Elvis Presley - The Albums and Singles Thread pt3 The Seventies

Hey @mark winstanley, are we supposed to be discussing the two "new" songs on this album today or are you planning to highlight them individually tomorrow?

 

Doing a little research, it appears that the song appeared only on the UK versions of the album. Yet another example of the folks at RCA UK having more on the ball than their US counterparts, since the song was unreleased on record and brought the album up to ten tracks (which had been the minimum for an Elvis record prior to this). I found images of a couple different pressings:

 

I think Sing You Children fits perfectly. It's packed with Biblical references, so it's as much a gospel song as any other on the record. And I think it's a pretty good song that deserves a second look in a more appropriate context than amid the generally weak Easy Come Easy Go songs.

I doubt this record had anything to do with the scheduling of He Touched Me. In terms of "new" Elvis records, they had an album's worth of 1970 Nashville Marathon stuff they wanted to release before getting to the new 1971 recordings, and obviously the Christmas record (recorded at the same sessions as He Touched Me) needed to come out in the autumn. So that would have pushed back He Touched Me regardless of this collection.

I think this is a really clever compilation. They find a new home for the gospel songs that were (justifiably) excised from the Christmas record, they round up the 1967 gospel single sides plus some appropriate movie tracks, and they release a brand-new American track. The only thing that would make it better would be if they'd delayed it a couple months and put Life and Only Believe on here too.

 

I'll be posting them tomorrow.
I didn't really know anything about this album and figured that guys may have stories about it or something

 

Lots of good points. I agree with much of it except including Life/Only Believe - I think it was a critical mistake having new singles being issued as new on Camden LPs (Burning Love/It's A Matter of Time and Separate Ways/Always On My Mind).

 

Is it the 1960 or the 1968 recording?

 

If this label is correct, I guess it was the 1960 recording, since it says it features the Jordanaires:

 

Top 5??

Elvis' Golden Records
Aloha
Elvis Golden Records vol 3
Live @ MSG
Elvis is Back

 

Keith Flynn's site shows L2WW-0381, the 1960 version.

 

You'll Never Walk Alone I only have as a Canadian CD, with a different cover:

Elvis Presley - You'll Never Walk Alone

The title track I find powerful... On the great CD So High (FTD), for "Take 1" he sings the entire song twice.

I love the two Thomas A. Dorsey songs, also on the '57 Christmas Album: (There'll Be) Peace In The Valley and Take My Hand, Precious Lord. Dorsey was a prolific blues artist in the late '20s, and later became known as the "Father of Gospel Music"... As far as I know, his first gospel sides were in 1930, as he's unconfirmed on this 1929 release:

Come And Go To That Land / Hold To His Hand - Gospel Camp Meeting Singers (Vocalion 1283)

 

I’m pretty sure the Swing Down Sweet Chariot Camden version is different to the 1960 version, or at least the backing singers sound different...??

 

C'mon Everybody and I Got Lucky were in line to cover 4 60s soundtrack EPs. Sing You Children is from one of those EP, leaving a spot to be filled with Fools Fall In Love.

 

Well having never seen or heard Swing Down Sweet Chariot on the Camden You'll Never Walk Alone, it must be from a non US release. It is possible it is from the The Trouble With Girls movie.

 

Let's Be Friends, and Flaming Star each have 9 tracks, as does the US You'll Never Walk Alone ho hone.

 

I think it would have been better to swap out Peace In The Valley from side 1 with Sing You Children on side 2.

 

"Where Did They Go Lord?" was recorded at the same session as "Whole Lotta Shakin'" and "Rags to Riches" and shares some of their "weird intensity." It's not the equal of those tracks but tends to be under-praised. At this stage of the post-comeback era Elvis was still giving his all, even to songs that weren't great. But this Dallas Frazier-Doodle Owens ballad is above-average, and Jorgensen notes that Elvis loved it. Guralnick wrotes the song was performed in Elvis's "new over-the-top style," but that style wasn't so new--I view Elvis's version of "Without Love" as the template for this style, with its full-throated emotional climax, essayed in a less formal manner than the early 60s ballads. Applied to an insubstantial song this style could be overwhelming in the worst way ("The Sound of Your Cry"), but the breast-beating of "Where Did They Go Lord?" doesn't stray too far into bathos.

 

Who Am I
Written By :
Charles Rusty Goodman

Recorded :
American Studios, Memphis, February 17-22, 1969 : February 22, 1969

When we see these American Studios trickling out on various recordings, I can full well understand why folks prefer to listen in order of sessions. It's two years since this session and there is still more to come from it.
I would actually be nice if FTD or someone put together a collection of sets that were based on, if not totally inclusive of all the Elvis recording sessions. Boy From Tupelo, being somewhat of the first shot fired. Anyhow
This is a beautifully sung, reverent ballad, that has a gentle demeanour that soothes and gives rest, rather than stirring or riling up.
I guess in many ways this somewhat strange album, is actually the perfect place for it.

 

Let Us Pray
Written By :
Ben Weisman & Buddy Kaye

Recorded :
Decca Universal Studio, Hollywood, March 5-7, 1969: March 5, 1969. take 8

This is a moderate to uptempo track from the Change Of Habit movie......
It is interesting that the two "new" tracks were put on here side by side, and it is also quite interesting how different they are.
This track is pretty good, but somewhat cheesy, whereas Who Am I is seemingly, to my ears at least, very heartfelt and direct.
I think this is still a good song, but very lightweight compared to its counterpart.

 

No matter how reverent and well sung WHO AM I is, it does not make much on me. On the other hand, LET US PRAY is so much more on the fun side, and it always makes me sing it all along. Because of that, my kids hate it. That one and the OH HAPPY DAY "TTWII" stage rehearsal are the only two Gospel I really enjoy from that particular era (1969/1971).

 

Melbourne post Punk band Models covered two songs from that album (Steam Roller Blues and Blue Moon) on the B side of their hit single Barbados.

 

My top 5 albums

The Complete Sun Sessions (1987) - my first purchase of the Sun material.
Elvis' Golden Records Volume 3 (1963)- I love the sound of Elvis early 60s stereo recordings!
How Great Thou Art (1967) -my top Elvis gospel album, in spite of what I just said above.
The Memphis Record (1987) - my first purchase of most of the Memphis songs and I get more songs than if I say From Elvis in Memphis.
As Recorded at Madison Square Garden (1972) - I can't not have some live 70s Elvis in my top 5!

It's tough to make a top 5, of course.
I have no 50s hits (ouch), no Elvis is Back! (hate to leave it out.)
But If I had only 5, I would be happy with these.

 

Absolute killer bass part on this one!

I'll never forget driving one early sunny, April Sunday morning from Graceland to Tupelo and this song came on the radio. At the time, it was the perfect song for the moment. Funny the things we remember.

 

Ok, a little backtracking here. I should have asked about this when we covered the 1970 Camden LP Elvis' Christmas Album. Please don't ask me for a link or source because I read this article online many many years ago. I will try to paraphrase as best as I can. I take you back to the earliest planning stages of the 1968 TV Special. You have to remember that at this stage, Elvis was going to come out and sing some Christmas songs and that's pretty much it. No groundbreaking comeback special or sit down shows were planned at this time. No Memphis sessions afterwards was in the picture at the time. There was an album scheduled to made but it wasn't the soundtrack that we're familiar with. What I read is that the plan was to have an album and single from this "Christmas Special". The LSP (e) /LPM 1951 LP had been discontinued and there was to be a new Camden Christmas album put together. This "Camden Christmas Album" was to be made up of the Christmas songs from the first album (now discontinued by 1968) and adding If Every Day Was Like Christmas while dropping the gospel songs. This brings us to the TV special as it was originally supposed to have a track or two placed on this album from the TV Special itself. This album, as originally conceived, was to be the Camden LP that was available as a promotion through the Singer stores and then later issued as a regular Camden release. There was also supposed to be at least one new Christmas song written and performed for release as a single. Once plans on the TV Special shifted so dramatically after Steve Binder came along, RCA was in a bit of a pickle. That's why they hastily threw the Flaming Star LP together. This also created a problem as now they conceived what became the TV Special soundtrack late in the game pushing a Camden Christmas album back until 1970 due to Elvis' unexpected resurgence and new releases. From what I remember reading, the fast cobbling together of Flaming Star to fulfill contracts with both Singer and RCA is what left some of the subsequent Camdens disjointed because many of the tracks that may have appeared in later Camdens were pilfered for Flaming Star. I haven't read this anywhere else so I wonder about it sometimes. It could explain some things if true.

 

I totally agree with your very astute appraisal here. When I use to see the title a long time ago, I always thought to myself, oh, here comes another pretty good gospel song, but it really is a love song in the most traditional sense, with some gospel underpinnings. Dallas Frazier, the brilliant songwriter who co-wrote it with "Doddle" Owens, said about Where Did They Go Lord, "It's a hybrid of country and gospel. The song is about a man crying out to God and just baring his heart over his loss. It definitely has gospel overtones in it. Elvis connected with the emotion in that song. He did a fantastic job on it."

 

I rate the two gospel songs pretty much as you do. Who Am I shows off one of Elvis's most restrained and delicate vocals on a gospel song. He displays the same type of tenderness and control on his vocal instrument that he showed just a few years earlier on Stand By Me for his sublime HGTA masterpiece. Let Us Pray sounds like a nice track written by movie songwriters trying to mimic a good gospel standard. It is pleasant enough and I kind of dig the guitar on it, but Who Am I is one of the standouts on this compilation album to my ears.