Best track on "From Elvis in Memphis" LP 1969

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Best track on "From Elvis in Memphis" LP 1969

Poll ended at Thu Oct 25, 2007 10:11 pm

Wearin' That Loved On Look
3
12%
Only The Strong Survive
1
4%
I'll Hold You In My Heart (Till I Can Hold You In My Arms)
0
No votes
Long Black Limousine
6
24%
I'm Movin' On
0
No votes
Power Of My Love
0
No votes
Gentle On My Mind
3
12%
True Love Travels On A Gravel Road
2
8%
Any Day Now
5
20%
In The Ghetto
5
20%
 
Total votes: 25


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Best track on "From Elvis in Memphis" LP 1969

Post by dreambear »

Hi again!

The time has finally come to take a look at the album that scares me most....because to remove two tracks here takes on my nerves. This is also the album which seems easiest to play to the average music listener. It has grown old very gracefully, with the exception of some of the stereo mixes, which was popular at the time (try "Abbey road" if you like some left channel drums...). One track is easy to remove for me: "It keeps right on a hurtin´". Perhaps it´s because of my swedish pair of ears, but that track doesn´t move me at all. The second track is almost impossible to cut out. "I´ll hold you in my heart", "I´m movin´ on" and "After loving you" is quite simple tunes, but Elvis´ vocal delivery on the first one is incredible. I love when the voice cracks up after "The stars upon the sky, you know..." "I´m movin´ on is a fun track and the bass playing is outstanding. This means that "After loving you" has to leave. The other tracks is a splendid mix of soul, country (May I dare to call "Gentle on my mind" countryfunk in this arrangement?), gospel, R & B and pop. The obvious hit here is of course "In the ghetto" but I have at least 4 tracks on this album that I prefer: "Wearin´ that loved on look", "Gentle on my mind, "Long black limousine" and "Any day now". The last one has that marvellous falsetto singing. But the dark feeling of "Long black limousine" is outstanding. And again his voice cracks up in sheer passion. It deserves a standing ovation, or at least my vote.

This album is my favourite studio LP by Elvis with "Is back", "Elvis Presley" and "Elvis Country" as other favourites.

Keep the votes coming!

By the way, this poll is especially dedicated to Joern... :wink:



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Post by drjohncarpenter »

This is a near-perfect album. How can anyone choose a track? The shock and awe that fans must have felt upon hearing this LP must have been overwhelming, it is THAT great a release. Even "Rolling Stone" gave it an incredible review -- I think from the pen of Peter Guralnick -- so much for lambasting the hippie generation.


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Suspicious Minds
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Post by Suspicious Minds »

I voted for Anyday Now. My favourite B Side track.


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Rob

Post by Rob »

In The Ghetto



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Post by Little Darlin »

A VERY Hard choice Dreambear. This Album is one I go back to time and time again.

Just LOVE His Voice on My most Favourite track .. Wearin' that Loved on Look.


I saw Elvis live in concert the year before he died. Even then, he was bigger than life, and had amazing charisma. Haven't seen anything like it since, ....until Adam.........Nocturnal 2010
No matter how old you are, no matter who you sleep with, no matter what color your skin is, we can all party together.” - Adam Lambert 2010


Rob

Post by Rob »

Only The Strong Survive



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Post by Little Darlin »

LOL!

Any Day Now


I saw Elvis live in concert the year before he died. Even then, he was bigger than life, and had amazing charisma. Haven't seen anything like it since, ....until Adam.........Nocturnal 2010
No matter how old you are, no matter who you sleep with, no matter what color your skin is, we can all party together.” - Adam Lambert 2010

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Post by Cryogenic »

Impossible to choose one. If the singles were included, I'd give the honour to "Suspicious Minds" -- one of the greatest recordings in Presley's career. As things stand, I can only repeat myself: it's too difficult.




Rob

Post by Rob »

Power Of My Love



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Post by dreambear »

Yes, almost impossible to choose. But if you look at the stars in the sky, some stars shine more brightly than others...eehh. Some of you guys will probably ask what I have smoked..? :D



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Post by bajo »

I'm with Doc on this one! All the songs on the album are on my favourite list. Each song has grown on me over the years. And it is such that I tend to pick out a track now and then and play it to death!


"If you love me let me know, if you don't, ....move it!"

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Post by Mike Eder »

I picked Gentle. Such a great atmosphere on it. Along with Elvis Is Back, and the Gospel LP's I think it is Elvis best sixties studio album.


Mike Eder

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Post by jeanno »

Only the strong survive is the one for me.



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Post by jeanno »

Doc, here is the review from Peter Guralnick (Rolling Stone) :

"Elvis and Memphis have changed, along with everything else. Country music has been polysyllabized, and rhythm and blues, which was once just that, has long since dropped the blues from its make-up. When Elvis was in high school he could have heard Muddy Waters' "Long Distance Call" or "Honey Bee" as popular new releases, Sonny Boy Williamson's "Don't Start Me to Talkin" came out at just about the same time as Elvis' own first song. Sam Phillips, Elvis' discoverer, had in the course of just a few years recorded Howlin' Wolf, Bobby Bland, little Junior Parker, Johnny Ace and B.B. King, all for the first time. Some records has been leased; others had appeared on his own Sun label. There was a relaxed interplay - musical and probably social - between white and black that was the product as much naivete as of conscious commercial exploitation.
When Elvis first recorded fifteen years ago there was no name for the kind of music he was playing. It was just the sort of thing you heard at roadhouses and country fairs all through Mississippi, Arkansas and Tennessee. Country singers like Sonny Burgess were known for raucous blues like "Red Headed Woman" and Harmonica Frank, The Great Medical Menagerist recorded by Phillips, was popular for his blues and novelty numbers. All of this was at Elvis' fingertips, and he couls sing Arthur Crudup's "That's All Right" as naturally as "Isle of broken Dreams" or "My Happiness" (the song he originally paid to record for his mothers birthday).

Elvis' first commercial release, Crudup's blues backed by Bill Monroe bluegrass tune, changes everything. For one thing, it changed Sun Records. From a white-owned Blues label which might have given the Chess brothers (to whom much of Phillips' material was leased) stiff competition Sun became first the harbinger and then the king of the new rockabilly sound. It's generally been assumed that the phenomenal commercial success of this music reflected a correspondent deterioration in quality, but I think that it in reality no such decline took place. In just three years Phillips put together a list that could rival that of another recording company in any other field. There was room for the talents of artists as diverese as Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, Charlie Rich, Billy Riley, Warren Smith, Johnny Cash, and Elvis himself, and really the only conclusion to which we are led is that Phillips was a man of exceptional and wide-ranging musical taste who possessed extraordinary abilities as a producer.

Dewey Phillips, a popular Memphis DJ with a big rhythm and blues following, broke Elvis' song on the radio, and according to legend the station was flooed with calls demanding that song to be played over and over again. Elvis himself hid out in a movie theatre and at last appeared at Dewy Phillips' radio show to quiet the puplis uproar, and, at Phillips' prodding, to give assurence(in order to authenticate his color) that it was indeed all-white Humes High School that hids has attended. We listen to these accounts not with disbelief but with a kind of in comprehension, unable to imagine so electrifing a triumph, unable to recapture so revolutionary a moment. In those days Sonny Boy Williamson was on the radio broadcasting from West Helena, Arkansas with his King Biscuit Boys, who sometimes included Elmore James and B.B. King. Rufus "Bear Cat" Thomas, the novelty blues singer, was a regular DJ on WDIA - as he remains today - and it was just a couple of years before that Howlin' Wolf left his job at KWEM and went north to Chicago after five years of spinning records and selling fertilizer. It seems in retrospect like such a faboulous time - yet many of these same singers are still around, and Elvis is still on top.
The new album is great. I think it is flatly and unequivocally the equal of anything he has ever done. If it were made up only of its weakest elements it wouls still be a good record and one that would fulfill in many ways all the expectations we might have of Elvis.

"In the Ghetto",a hit big enough to substantiate Elvis' continued popularity, is for all its lush orchestration convincingly sung and pjhrased with sensitivity. It substantiates as well the whole liberal complex we grafted onto Elvis in adopting him for our hero, and despite a message fuzzy enough to allow the song considerable C&W popularity it gives us a statement as explicit as any we are ever likely to get. "Only The Strong Survive", while a little stiff and thightly sung, is a creditable soul offering, and even "Any Day Now" is palatable enough in this vein. Finally "Gentle On My Mind" offers us Elvis in the new mod buckskin image of country music, as he triumphs forcefully over the banality of the lyrics with the willingness to use dramatics, even at the risk of seeming melodramatic, and all this on a song that has previously been the property of singers like Glen Campbell and Bobby Goldsboro.

Most striking are the powerful evocations of an earlier style with "Power of My Love", a tough blues with a popular bridge, and "After Loving You", a stammered blues ballad very much like "One Night". Both have basic rock and roll accompaniment, both are marked by the boastful sexual swagger of the earlier days, and "After Loving You" is highlighted by what sounds like Elvis' own lowdown guitar (with the same runs that brought cries of "Play it dirty, play it dirty" on the TV special). "True Love Travels On A Gravel Road" gives us a well-written love ballad, eerily updated with scarcely a hint of the anachronistic style of "Love Me", "Love Me Tender", and "Loving You". It's put across in Elvis' best genteel manner, offering a glimpse af real sophistication while ar the same time "It Keeps Right on A-Hurtin'" and "Movin' On" are masterful reminders of country and western roots. "It Keeps Right On A-Hurtin'" showscases fine Jerry Lee Lewis-styled country piano, and "Movin' On", Hank Snow' driving classic, complete with whinning steel guitar, is nicely understated by Elvis' normally extravagant voice. Both cuts are marked by the same sensible arrangements which distinguish the greater part of the album, and both are vivid, highly successful performances.
All of this is merely confirmation of what we already knew about Elvis, through. What is new, and what is obvious from the first notes of the record, is the evident passion which Elvis has invested in this music and at the same time the risk he has taken in doing so. From the hoarse shout that opens the album to the hit song that closes it, it seems clear- as indeed it was clear on the TV special - that Elvis is trying, and trying very hard, to please us. he needs to have our attention, and it comes as something of a shock to discover that a hero whom we had set up to feel only existential scorn, a hero who was characterized by a frozen sneer and a look of sullen discontent should need us in the end. It is his involvement after all which comes as the surprise.


Many of the songs take their inspiration from gospel stylings. "Wearin' That Loved On Look" is very much in the gospel idiom, for example, with its strained hoarse vocal, ethereal female chorus, and the almost classic piano break in the middle. Both "Power of My Love" and "After Loving You" are sung with unmistakable feeling, with "After Loving You" in particular notable for its staggered gospel-type phrasing. Even the soul ballads, "Only the Strong Survive" and "Any Day Now", present an unashamed emotionalism that few of Elvis' golden hits would admit to achieve a kind of tension at least that is singularly absent from the earlier songs.
But it is "Long Black Limousine" and "I'll Hold You in My Heart" whick mark the high point og the album and indeed may mark the high point of Elvis' career to date. "Long Black Limousine" is the almostquintessential C&W ballad, whose melody bears traces of such mournful standards as "Old Shep" and "Green, Green Grass of Home". It tells the classic story of the country girl who goes to the city in search of riches, only to be corrupted by city ways:

When you left you know you told me
that someday you'd be returning
In a fancy car for all the town to see
Well now, everyone is watching you,
you've finally had your dream
And you're riding in a long black limousine
Ordinarily songs like this will be treated as a kind of grim cautionary tale, delivered in a flat unadorned voice with simple sentimental country backing. Here the accompaniment is ornamented with bells, horns, and female choir, but it is Elvis' voice upon which the words depend for their dramatic effect. In a departure quite uncharacteristic of country music, there is a feirce, almost shocked indignation in the voice, and the passionate intensity of Elvis' voice transforms a fairly ordinary song into a vehicle for savage social protest.

"I'll Hold You In My Heart (Till I Can Hold In My Arms)", an Eddy Arnold composition, is a simpler kind of song and a simpler kind of message. Here Elvis dispenses with words almost altogether, the arrangement is just country-gospel piano, stong supporting guitar, organ, and rhythm, and the message consists only of one or two verses repeated hypnotically over and over. The effect is allenveloping, though, and nothing could better exemplify the absorbing character of Elvis' unique and moving style. At the same time nothing could more effectively defy description, for there is nothing to the song expect a haunting, almost painful emotionalism. It goes on and on , long past the point where you would think it might logically have stpped as Elvis himself is seemingly caught up in the mesmerizing effect of words and rhythm until he is lost in the song, using the dynamics of his voice to marvelous effect, calling up an aching vulnerability which he has never before exposed. He doesn't let go of the song until he has wrung every last ounce of feeling from it, and listening to this performance is an absorbing, emotionally riveting experince. Elvis has never sung better.
And yet it's still not the same. There is that unavoidable tightness in his voice. For a moment we lose sight in "I'll Hold You In My Heart", but it's a function of knowledge as much as anything else. you can't recapture the innocent ease of those first sides, you can't recall the easy innocence of adulthood, whether for listener or for singer. What is so striking about the Sun sides, even today, fifteen years after their first release, is the freshness of style, their cleaness and enthusiasm. there is a total lack of pretentiousness in Scotty Moore's crisp lead guitar and in the easy swing of the combo. The sound is without affectation or clutter, and the songs - about equally didived between blues and country and mostly available on two RCA albums, A Date With Elvis (LPS 2011) and For LP Fans Only (LSP 1990) - are all of them timeless. most of all the voice, free of the mannerisms with which it has inevitably become infected, is joyously full of confidence and youthful vitality.

The first arrangement of "That's All Right", it is said, was worked out during a coffeebreak between takes of a ballad called "Without You". Really, all the early songs sound like some kind of inspired accident. It's as if some musicians got together and fooled arund to make music for themselves, and the result somehow found its way onto record. There's the unexpected falsetto and chuckle with which Little Junior Parker's "Mystery Train" trails off, the bubbly beginning to "Baby Let's Play House", and the too-perfect, beautiful slow take of Kokomo Arnold's "Milkcow Blues" when Elvis says, "Hold it, fellas. That don't move me. Let's get real, real gone for a change."


Well, he got gone. Sun sold his contract to RCA for $ 35.000 ."

Original link: http://www.dsr.kvl.dk/~jakobpo/album.htm



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Post by Suspicious Minds »

This is the original From Elvis In Memphis album not the remastered album. Wearin That Loved On Look and Power of My Love is the tracks I don't play that often. Everyone has their own favourite tracks on each album.


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Post by kuenzer »





Rob

Post by Rob »

Wearin' That Loved On Look




JerryNodak

Post by JerryNodak »

My favorite on this album bar none is "Long Black Limousine."



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Post by ColinB »

jeanno wrote:Doc, here is the review from Peter Guralnick (Rolling Stone) :

"...The first arrangement of "That's All Right", it is said, was worked out during a coffeebreak between takes of a ballad called "Without You"...
Not strictly true.

The attempts at Without You and the That's All Right session were separate occasions.


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Post by GIRL HAPPY BOY »

What a diamond LP ! just like the DOC said: how can we choose :shock:
i like every one of the songs
So...finally i pick: IN THE GHETTO !
perfect , perfect , perfect !!!
sincerely
LIOR B.




Rob

Post by Rob »

Gentle On My Mind



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kuenzer
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Post by kuenzer »

Rob wrote:Gentle On My Mind
What a coincidence! That's my favourite song as well!




Rob

Post by Rob »

I can't begin to tell you how warm and fuzzy that makes me feel.


It's only my favorite for the time being. It is such a great album that I can't make up my mind.



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Post by kuenzer »

Rob wrote:I can't begin to tell you how warm and fuzzy that makes me feel.
Isn't that why we are here in the first place?



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Post by dreambear »

Nice to see that "Gentle on my mind" is a favourite. I wrote earlier about the bass playing in "I´m movin´", but it´s terrific in this song too. The whole song is nicely arranged.

//Björn