Elvis Presley - The Albums and Singles Thread pt3 The Seventies

Imagine a Blu-ray with an uncompressed version of the 2004 5.1 mix, AND the old Quadraphonic mix as an audio option!

 

POB I agree with you 100% on this (I'm still holding out re Burning Love heh heh ) However I've come to the conclusion that Elvis didn't place a lot of value on his own back catalogue, hits aside. We're looking at his canon with the benefit of hindsight. Others who were around at the time are in a better position to comment than me, but it seems that over the years he got a lot of grief over the quality of his output. Deservedly at times, but a lot of it quite snooty. And we all know how insecure he was.

Evidently his own view was that he'd never recorded a classic.

 

Or right depending on your perspective. And I'm an ageing punk!

 

I also have to wonder if Elvis was scratching his head at what the public wanted. He makes excellent quality albums like Elvis Is Back!, FEIM, Elvis Country, and TTWII, and they sell modestly. Blue Hawaii, Burning Love and Aloha sell well??????

 

That's a very good point! It's somewhat bizarre that the best selling Elvis albums (excluding greatest hits) are not the ones most admired by critics. When Elvis made really good albums the public seemed largely disinterested - although this could have in part been due to marketing, eg. Aloha was always going to be huge as it was tied to a big event.

 

Also Sprach Zarathustra - The improved sound over MSG is evident right away.

See See Rider is solid but not stellar. A decent start.

I like considering (if not necessarily accepting) POB's suggestion that Burning Love here is better than the studio version. Just because it's fun to reevaluate and reappreciate an Elvis performance that you thought you had already figured out, a big value of these threads. BL here is pretty darn good. Elvis vocal is committed. I do like the bigness of the sound. The horns and backup groups in unison on the ahhh ahhh ahhh part just now reminded me of how Ray Conniff liked to meld horns and voices together to get a unique sound. I don't know if Ray Conniff & Elvis is going to be a positive association for people here or not.

I've always enjoyed this Something, although Elvis sounded better in 1970. Kathy Westmoreland's voice is beautiful.

You Gave Me a Mountain and Steamroller Blues are outstanding. The passion is there on those.
I like Steamroller as a single. Glad it was a hit. Years ago when my wife was first hearing me play it, she was hearing the "cement mixer" lyric differently. I told her he was singing "cement" and she said "are you sure?"

I used to like My Way. Not as much anymore. Elvis "sings all kinds", so if he wanted it, A-OK. He sings an almost flawless version but I'd prefer another song there. In retrospect, obviously the end was near for Elvis. At the time, he should have been too young in his life and career for this song.

I just like Love Me. I like the song, the tune. Even if Elvis is a little casual with it, I still enjoy it.
Elvis introduces it by saying he's like to do a medley of some of his records. But it's just one song. I'm thinking he said it because Love Me was usually followed by a few more 50s songs in his shows. But still?
Elvis and Robert Plant sang a little bit of Love Me together when Led Zeppelin met Elvis in 1974.

 

I wonder if Elvis ever talked about it? He works really hard on an album and it barely outsells something that he had little or no interest in. Here comes the Burning Love album with a hit single that he wasn't crazy about with a bunch of old movie junk songs added and it sells like hotcakes???? It was already getting difficult to get him into the studio to record. I know that there were multiple reasons but I'd bet a lot of it was "why bother?".

 

From my understanding Elvis not wanting to go in the studio was more to do with his personal life and he simply lost interest. Music never left him totally. He still had passion for music but in terms of recording albums he had lost interest after May 1970 and his personal life turmoil and his depression had a lot to do with him losing interest.

In terms of the Burning Love album, I wonder if he ever known or cared about the song selection.

 

But if an album like Elvis Country did really well in the charts and was hailed by critics etc, maybe he would have found renewed interest in recording new material, even as a way of briefly escaping his personal problems.

 

Maybe. But unfortunately these other lesser albums sold well and made it appear the Colonel knew best as he continued to steer Elvis in the wrong direction career wise. However, even so, Elvis had lost interest in recording for a lot of the 1970s regardless of how much any of his albums sold

 

Correct, he lost his passion for the recording process. With respect to Burning Love, it is highly unlikely he had any knowledge that Parker was compiling a budget album around the hit single. He was pretty detached from product.

 

For me, Elvis’s definitive take on My Way is found on this great FTD release from 1972. He absolutely kills it on this CD.

 

I will have to hear that! As it is, the Aloha version of My Way is my favorite second only to Sinatra's original.

 

He looks so cool in that picture. I love those 1972 pics where he is out of the jumpsuits and wearing those funky shirts. Totally bad ass.

 

The August 1972 Las Vegas engagement would have been a good one to see. It didn't represent his best live work, but he was still performing a notable level during the summer of 1972, which arguably marked the end of a relatively consistent early 1970's run as a live performer.

 

If there is one thing that I've learned from all of the learned Elvis experts here over the past three threads is that Elvis' whole career was a wonder. He took little interest in the business side of things and his management was out for the quickest buck regardless of the long term results. His tremendous talent was the only consistent ace in his pocket. He had some lucky breaks for sure like breaking into That's All Right when the other stuff wasn't cutting it with Sam Phillips. Like being paired up with Bill Black and Scotty Moore that helped to give him that awesome backing sound for years to come. Being totally reborn as an artist by being teamed up with Steve Binder and turning a Christmas special that would have congealed his career as a has been except they made it into a comeback event. Despite poor management, personal sabotage, sycophants in droves, drug addiction, depression, bad career moves, an incompetent record label, and an underappreciated body of really great work, here we are still enjoying his music.

 

I have no problem with any kind of setlist as long as all the numbers are performed with care. I'm quite happy to have that Aloha take on I'M SO LONESOME I COULD CRY actually. What I do not stand anymore are those half-hearted (at best) versions of most of his 50's gold numbers (TRYING TO GET TO YOU being maybe the exception.) None of them deserved that kind of treatment. What is the point of a 50 seconds HOUND DOG?

 

Johnny B Goode
The band rips into this track, and Elvis seems to be more interested in this than his own fifties tracks.
It is still a short track, that just seems to be the way Elvis was rolling the fifties tracks. Unlike the big bands of the time turning them into 5-25 minute jams, Elvis is just pounding out the core of the songs and moving on. I guess there is actually something to be said for that, as many many concert goers were tiring of over-extended jams ... but anyhow, this is a solid version.

 

It's Over
I am a fan of these types of tracks in Elvis' live shows, and part of the reason is he is into them.
In some ways, it almost seems as if he would have preferred to throw out his legacy recordings and moved into a big selection of big ballads, and the reality is that it would have probably been better for Elvis and the audience. I would rather hear a singer fully committed to anything, than playing hits with almost contempt.
This track is right on the money for me.

 

Blue Suede Shoes
Elvis does a pretty good version of this, but to some degree it's debatable whether this track should have walked out of the fifties. Again, at about 55 seconds it is debatable whether Elvis wanted it to walk out of the sixties lol

 

I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry
This vocal is committed, it comes over very well. The singer is somewhere he is happy to be, and it shows. If the setlist was made up of tracks that the singer wanted to really sing, imagine how much better this album/concert would be.

I enjoyed reading the comments upthread about Elvis being confused about what exactly the public wanted. It has been revelatory to me seeing what sold and what didn't .... and to me it seems almost like every time Elvis offered up a Filet Mignon it was received poorly, and every time he offered up a poop sandwich it went platinum .... That would drive me bonkers, and there is every chance that I too wouldn't have wanted to record anymore if that's how it went. Anyhow I digress ....
This track is really good.

 

I'M SO LONESOME I COULD CRY
November 1973, home recording

 

It's Over is wonderful. The lyrics give Elvis plenty to work with ("If time were not a moving thing..."), and he sings them with so much passion. The Aloha version is great, as is the 1972 master. If I had to choose, I'd probably pick the latter. It sounds particularly great on the 70s box.

I must be the only Elvis fan who doesn't care for I'm So Lonesome. The song itself doesn't appeal to me, and even Elvis can't save it.

 

Nobody's perfect.

 

Start about 1:23. Aloha director Marty Pasetta explains how the show was not long enough to fill it's allotted time. It sounds like it was just before showtime that Elvis was told this and had to add some songs. Johnny B. Goode, I Can't Stop Loving You, and Long Tall Sally/Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On were Elvis' last minute choices to fill out an additional ~10 minutes of air time. I have to say that I like all of those additions, so I'm glad that happened.
On the other hand, he could have expanded Blue Suede Shoes and Hound Dog to be longer and more substantial to fill out some of the time. Anyway, Elvis did a good job of improvising at the last minute in a high pressure situation.