Elvis Presley - The Albums and Singles Thread pt3 The Seventies

Or with a separate thread for The Sound Of Your Cry.

 

The fact that seeing her pain would hurt him doesn't prove he loves her. Unless you're a complete sociopath, sitting with someone and hearing them cry and hearing them beg you not to leave would be a painful experience, regardless of your level of feeling for them. And I don't think it makes him more sympathetic that he cares about whether or not he hurts her, because obviously his caring doesn't extend to the point of wanting to do anything at all to mitigate her pain. He just wants to avoid it.

I agree with all of the above except your last sentence. I agree that he's using it as an emotional workout and really inhabiting the character in the song in perhaps an over-the-top way, but I don't think that inherently makes the character sympathetic or romanticized. The song reminds me a bit of one of my favorite Conway Twitty songs, "How Much More Can She Stand" (which I've linked below). That song is about a man who cares about his wife yet cheats on her incessantly, and Twitty sings it with a passion and deep emotion. Yet I do not think he is intended to be viewed sympathetically. The listener can maybe empathize with his character if they've also done things they regret and feel guilty about, but they most definitely don't view him as romanticized. I think The Sound of Your Cry works the same way.

 

To the narrator it would not merely be a painful experience but a heartbreaking one, and he reluctantly takes his time leaving her, as suggested by the much repeated insistence at the end of kissing her goodbye and asking to sleep on. He would obviously be much less sympathetic if he left calmly and felt little about how she would feel. Further more, the song suggests that the love affair was fated to end: "Though I knew the time was coming and our love would end somehow...I know we can't go on, that it was wrong to start." So no matter what the singer does, the situation would be painful for everyone involved. That makes it different from the Conway Twitty song, because what Twitty is doing is unambiguously immoral and avoidable.

I don't hate the song enough to participate in one!

 

You're right that the vagueness of the situation leaves it open to interpretation in a manner that is not the case with the Twitty song. I take "It was wrong to start" as an implication there's cheating involved here, probably on the Elvis character's part. But that's open to debate. At any rate, I think in both cases we can sympathize with these guys to a degree because they feel guilt about what they are doing and its effect on someone else. But in neither case are they too sympathetic, because they are doing something wrong regardless of any guilt they might feel. I guess I'm starting to repeat myself though. I'll just conclude by saying that I still don't think the intent was to present this character as sympathetic. If you perceive him as "a twerp" why wouldn't G/B/K also be aware he came across that way, or Elvis? At minimum, I think their intent was to present him ambiguously, rather than in a romanticized way.

Or perhaps... this is a song about Elvis' character smothering his girlfriend with a pillow. That's why he keeps repeating "sleep my love" at the end of the song. She just refuses to die!

 

I like the 'smothering his girlfriend with a pillow' idea - it makes it sound like something from Nick Cave's Murder Ballads album!

 

That is pretty spot on IMO. Elvis spent years as one of entertainment's most eligible bachelors. I'm sure the sneaking off thing did hit close to home if y'all catch my drift. I'm sure that quite a few of the women he dated had a more than passing interest in a relationship with him.

 

CATCHING UP FAST...

I Got Lucky (Candem) ... No real interest for me. Flooding the market with tons of Elvis albums was no good strategy in my opinion. They were cheap? Yes. Does it show? Yes. (Artwork, content and all.)

IT'S ONLY LOVE ... It had that Soul sound and feeling to become a classic but it did not. I bet that if Presley had recorded it 1 or 2 years earlier, it would have been a hit. But in 1971, Elvis had some straining issues with his voice: it sounds like it takes him too much effort to reach its full potential. The song itself is not bad at all, it's just that Elvis is not 100% into it. And it shows. IT'S ONLY LOVE was still a success in the UK in 1980 IIRC (#3).
THE SOUND OF YOUR CRY ... This case is the opposite: the song is not very good but Elvis gives it all. I for one prefer the alternate take on the "Nashville Marathon" (FTD): I love his voice at the beginning when he says "I'll leave 'cause I can't stand to see you hurt this way" as he really sounds like in the early 60's. Problem is that the "SLEEEEP MY LOOOOOVE" chorus always cracks me up: impossible for his lover to sleep with such repetitive shouts! Anyway, a far cry (hahaa!) from his best singles.

 

O Come All Ye Faithful
Written By :
Arranged by Elvis Presley

Recorded :
RCA's Studio B, Nashville, May 15-21, 1971: May 16, 1971. take 1

We have a sparse arrangement to start the album, just the piano and the singers. Almost like a carol's by candlelight situation.
It is very effective, but could really be anybody at this stage. Then we get the kick drum come in and some stings. We get some high female singing with a counterpoint type feel.
This is a reverent redo, and works quite well, and although Elvis is not the complete focus, we can tell it is seventies Elvis via the arrangement.
Actually the arrangement is quite interesting, being such a well known standard, it does have somewhat of a new identity.

 

The First Noel
Written By :
Arranged by Elvis Presley

Recorded :
RCA's Studio B, Nashville, May 15-21, 1971: May 16, 1971.

We have the organ intro, then we get a lone Elvis vocal, and it is reverent and quite sweet. The backing singers join the chorus, and it is a quite a nice version. This song even more recalls a carol's by candlelight situation.
I can't help but think of carol's by candlelight when going through Christmas songs, because as a kid I loved that night of the year. It was nice being around a bunch of people singing together, and even if it was just a facade, the idea of people actually being nice around one another was somewhat of a comfort to me, that the world wasn't a complete crapfest.

 

There are three takes on the Good Times FTD, with the third being marked "undubbed master." It doesn't say anything about a composite or splice. Is this an error?

 

Well to be quite honest and accurate, according to Ernst Jorgensen, this LP actually sold quite well during it's first two Christmas seasons, accumulating sales of over four hundred thousand (400k) copies initially, so no doubt it definitely went gold during Elvis's lifetime, but probably pushed it to platinum after Elvis' passing.

In my honest opinion, it's actually quite baffling that Elvis' best-selling Lp's are Christmas and Gospel albums. I mean, what the hell, "Elvis' Golden Records" still sitting at six times Platinum, not only my favorite Elvis album but this album should be double Diamond.

 

It's not an error but on the released version the ending of the song was looped. I don't know why they did it because the unedited version is just as long as the released version. When Our Memories of Elvis was released in 1979, they removed the looped part making the song about 20 seconds shorter.

 

OK, bear with me here.... what if.... just what if.... the protagoinist of the song is.... wait for it.... the guy from Kentucly Rain a few years after 'that' incident? Mind blown, I know.

 

And then after they get back together AGAIN, the story continues with Softly As I Leave You.

 

This is now my head canon.

 

Turnabout is fair play?

 

I agree with your assessment of the single. Elvis could have done a sharper job vocally on the A side a year earlier. Here we are only taking about a difference of one year. I have also wondered before what some of his later 70s songs, like Burning Love or Moody Blue, might have sounded like if recorded in 69 or 70.

 

O Come All Ye Faithful - I quiote like this version. There's a few interesting twists musicall (love the drum beat that comes in at 2:06), the string counterpoints and the parts where they play against tempo, and yes, the bombast.

The First Noel - fantastic organ intro, great retro sound (although in 1971 it wasn't retro!). A reveverent version, and in some ways I can almost hear Elvis in his 1957/58 voice doing a similar arrangement.

 

I never thought I would see the day when there was a discussion about the lyrical interpretation of The Sound of Your Cry!

 

Just brilliant! You made my morning. The thread was in dire need of some humor after our deep analysis of The Sound Of Your Cry and My Boy. I almost spit my coffee back out after reading this for the first time. Just hilarious, my friend.

 

In general, I like Christmas music and I like this album.

Title/lyric-wise OCAYF makes a good opening for the album. Elvis and the Imperials sound good together. I like the drums which add a little rock and roll to this old hymn. I don't care for all of the strings. Would like to try a listen with some or all of them removed. Overall, beautifully done.

 

Once again I like Elvis and the Imperials together. I like that there are few overdubs. Just pure Elvis and the quartet singing with a minimal accompaniment. (With a little Millie Kirkham in there too.) Yes, Elvis' 1971 voice wavers some, but it's still good to me.

 

I am both surprised and delighted that both of these fine gentlemen appreciate why Elvis's unique version of O Come All Ye Faithful is so special and glorious. I know a lot of fans are going to praise some of the highly regarded bluesy tracks like Merry Christmas Baby on this holiday album, but as @czeskleba has previously pointed out in his stellar post on the merits of TWWOC; It is the sheer variety of country, pop, blues and MOR that make this album stand out among so many iconic Christmas albums.

Shawn really nails why the brilliant arrangement by Glen Spleen works so well for this warhorse of a Christmas Carol. I assumed incorrectly for many years that the arranger for O Come All Ye Faithful was Bergen White as it has all the same elements that he used on Elvis's grandiose version of Bridge Over Troubled Water. You have a sparse arrangement at the beginning with just a piano and some voices as @mark winstanley points out in his post and than the song slowly builds with that kick ass drum announcing that something bigger is soon to come. The strings are simply magnificent too as they swirl in and out of the arrangement. There are a bazillion fantastic versions of O Come All See Faithful, from Bing Crosby to Nat King Cole's great take on his iconic The Christmas Song album, but Elvis's truly unique take of the often recorded classic is one of my two or three favorite versions ever.

I like Elvis's reverential version of The First Noel well enough for all the reasons already cited by everybody else, but I do always find it a little perplexing that Elvis's voice gets completely drowned out by the stellar background choir during the chorus.