The Times of Our Lives: August 16, 1977 ... Elvis ... and Heartbreak Hotel....

Elvis Presley in his 1968 Comeback Special,
reproduced here for informational/educational purposes only,
citing "fair use" provisions of applicable U.S. Copyright Law

Well, since my baby left me,
Well, I've found a new place to dwell
Well, it's down at the end of Lonely Street
At Heartbreak Hotel....

In 1956, a true, culture-bending/shattering phenomenon burst onto the American music scene. His name was Elvis Presley ... a poor boy from poverty-stricken Tupelo, Mississippi, transplanted to Memphis, Tennessee ... and he would be a major factor in altering the face and tenor (no pun intended) of American music, and the relationship of kids, adolescents, to their own brand of music, actually a new concept ... forever.

Some have posited that the Beatles had the most profound effect on the world of music in the 20th Century ... but I must respectfully disagree. There was nothing like Elvis ... before or since ... nothing like the absolute liberation and joy and sense of unfettered abandon and all the possibilities and dreams he brought to our music and our lives.

Some may contend That's All Right Mama and Blue Moon of Kentucky, recorded under the aegis of the legendary Sam Phillips at Sun Records studios in Memphis on July 5, 1954 were the true rhythmic harbingers of the coming youthquake. Others wax absolutely rhapsodic over the nuances and influence of Mystery Train and I Forgot to Remember to Forget, recorded at Sun July 11, 1955 and released in December of that year. Aficionados or specialists in Elvisiana will hold that "the (once and forever) King" first impacted the national consciousness in a significant way with the releases of his cover of Big Mama Thornton's Hound Dog and Don't Be Cruel, recorded at RCA Studios in New York City and released in July 1956.

But IMHO ... in my memory and my judgment and personal preference ... Elvis was forever seared into the folds of our collective brains, engendering a mass media mindmeld, with the release of the hot, heavy, mournful but edgy, sexually charged Heartbreak Hotel, recorded at RCA Studios in Nashville and released in January 1956. (I must add here that I've always been very fond of Lawdy, Miss Clawdy, released by RCA in August 1956 ... which my brother Scott, all of five years old at the time, used to wail in a pretty good imitation of Elvis while "strumming" a tennis racquet at the Saturday morning Birthday Club talent competitions at the Palace Theater. Some of you will remember.... But I digress ... for the moment....)

Those smoldering, piercing eyes ... that curling, promissory yet cautionary lip ... those unbelievable hips rolling and those legs shaking as if they were somehow separate entities from his body ... all seemed to explicitly guarantee that this mad, bad and dangerous man would indeed take you down a honky-tonk road to that hotel for the broken and the broken-hearted ... that you would gladly take the ride ... and that you would love the trip ... if possibly poetically and tragically regretting it later when your seducer had moved on to new conquests.

I was nine years old when Elvis "hit" with the 1956 records (I would turn 10 in October of that year, just before he wiped us out again with the release of Love Me Tender in November) ... and yet he spoke to me ... and to my friends ... in a visceral, primordial language ... and we felt the power, even if we couldn't have articulated very well then just exactly what it was we felt.

Until the day she died in 1983 (also in a relatively young ... age 56 ... tragic, needless, substance-abuse related death), my mother never tired of telling the story of how that one year ... 1956 ... only one of several that the girls and I participated in Camp Fire Girls ... that one year that mother and Neysa Davenport (Pat's mother) decided to sponsor our troop ... that one year of maternal sacrifice on her part ... just had to be the ELVIS YEAR. (As if it had been preternaturally and specifically arranged that way as a personal affront to her and her intermittent, fitful motherly instincts....) It frustrated mother and Neysa to no end that they could not, despite dire threats and wheedling entreaties, get us to work on Camp Fire projects ... all we wanted to do was listen/dance to Elvis Presley records. I don't even have to close my eyes to visualize all of us now, in our Camp Fire blue skirts and white blouses and neck scarves, dancing dancing dancing to record after record, and then repeating and repeating the records, in Pat's living room ... and mother and Neysa pleading with us to please turn off the record player and come work on our scrapbooks, or whatever. I am not exaggerating this ... Yahn heard my mother tell the story many, many times ... always in the same tones of aggrieved consternation and disapproval, tinged ever so reluctantly with a subtle acknowledgment of the overwhelming nature of the Presley mystique.

My grandmother was 56 when Elvis initially appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show. (I think it is worth noting here that in early 1956, Sullivan stated unequivocally: "I wouldn't have Presley on my show at any time" ... before introducing Elvis to his audience for the first time on October 28, 1956.) I think my grandmother developed a bit of an innocent, matronly crush on Elvis. I know she always liked him after that original cropped-at-the-waist outing ... always called him "that sweet boy" ... always made time to watch when he was a guest on someone's TV program, or later in his televised specials including the black leather "Comeback Special" in 1968 ... and the Elvis: That's the Way It Is documentary special released November 11, 1970 ... and the Aloha from Hawaii special in 1973.

My grandmother, who lived almost two years after Elvis died, was saddened by his untimely demise ... and despite his much-publicized problems in the years before and after his death, she always retained a soft spot for "that sweet boy" ... always enjoyed the special magic of his music.

In many ways, my grandmother was a "better" Elvis fan than I, certainly more constant, because I somewhat condescendingly put him aside when he was no longer as "hot" ... or "cool" ... as he once was ... after a string of truly egregious movies negotiated by his manager, the wannabe "Colonel" Tom Parker (ne Andreas Cornelis Dries van Kuijk) ... after a string of marginal and downright bad records ... but Mamaw remained steadfast in her appreciation for him.

It was with Mamaw that I sat down to watch the 1968 special ... and found myself captivated once again by the sheer talent and inimitable musical styling ... the sight of that black leather, and that bad-boy hair and hunka-hunka snarling lip, that promise of danger and the unknown ... that seminal rebirth combining pop and gospel music, and including the wistful Memories, as well as the moving and hopeful If I Can Dream ... which was actually substituted for the more wonderful and now standard I'll Be Home for Christmas.

It was after I "came back" that I developed enough maturity and compassion to look at the man as well as the stratospheric/Stygian career ... to celebrate and acknowledge the undeniable talent (and yes, he was sui generis) while beginning to comprehend how the pain inside him helped drive him to the heights he attained and the depths he plumbed ... without the mental or emotional supports he needed to navigate the rocky terra incognita of fame.

Oh, although it's always crowded,
You still can find some room
For broken-hearted lovers
To cry there in their gloom....

[Sidebar: There was one bit removed from the "comeback special" which was deemed too risque by NBC network censors ... a segment set in a bordello featuring a pretty much unknown song titled Let Yourself Go.... Though the first airing of the Burbank recording sessions comprising the "comeback special" aired in December, only one seasonal song, the haunting and truly classic Blue Christmas, was included ... and that was replaced when the show was rerun in 1969. Further, it is worth noting that some believe the "comeback special" was the model for the later MTV series Unplugged....]




Elvis in 1970, reproduced here citing "fair use" provisions of U.S. Copyright Law


If anyone is interested in a complex, thorough analysis of Elvis and his career and his music, I recommend Peter Guralnik's wonderfully researched and written duo Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley (published in 1994, and the better of the two books, IMHO) dealing with Elvis's early career, and Careless Love: The Unmaking of Elvis Presley (published in 1999), chronicling the later, darker side of his life ... both much better, more factual and more insightful than some of the scurrilous and self-serving biographies of so-called friends and/or the "Memphis Mafia" which have been written for selfish (largely pecuniary) reasons.

Of the day Elvis died ... August 16, 1977 ... I am sure there are many in our class ... our generation ... generations either side of ours ... who can tell you where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news (although it was certainly not in the same category as the JFK assassination on a "shock and horror" level). I was in my office, drafting a presentation for submission to a governmental regulatory authority, listening to the radio as I did throughout my working life (which is one reason it was always helpful to have my own office ... grin) when the announcer interrupted the record to say that Elvis was dead.

As is usual in such moments (the death of Marilyn Monroe August 5, 1962 springs readily to mind), the initial reaction was complete and total disbelief. No way!!! Not Elvis!!!! (Nor Marilyn, nor....) He was young! He was an absolute icon! He was part of our lives and our youth! He was Elvis, for god's sake ... therefore ipso facto immortal!!! If he could die, we could die!!! It simply could not happen!!!! (And under no possible imagined scenario could the King have died falling off the toilet after a drug-induced cardiac arrest ... how gross!!! ... but we would have to wrap our heads around that later....)

Now, the bellhop's tears keep flowin',
And the desk clerk's dressed in black
Well, they been so long on Lonely Street
They'll never ever look back....

While many of us may not have felt ... or come to feel ... the identification and affinity with Elvis that others of us did ... I would still speculate that there is at least one Elvis song (and probably more) which resonates individually with the majority of us in the Class of 1963 ... and the Class of 1962, and 1964, and other years ... which threads through the intricate tapestry of our memories and reveries and dreamscapes ... that there is at least one song rendered in that honeyed, melting caramel-smooth, stroking-stoking voice ... at least one song that compels you to recall kissing your girl or guy for the first time ... for the last time ... for a long time ... that you got engaged, or broke up, or yearned for someone to get engaged to or break up with ... in other words, there is at least one Elvis song ... somewhere, over all the years of his remarkable career ... that meant something in your life.

And I would wager that you will all think of that one song which is special to you ... or more than one, if applicable ... during the televised shots and stories this weekend from Graceland, at the culmination of another Elvis Week in Memphis, a true American cultural happening that has taken root in the years since Elvis's death ... arguably making him a bigger star ... and inarguably making him richer ... in death than he ever was in life.

Elvis week ... and particularly August 16 ... is always unusually difficult for me. Not only do I have all the cultural, aural baggage and touchstones which weigh on me with regard to the King ... not only is Elvis a formerly living, breathing and now real gone allegory for many of the problems which have beset our generation ... but there are more personal connections and memories which are triggered for me as well. My brother Scott ... my only blood sibling ... a talented musician in his own right, a singer with a strong voice and a "magic" understanding of how to play many musical instruments ... brought to grief and premature death by immaturity and substance abuse and addiction, as was Elvis ... also died on August 16 ... in 1981 ... at the age of 31.

Scott played and sang with bands around the Childress area for years, but despite a couple of efforts was never able to break away from that area of the Panhandle and the bonds which tied him there to seek a wider audience. Some of you (I know some of my friends) heard him play and sing and knew that he had a special talent ... perhaps not as incandescent and otherworldly as Elvis's ... nevertheless, a true talent for music.

I loved Scott very much, despite the usual cliched sibling rivalry ... but he was in many ways a sad, tragic figure ... and I really had not-unwarranted (valid, as it turned out) concerns about his prospects for surviving to middle age. Nevertheless, when he died, it was a complete shock and surprise ... ultimately mystical, in truth, and perhaps ordained as the universe is sometimes wont to do such things, as Scott's death (and relative, relevant occurrences) helped set me firmly on the metaphysical path that I have traveled since, where I believe I am meant to go. But that is another story ... and I digress....



Elvis in the Aloha from Hawaii special, 1973,
reproduced here citing "fair use" provisions of U.S. Copyright Law


The deaths of Elvis ... and Scott ... did help teach me ... solidify in my mind ... one of life's greatest lessons, which has been articulated several ways by different people, but I will posit thusly: Don't judge anyone else ... how they've lived or died ... until you have literally walked that metaphoric mile in their shoes ... inside their head ... until the same demons which may have been their frequent companions are on a first-name basis with you. Otherwise you lack understanding ... comprehension ... empathy and compassion ... anything which might possibly and broadly be construed as giving you any sort of right to judge someone else. As a historically-noted Jewish carpenter with a vision is said to have taught: Judge not lest ye be judged....

Well, if your baby leaves you
You got a tale to tell
Just take a walk down Lonely Street
To Heartbreak Hotel

Where you will be
You'll be so lonely, baby
Well, you'll be lonely
You'll be so lonely you could die....

Today ... August 16 ... once again I will listen to the radio and the ubiquitous Elvis tributes ... and I will watch the television news programs do their stories featuring Elvis Week and the annual candlelight ceremony at Graceland ... and I will let the music and the feelings wash over me, and through me, and carry me to someplace outside myself for just a little while ... and I'll think of long, long ago when I was young and hopeful and not too cynical ... and of a sometimes confused man-boy who yearned for and sang about and knew of love, and loss, and need, and the quest for the perfect complementary soul ... and I will remember ... mostly the good things, because I think if we are wise these are the memories we choose, and not the ones of crushing, crippling sadness....

I wish you good memories this weekend ... even if they sometimes bring a quick, illuminating, purifying tear ... and every other day....

)O(