He doesn't seem to have much in his army induction photos, and he obviously didn't shave for those. Likewise in this gif that appears to be from 1967 (a period when he wasn't appearing shirtless in movies so he'd have no reason to be shaven):

 

I've Got To Find My Baby
Written By :
Joy Byers

Recorded :
Radio Recorders, Hollywood, June 10-12 and 15, 1964: June 15, 1964. take 1
We have a another pretty good rock and roll song here and really this album ends up being for me a good Elvis album in spit of it being a mid to late period soundtrack.

 

You'll Be Gone
Written By :
Charlie Hodge, Elvis Presley & Red West

Recorded :
RCA's Studio B, Nashville, March 18-20, 1962 : March 18, 1962. take 3

A-side "Do the Clam"
Released February 9, 1965
Format 45 vinyl
Recorded March 18, 1962
Genre Pop, rock and roll
Length 2:20
Label RCA Victor
Songwriter(s) Elvis Presley
Red West
Charlie Hodge

"You'll Be Gone" is a song co-written by Elvis Presley and published by Elvis Presley Music and released in 1965 on the Girl Happy soundtrack album and as a 45 single.[1] The song was recorded in 1962 and is significant because it was co-written by Elvis Presley, with his bodyguard Red West and Charlie Hodge.[2] The other song that Elvis Presley composed was "That's Someone You Never Forget" in 1961 with Red West, which was on the Pot Luck LP released in 1962.

The song was recorded on Sunday, March 18, 1962 at RCA Studio B in Nashville, Tennessee.

"You'll Be Gone" was released as an RCA Victor 45 picture sleeve single on February 9, 1965 as the B side with "Do the Clam", as RCA Victor 47-8500.[3][4] The Jordanaires provided the background vocals. "You'll Be Gone" charted at no. 121 on Billboard. In Canada, "You'll Be Gone" reached no. 16 on the singles chart as a double A side with "Do the Clam" in February, 1965 in a six-week chart run.[5] The A side "Do the Clam" reached no. 21 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart and remained on the chart for 8 weeks. The song was also released as a 7" 45 single by RCA (Teldec), 47-9686, in Germany in 1965 backed with "Blue River". The single was also released in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, France, Japan, Greece, Egypt, the Philippines, Turkey, and Israel. In France, the single was released as a picture sleeve 45 as RCA Victor 49801 in 1971. In Egypt, the single was released by Sono Cairo.

Red West recounted that "You'll Be Gone" was written after a suggestion or idea made by Elvis to write new lyrics for Cole Porter's 1935 classic song "Begin the Beguine", from the musical Jubilee: "Elvis recorded 'It's Now Or Never' and he wanted to take another old standard that was a great song and change the lyrics. ... He said 'I like the song "Begin the Beguine". I like the melody but I'd like to put new lyrics on it.'" When Cole Porter denied permission to alter the lyrics, Elvis, West, and Charlie Hodge worked on creating new lyrics and new music for a song that would be entitled "You'll Be Gone". The song was replete with Latin rhythms and classical guitar passages. The beguine had been a dance popular in Martinique and Guadeloupe in the 1930s.

The song was copyrighted on February 4, 1965 and re-registered on March 10.[6] The publishing company was Elvis Presley Music, Inc.

In the liner notes to the CD Elvis by the Presleys (2005) Ernst Jorgensen wrote: "When Priscilla came to visit Elvis in the U.S. in the spring of 1962, Elvis proudly played her the new recordings he had just made in Nashville. One of these was 'You'll Be Gone,' a song that he had written himself with his good friends Red West and Charlie Hodge. To his deep frustration, Priscilla remarked that she liked his rock 'n' roll recordings better. Elvis had a fit, Priscilla was devastated, and Elvis never tried to write a song again."[2]

Elvis Presley's wife Priscilla noted in the liner notes to the CD Elvis by the Presleys (2005): "The reason we've included it is because it's the last time Elvis ever wrote a song."[2] She recalled that he played her the song.
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I'm not sure how true all the information above is, but it relays the truth that the smallest and somewhat innocent statements can have devastating effects. I also don't know to what extent Elvis wrote the song, but to be so hurt that Priscilla didn't like it, one would assume that he had something to do with it.
This is a good song, and I think it has a good sound and feel, but the reverb from the other sessions makes it sound a little out of place here. You can hear that it came from somewhere else, and it's surprising that they kept the same sound (perhaps they had no choice due to the way it was recorded)

 

Always liked this song. I've always liked the soundtrack to "Girl Happy". I know this one gets slammed pretty hard but even the sillier tunes are pretty catchy. Haven't seen the movie in years though. I don't remember being too jazzed about it as a kid though.

 

It could, of course, just be that it wasn't required in the post-Acapulco films, but I would argue it does seem odd given some of the scenes in the films. There is the prominent use of the pool in Tickle Me, too, but Elvis never enters it.

Oddly, the only MGM film where he does appear shirtless is, I think, Jailhouse Rock - all the other movies were for Paramount (G I Blues, Blue Hawaii, Acapulco), Fox (Flaming Star) and Mirisch (Follow that Dream, Kid Galahad). Jailhouse Rock was a 1-picture deal with MGM.

So could it be that it was in his 1960s MGM multi-film contracts that he had to keep his shirt on? It sounds stupid enough to be possible.

 

The problem with these stories is that we only have Priscilla's word for it. It was also from her that the stories came of how much Elvis hated the songs from G I Blues - but does he mention once during the sessions tapes that he hates a song, or feels a fool singing a song? Not that I know of. Sure, he's irritated because of the recording set-up and there is the lunch break dialogue on the Silver box. But surely if he hated the songs as Priscilla says, there would be something within the dialogue on the tapes.

 

The song was edited for release. I think the complete version exists, taken from an acetate.

 

I've Got To Find My Baby is another one I like from this LP. But it's another one where to my ears the mix is a bit wonky in regards to Elvis' voice, and it's one I wish they didn't fade early. I like You'll Be Gone as well, and it wouldn't have been out of place as a bonus track on Fun In Acapulco. And it's certainly an odd pairing on 45 with Do The Clam on the A-side.

 

I just watched my 16mm print of Girl Happy about 6 weeks ago, it’s a little faded and pan and scan (ugh) but it’s really a fun film overall. I sort of forgot that it’s a solid second-tier Elvis feature with songs that don’t make me cringe too much.....