I don't have this one yet, but was listening to the American Sound 1969 Highlights this week (RSD from last year) and I must say, I kept mentally filling in the missing background singers on almost all of the tracks. Also, what it sounded like to me at least, is that the songs were recorded with all the "additional" parts in mind. There are quite a few instrumental "in between" sections that are just crying out for something... On older recordings from the early - mid sixties, there would always be some fill or solo in those parts, here they're just "empty".. So, I'm a bit apprehensive about this one..
Not much of a song, but I think it works great without the horns, which I always think were too loud in the stereo mixes.
Good point. My earlier point was a sloppy generalization but I think there is still something to be said about the results Elvis and the band approved of on the day of, in the recording studio. He may have expected strings, horns and background vocals to fill in the gaps later but the product they made in the studio right then there with just themselves is pretty significant in my opinion. Anyway, not trying to rewrite history just trying to look at it from a different angle.
The new production makes the song tougher and dare I say rock harder. The song never did it for me before except maybe the live version on a good day but this version hits all the right buttons now.
As someone who has actually written liner notes on a couple of RCA reissues for Real Gone Music, I find the liner notes pretty interesting and compelling, particularly the section by David Cantwell. I do not in any way or fashion want to tread into the Chips vs. Felton debate that has been beaten to death here previously on these fine Elvis threads. However, I will say that I don't personally read Ernst's liner notes as some sort of veiled criticism of Chips Moman, who he has spoken of very highly in the past. Ernst has two passages below that directly relate to the two respective recording sessions: As RCA's management wasn't enthralled with the idea of Elvis recording at a third-party recording studio like American Sound in Memphis, Felton managed to bring Elvis back to his home base in Nashville and escape the complication of Chips Moman at the same time. In the above quote, Ernst is clearly talking about the perspective of RCA and Felton Jarvis, and I don't think there is any direct criticism of Moman intended. He is merely recounting how and why Elvis ended up back in Nashville. As we all know the issue was complicated and involved a host of parties with separate interests, including Marty Lacker, Chips, Tom Parker and Felton himself. The liner notes are trying to make the case that the Nashville recordings were a successful and significant session, and they were certainly no place to go into detail regarding the whole controversy of why Elvis did not return to the very talented hands of Chips Moman. There is another quote that could be interpreted as a slight to Moman, but I do not read it that way, especially since it was coming from Ernst, and it really was his best effort to explain the working difference between the two producers in getting what they wanted out of Elvis and the musicians. I would argue that Elvis became the de facto working producer of the Nashville sessions in 1970 by the way and not Jarvis. No more grueling 22 takes of "In The Ghetto" or 23 of "You'll Think Of Me" - a live approach to the recording process was chosen as opposed to Chips more modern procedure of just cutting basic tracks and do repairs and overdubs later. Now once again, I do not believe that Ernst is making a definitive statement here about which technique actually yielded better results for Elvis. He is just giving you the lowdown of how different it was between the two sessions. I would argue that Chip's modern technique was actually the superior one, but he also had better original material at his disposal for Elvis to record at the American Sound sessions in 1969. Yes, 22 grueling takes is sometimes what Elvis wanted earlier in his career, but if something really touched him, as his cover of Bridge Over Troubled Water certainly did, he was willing to work at it until he got it right. Other times he liked the spontaneity of working out an arrangement quickly with the musicians and letting perfection scatter in the wind. The last technique was used most often during the Nashville sessions, and provided some great highlights, as well as a few mediocre performances.
I’m not sure I completely understood how Sony was going to present this material, but holy crapballs is this a tremendously fun set. It’s like listening to many of these tracks for the first time. It’s jumped into my three favorite Elvis sets.
Mine has just arrived, and I look forward to listening to at least disc 1 tonight. I don't mind that the packaging matches A Boy From Tupelo, but the discs will be going into sleeves, and the folder that has the discs is pretty boring IMO.
I picked up on the same thing. Ernst has always tried to be fair to Jarvis and not dwell on his arguable deficiencies as a producer. Obviously Jarvis was dealing with a difficult artist by 1971, and because professionally he became exclusively reliant on Elvis, he found himself in a difficult position where he was limited with how much he could challenge Elvis, ultimately becoming another one of Elvis' sycophants. These Nashville sessions were arguably the pinnacle of his work with Elvis, with his role less prominent during the How Great Thou Art sessions that he technically helmed (most Presley enthusiasts and historians acknowledge that Elvis managed and produced his gospel session work). Ernst simply tries to differentiate between the two styles of Moman and Jarvis, that in the end, Ernst believes delivered similar artistic results (while acknowledging that the 1970 sessions did not have the luxury of the same hit material). That is where I differ from Ernst on this subject. I think Jarvis actually tried to emulate what was achieved at American, from trying to secure similar adult contemporary songs, to embellishing the recordings with similar post-production arrangements. And why wouldn't he? It was a successful formula. The problem was that Jarvis was not Chips Moman in both skill and directing the session work, nor did he have access to the same quality of material. Furthermore, as fantastic as the Nashville musicians were (including the addition of Burton on guitar), they weren't the American Sound band. There was no way to truly emulate the formula. The "country" album fell into Jarvis' lap, largely because Elvis insisted on recording some of that material in an off-the-cuff fashion. In the end, Elvis had much more latitude in Nashville, and really co-produced the session work because he largely did what he wanted. It worked. One time. This approach to recording never yielded the relative consistency of these results again.
I think you make a very salient point here that is hard to dispute. How could Jarvis not be influenced by the success of the American Sound recordings? He was definitely following the formula that Chips Moman had established in Memphis, despite the fact that his previous work with Elvis preceded those studio recordings.
Moody Blue was the third album of Elvis's that I bought in a row and helped to make Elvis my very favorite male singer. I loved both of the double sided hit singles, but his live version of Unchained Melody just blew me away and sealed the deal.
I love that album. While people were listening to Darkness on The Edge of Town, I had Moody Blue on constantly. I just love the whole thing, he kills She Thinks I Still Care.
Darkness On The Edge of Town is a tremendous rock album, arguably one of Springsteen's top five albums and one of his greatest artistic achievements. I would hardly place the slapdash Moody Blue album in the same category. Moody Blue is half an album, with the rest of its content compiled in a desperate manner to fill it out and meet a contractual obligation. Had Moody Blue not been the final album released prior to Elvis' death, it is highly unlikely it would have sold over a million copies when the average figure moved by Elvis post-1970 was a couple hundred thousand per album (Aloha and As Recorded At Madison Square Garden being the exceptions). It became a sentimental favorite for obvious reasons, but it hardly represents Elvis' best work.
It's quite funny that you mention Elvis's cover of Little Darlin' because I was really familiar with The Diamonds' version, who had the original hit. My father, who was the PD for the Mighty 690 in San Diego, CA from 1958 to 1961, loved those rock 'n' roll groups from the 50's and part of their charm was their funny phrasing and somewhat silly lyrics. In that sense, Elvis got his cover version about right, as it seemed to me it was done with a wink and a nod. While I think it was a shame that Elvis never got to that final recording session in Nashville in 1977 that would have surely helped fill out that Moody Blue album with stronger studio material, Elvis's cover of Little Darlin's always made me chuckle a bit. I think that Elvis was in on the joke, but I am not sure that all of his fans were to say the very least.
That is great, you are entitled to prefer Moody Blue. With respect to vocal work, Springsteen was never known as a great vocalist in the traditional sense like Elvis. That is not why his work resonated with the public (although Springsteen's vocals were perfect for expressing his work). Could Elvis write a song like Springsteen? Of course not. We are talking about two very different artists. It is a silly comparison on that level. And it should be noted, Elvis' vocal work had deteriorated quite a bit by 1976 -- the Moody Blue album does not represent Elvis' best work, not even close.
As you know, Little Darlin' was included on the album out of desperation. It wasn't any sort of artistic statement. Jarvis could not get Elvis to commit to finish recording the album, so he took a 4-track recorder on the spring 1977 tour in hopes of capturing something unique or new that he could include on the album due to RCA. Elvis didn't rehearse or prepare in any manner, so Jarvis was simply gambled that he might capture something. He ended up with a raw Unchained Melody that required considerable overdubbing and vocal augmentation, a pedestrian cover of If You Love Me (Let Me Know), and the ridiculous Little Darlin'. Even if you find it charming, I think we can agree the latter track had no business being on a mainstream commercial album in 1977. And while Elvis may have found the song and its arrangement fun and a bit of joke in concert, it also raises the question, why was Elvis promoting such material when he had hundreds of quality songs from his own catalogue that he continued to ignore on the concert stage?
I am not too sure that Elvis was drawing his concert setlist based on marketing or label considerations in 1977. I believe he only attempted a live concert version of the title song and hit number one country single, Moody Blue, one or two times, and I believe it wasn't satisfactorily completed, IIRC. Elvis made no attempts at a live version of his future number one single Way Down either, despite it being a terrific new original song. Elvis did sing Hurt a ton of times, but that was an old cover song of Roy Hamilton's that showed off Elvis's vocal power and range, and he instinctively knew it was an absolute showstopper (He would also often do a reprise of the ending in his live concert versions). Elvis never attempted a live version of the flip side of the single, For The Heart, either, despite it being an original song written by Burning Love tunesmith Dennis Linde.
Clearly Elvis wasn't constructing his setlist based on marketing or label considerations in 1977. For the most part, he had been parading the same tired formula for several years. My point was he invested way too much of his set-lists during the 1970s with music and hits by other artists, rather than presenting his own deep catalogue of music. For example, two Olivia Newton-John songs in one concert? There was a lot of depth in his catalogue, and he essentially ignored most of it. Little Darlin'? Think of the dozens and dozens of high quality songs from his own catalogue he could have performed in its place -- and I would argue 99% of the audience would have preferred hearing a Presley standard or Presley album cut over the Little Darlin' parody and covers of Olivia Newton-John and Perry Como. He really could have delivered a much more compelling live show.
