The 2010 edition of the annual "Top 2000" chart - an all time greatest hits chart - featured 20 Elvis songs, with "Suspicious Minds" entering the Top-100 at #77 (#108 in 2009).
Elvis Scotty & Bill
The Charly label released the budget compilation "Elvis Scotty And Bill".
Good To Be BackThe Gravel Road import label continued the promotion of their new release "Good To Be Back".
From the press-release:
The December 13th, 1975 is widely accepted as one of the finest later-period Presley shows available on soundboard. Yes, the punk lounge rock feel of the ’69 shows was now gone, but in its place were a warmth and an intimacy that were just as captivating in their own way.
Our man was in top form vocally in late ’75 (just listen to his sensational vocals on ‘How Great Thou Art’), and the December 13th, ’75 Midnight Show stands out as one of the finest from this engagement. This show was the first soundboard to be released on bootleg back in ’91, causing quite a sensation at the time. The technology used for working on vintage recordings have improved greatly in the years since then, and Gravel Road has used the latest version of the renowned Oxford / ProTools technology to work on this show.
The results are it’s an obvious sound upgrade that makes this remarkable show shine that much more -- Just like you’ve come to expect from us with ‘Prodigy’. It’s also interesting to point out that this release is more complete than the aforementioned ’91 release (which had several edits).
‘Good To Be Back’ is a title that really captures the sentiment of the show, since Elvis clearly enjoyed being back on stage again following his August ’75 hospital stay and subsequent three months of rest. He’s relaxed and in a great mood, and he delivers several fantastic performances, with one of the highlights being a beautifully sung ‘Just Pretend’.
This new Gravel Road release is a true keeper. Presented in a stunning digi-pack with numerous photos from the actual show, memorabilia related to this engagement, intelligently written liner-notes packed in a 28 page booklet. As an extra, a special limited “Concert Tour ’75 Photo Folio” as it was available during the tours and Vegas shows in the 70's with some totally new color photos in high quality from the '75 Tours. This album is one of those rare releases that you just got to have.
It’s made with great professionalism and love for Elvis, and this shines through in every single detail of this release. ‘Prodigy’ was sold out within weeks of its release. Order ‘Good To Be Back’ now to avoid disappointment.
Elvis inductee - Gibson Revolutionary Hall of Fame
Gibson.com is pleased to present the inaugural class of the Gibson Revolutionary Hall of Fame. The Hall of Fame honors musical artists whose contributions went beyond mere entertainment and actually altered the art form, the business or the technology of popular music. This year’s inductees were chosen in a recent poll on Gibson.com, asking fans and pros to decide the Top 50 Most Revolutionary Artists of the Past 100 Years. The list of inductees is composed of the top five vote recipients from the readers poll, as well as the top five from the overall combined poll of fans and professionals. As there was some overlap between the lists, a total of seven artists have been honored. Today we celebrate one such honoree: Elvis Presley.
Anyone who’s ever said, “Elvis Presley had no right to sing the blues,” has no idea who he was or where he came from.
Born in a shotgun shack in Tupelo, Mississippi on January 8, 1935, with a stillborn twin the family named Jesse, Elvis Aaron Presley grew up in a family that lived paycheck to paycheck, on a good week. His father Vernon worked odd jobs when he could get them, but the Presleys still sometimes required help from the government and from their neighbors — particularly in 1938, when Vernon was jailed for passing a bad check and the family lost their modest home.
I mention all of this to give you a little background about this guy who “stole” blues and R&B music. You have to understand: the blues was all he had. When he entered the sixth grade at a new school in his predominantly African American neighborhood, he dragged his cheap little guitar to class nearly every day and — to paraphrase one of his later hits — his hunger burned.
Presley didn’t only grow up with rhythm and blues music. He was also raised with a healthy diet of gospel, courtesy of his mother Gladys. And there was always some old country music in the air, as well: Jimmie Rodgers, Hank Snow, Ernest Tubb and the like. All of these musical seeds took root in young Elvis and grew into something…something new.
Now Presley wasn’t the only one to marry blues, rhythm and blues, gospel and country, but he was certainly in that first wave – with Ray Charles, Jerry Lee Lewis and the rest. The thing Elvis brought to the table — which was evident when he launched into Arthur Crudup’s “That’s All Right, Mama” on that fateful night in Sam Phillips’ Sun Studios in 1954 — was an electric charisma and a voice. Man, that voice. Elvis Presley had that one-in-a-million, billion-dollar voice that could find equal shelter in a Sunday school choir or the dirtiest juke joint on Beale Street. Phillips saw (and heard) it — and fostered it. Put a killer band behind Elvis and let him be himself. Let him sing whatever song he wanted, no matter what side of the tracks it came from or what polite radio might think of it.
Who knows what rock would have been if it wasn’t for Elvis Presley. Maybe Chuck Berry and Little Richard could have broken through on talent alone. God knows they had plenty of it. But it’s very difficult to say whether it would have won such a complete and overarching victory over American — and world — culture. After Elvis it was, quite simply, a different planet.
Hail to the King!
(Source: ElvisMatters / Gibson / Elvis Club Berlin)
