Early January 2004
- Still a hit: Elvis, 69, gone but not forgotten
By Frank Cassidy
(Canberra Times, January 8 2004, p.8)
Elvis Presley turns 69 today and the millions who still love him tender will be all shook up celebrating the milestone. The fact that he died 26 years ago doesn't seem to faze the King's millions, trekking to his Graceland mansion by the thousands and holding dances, wakes and birthday parties all over the world in his posthumous honour.
In Canberra the celebrations will be low key, impersonator Garry Buckley saying past celebrations suffered from poor attendances as summer beaches and holidays intervened to lure the faithful away. "This is the first time we're not doing anything," Mr Buckley said. "It's a bad time of year". But to a diehard fan like Mr Buckley, Elvis is still the King, the greatest rock 'n' roll performer of all time and he isn't finished yet. "There're only just starting to scratch the surface of how good Elvis was." According to the host of 2XX's Rock 'n' Roll radio show on Saturday afternoons, Don Fisk, Elvis is still a powerful force in popular music. "He's still one of the biggest-selling artists in the world," he said. For local Elvis fans hoping to party with the King, the annual Elvis Revival Festival at Parkes, NSW, this weekend could be their opportunity. ...
- Elvis lives!
(BBC, January 5 2004)
The world-wide obsession with the King of Rock and Roll, Elvis Presley, continues and shows no sign of abating. Many fans will be making the annual pilgrimage to Graceland, the singer's former home in Memphis, to join in with celebrations to mark the anniversary of his birthday on January 8th. If you are taking part in any celebration or just marking the day in a personal way we'd like to see your photographs of how you will be paying tribute to the King. ...
- The fickle world of celebrity marriages
By Keily Oakes
(BBC, January 5 2004)
Britney Spears' short-lived marriage is one of several celebrity nuptials to have ended after just a matter of days, or even hours.
Spears' 48-hour union with childhood pal Jason Alexander may take some beating, but the queen of multiple marriages, Zsa Zsa Gabor, can claim to have gone one better. Her 1982 marriage to Felipe de Alba lasted just one day. ...
Odd couple: Elvis Presley's daughter Lisa Marie Presley has not had much luck in her high-profile marriages. Although her first marriage to unknown Danny Keough lasted for six years, it was her 1994 wedding to pop superstar Michael Jackson that really raised eyebrows. The couple had a complete breakdown in their relationship before a bitter divorce 19 months later. She went on to marry actor Nicolas Cage, who was also a huge fan of her father's music. After just 107 days the marriage was over, although there have been rumours of a reunion despite both sides saying they regretted getting hitched. ...
- The King's style: He died in an unfashionable decade, but 'Elvis Fashion' is no oxymoron
(Lafayette Advertiser / Associated Press, January 5 2004)
"Elvis Fashion" by Julie Mundy explores The King' s impact on style, despite the flashy, trashy excess of the superstar's white jumpsuit days. Take the words "Elvis" and "fashion" and put them together, and unfashionable images might spring to mind: white jumpsuits, loud polyester prints or the divinely tacky decor of Graceland, the King's home. Blame the 1970s, not Elvis Presley, says Julie Mundy, who wrote "Elvis Fashion" (Universe) with the cooperation of Graceland. "Elvis died in the most unfashionable decade. So he hasn't had the chance to redeem himself," says Mundy, interviewed by phone from her home in London. ...
- Elvis is in the building
By CHRIS CLAY
(MISSISSAUGA NEWS, (Ontario) January 4 2004)
Three days short of what would have been Elvis Presley's 69th birthday, tribute artist Stephen Kabakos will slip on a pair of blue suede shoes, zip up his rhinestone-studded jumpsuit and take to the stage as the legendary King of rock & roll. "Elvis: The Way It Was" comes to Mississauga's Stage West tomorrow (Monday) for one night only. Tickets to the two-hour performance cost $49.95. The curtain goes up at 7:45 p.m. According to Kabakos, 32, the show is "an introspective of Elvis' life, told through music." Presley enjoyed a long and successful career and Kabakos will be joined on stage by a 12-piece ensemble as he honours each distinct stage personality that was Elvis. ...
- Jake Hess, singer, gospel 'visionary'
By KAY POWELL
(Atlanta Journal-Constitution / contributed to by Associated Press, January 4 2004)
In the early 1960s, Elvis Presley was asked who his favorite singer was. Reporters were stumped when he replied, "Jake Hess". "After Elvis said that, people who didn't know me from a sack of sand were calling me and offering the moon," Mr. Hess said in a 1993 Atlanta Journal-Constitution article. Mr. Hess was a four-time Grammy winner who sang with some of the country's top gospel quartets, including the Statesmen and Masters Five. He founded the Imperials, who sang backup for Mr. Presley. Mr. Hess, 76, of Columbus died of pneumonia Sunday at East Alabama Medical Center in Opelika. The funeral is 2 p.m. Wednesday at Morningside Baptist Church in Columbus. McMullen Funeral Home of Columbus is in charge of arrangements. "Jake was a pioneer, a visionary," composer and performer Bill Gaither said in the 1993 article. "He paved the way for contemporary gospel music." Mr. Hess was a regular member of "Bill Gaither's Homecoming Friends" for the last 10 years of his 60-year career.
When a teenaged Elvis Presley became a fan, Mr. Hess was singing gospel in gymnasiums and auditoriums throughout the South. When Mr. Presley died in 1977, his father invited Mr. Hess and the Statesmen to sing at the funeral. Mr. Hess had sung at country star Hank Williams Sr.'s funeral in 1953. That was the same year television was making its mark on American culture, and the Statesmen made their mark on television. The prime time Statesmen were sponsored for decades by Nabisco. Music was pre-recorded in the ballroom of Atlanta's old Biltmore Hotel. The group then lip-synced on film from locations such as Stone Mountain. ...
- Grammy-winning gospel star Hess dead at 76
(Tuscaloosa News / Associated Press, January 4 2004)
Jake Hess, a four-time Grammy winner who sang with some of the premier quartets in gospel music and influenced the career of Elvis Presley, died early Sunday. He was 76. Hess, whose career spanned more than 60 years, died at East Alabama Medical Center in Opelika, Ala.
... As a teen, Presley was a regular at Statesmen concerts. Later, Hess was a backup singer on several of Presley's Grammy-winning albums. When Presley died in 1977, Hess sang at his funeral, as he had at the funeral of country legend Hank Williams in 1953. Peter Guralnick, author of a two-volume biography of Presley, said the rock star always wanted to emulate the voices of Hess and crooner Roy Hamilton. "They were such virtuosos," Guralnick said. "Each had a voice that Elvis never felt he could fully emulate. What he did seek to do was to emulate the feeling they had in their singing." ...
- The man is back (well, he will be soon)
(Sunday Herald, January 4 2004)
When he died last September, Johnny Cash left dozens of songs in the can. As the world waits for their release, Simon Stephenson recalls the life and loves of the legendary singer-songwriter. As a young man, Johnny Cash enlisted in the US Air Force and was promptly posted to Germany. L ater, when asked about that time, he replied: "I spent 20 years in the Air Force, between 1950 and 1954." It's perhaps appropriate, then, that the new Johnny Cash five CD box-set - which had been top of every mourning Cash fan's Christmas wishlist - should now be arriving in stores two months late due to a production delay in Germany. Nevertheless, like Cash's own time there, during which he honed his guitar playing and formed his first group, the long hours of waiting have been worth it: Unearthed is an impressive bequest and a fitting finale to the 50-year career of an American icon. ... Just as with Elvis Presley, another Sun colleague, fame and fortune were to prove awkward travelling companions for Cash. Following his early success, he switched labels to Columbia and embarked upon a decade of amphetamine-fuelled madness. Edited highlights include smashing out the footlights at Nashville's revered Grand Ole Opry, being busted in El Paso with a thousand Dexedrine tablets in his guitar case and starting a forest fire in Los Padres National Wildlife Refuge. During these years, Cash became increasingly estranged from his wife Vivian and their four daughters; his plaintive cover of Nine Inch Nails' Hurt - from his 2003 album The Man Comes Around, and included on Unearthed - testifies to these less slapstick aspects of addicted life. ...
- Monroe budget woes could mean more troubles for its civic center
(www.nola.com / Associated Press, January 4 2004)
In its heyday in the 1960s and 1970s, the Monroe Civic Center Complex was host to world-famous entertainers including Elvis Presley and Liberace. The complex was a center of entertainment for Monroe and much of northeastern Louisiana. Now, however, the city's budget problems may mean the end of any hope that the complex could regain its former glory. The city faces a shutdown of the arena from April to September, as well as discontinuing operation of the Anna Gray Noe Fountain in the front of the complex.
- Last Call with Mallory: HBK, Goldberg, Warrior, Raw Preview, and Missy Said What?
By Mallory Mahling
(The Lounge, January 3 2004)
Hope everybody had a Happy New Year. We're three days into 2004, not too late to make a New Year's Resolution or two if you still haven't done so. Some of you have probably resolved to look like this or this in the new year, depending on who's making the resolution. Personally, I decided not to make any resolutions this year -- that way I won't have to worry about breaking them.
... Looking ahead to this Monday, according to wwe.com there will be another homecoming when Raw comes to Memphis, home of a couple of famous kings -- Elvis Presley and Jerry Lawler. WWE is nothing if not predictable, so I would imagine Lawler will be in the ring kicking somebody's behind before the show is over. ...
- 200 Cadillacs' looks back at King's random, impulsive gifts
By John Beifuss
(Commercial Appeal, January 3 2004)
Each year when Elvis's birthday rolls around like a vinyl platter on Dewey Phillips's turntable (the King was born 69 years ago Jan. 8), I try to write about a Presley-related home video release. In the past, that's meant coverage of the DVD debuts of such features as "Wild in the Country" (Elvis hits on social worker), "Fun in Acapulco" (Elvis hits on lady bullfighter) and "Change of Habit" (Elvis hits on nun).
This year, however, the pickings are as dubious as Colonel Parker's passport. In fact, the only Elvisesque release that's come to my attention is "200 Cadillacs," a 63-minute documentary from Image Entertainment devoted to what the DVD's liner notes describe as "the generosity of Elvis." "200 Cadillacs" was produced and directed by Dan Griffin and "Produced and Conceived" by singer-songwriter Rex Fowler, who also appears at the end of the film in a music video tribute to the King (in one shot, Fowler visits Tops Bar-B-Q on Union Avenue). Because of the high costs of licensing Presley's recordings, the soundtrack includes no Elvis music. Instead, we hear several Fowler songs. "He loved his Cadillacs/He gave a ton away/200, more or less/Or so the pundits say," Fowler sings in the title track. Another song, "Let's Shine a Little Light on Elvis," features these lyrics: "Yes, he got heavy/And he sang some bad songs/But he sang some great ones/Before he passed on." And then there's the number about Beale Street that rhymes "fascinating" with "integrating."
The movie consists mainly of talking heads-style interviews with recipients of "the King's gift of choice a shiny new Cadillac." If that seems a slim peg upon which to hang a jumpsuit much less an hour-plus documentary, the film also alludes to such Elvis gifts as TCB (Taking Care of Business) necklaces, mink coats, a yellow Pantera, the entire dog inventory at a pet store, and 48 horses. Larry Geller, identified as "Elvis's Hairstylist and Spiritual Adviser," remembers that Elvis gave him an "American" Cadillac after telling him to get rid of his "Nazi" Mercedes. A former Denver TV reporter whose report on Presley amused the King testifies that a gift of a Cadillac from Elvis became "an emotional burden" because it caused his journalistic ethics to be questioned. Imagine that!
The imperfect English of Elvis's karate instructor Kang Rhee adds welcome spice to the rhetoric. "He thinking I am looking terrible," Rhee says of his most famous student, "so he give to me a leather jacket and many different clothing."
Linda Thompson, described as "Elvis's long-time live-in girlfriend" ("I was Miss Tennessee Universe and he was Elvis," she states, as if the scales were in balance), remembers that "Elvis was very much like Santa Claus." "Just the generosity of spirit was appreciated more than the actual gift of the car," she says.
Other beneficiaries who appear in the film include Bernard Lansky, the clothier to the King, Elvis's nurse Marian Cocke, former "Memphis Mafia" members Jerry Schilling and Sonny West, Myrna Smith of the Sweet Inspirations and drummer D. J. Fontana. Unfortunately, no Elvis biographer or psychoanalytical type is called upon to ponder the meaning behind these random, impulsive purchases.
Sums up Geller: "Elvis was a little strange, I guess, but he was beautiful."
- British Travel Writer Richard Knight Explores the Blues Highway
By Nancy Beardsley
(www.voanews.com, January 2 2004)
Congress officially declared 2003 to be The Year of the Blues, as a way of marking the 100th anniversary of the day when African-American composer W.C. Handy stood on a train platform in Mississippi and encountered what he called "the weirdest music I ever heard." W. C. Handy became fascinated by those sounds, and ended up doing so much to help make them popular that he's come to be known as the father of the blues. The year has been full of blues festivals, films, teaching projects and other centennial events, including the publication of a new guidebook by British travel writer Richard Knight. He is among the many people worldwide who have become passionate fans of the Blues. Nancy Beardsley spoke with him about his travel guide titled The Blues Highway: New Orleans to Chicago.
In the 'Big Easy,' blues fans can make a time honored pilgrimage to hear the Preservation Hall Jazz band, view a statue of trumpet great Louis Armstrong, or see what's billed as the boyhood home of piano player 'Jelly Roll' Morton. A few hours up the Mississippi River in Memphis, Tennessee you can visit what Richard Knight calls "the birthplace of rock and roll. The southern born musician Muddy Waters sang a song called The Blues Had a Baby and They Named it Rock and Roll. "Memphis in its geographic position at the top of the Mississippi Delta acted like a funnel through which all this talent passed," says Richard Knight. "Blues men people traveling north from Mississippi met people from the hills of east Tennessee, who played country music and also met a great tradition of gospel music and put the three together. And that's pretty much what rock and roll is."
Graceland: In Memphis, you can visit Elvis Presley's Graceland Mansion and Sun Studios, where record producer Sam Phillips helped launch Elvis and other rock and roll legends. Richard Knight says he also came across echoes of the blues in more unexpected places. Take Davenport, Iowa, located further north along the Mississippi River, west of Chicago. There you can visit the birthplace of jazz musician Bix Beiderbecke.
- Las Vegas is now set to be 'colonized' with Hilton sale
By Steven Mihailovich
(Las Vegas Business Press, January 1 2004)
For those still shaking off the holiday spirits, it might still be news that Caesar's Entertainment announced the sale of its Las Vegas Hilton Hotel and Casino to an affiliate of Los Angeles-based Colony Capital LLC for an estimated $280 million. While legendary Hilton has provided the setting for celebrated performers and performances, such as Elvis Presley's return to the concert circuit in 1969, the year the hotel opened, the sale of the property could set the stage for new performers just as renowned but playing on the investment and operations side of the business. A sweet deal all the way around for Caesars, the company had divested itself of the Hilton to concentrate on its core group of properties -- namely Caesar's Palace, Bally's, Paris and the Flamingo -- which dominate the action where the Strip intersects Flamingo Road, according to prepared statements from the company. It was no secret that the Las Vegas Hilton had become a poor performer the last couple of years within the company's holdings, posting a $6 million loss in operating income for the 2003 fiscal year which ended on September 30. ...
- One nation 'under God'
By Pat Boone
(Washington Times, January 1 2004)
Back in 1954, a skinny 20-year-old kid from Nashville was on the brink of a dream come true; a career in entertainment and music. Even then, he knew something that still holds true 50 years later: that a little faith in God can be a very big thing. I know this for a fact, because I'm that skinny kid. ... Pat Boone, singer and performer, sold more records in the 1950s than all other artists except Elvis Presley.
- Rock rogues gallery
(Washington Times, January 1 2004)
Drumroll, please. Q, the British music magazine, has compiled a list of the "100 most insane moments" in rock history, and the winner is: Keith Moon. The late Who drummer earned the top spot for incidents such as a food fight with police in Flint, Mich., and a literally dynamite performance on TV. Others singled out for Q's rogues gallery include Prince, for proselytizing door to door for Jehovah's Witnesses; Elvis Presley, for flying 879 miles for peanut-butter-and-bacon sandwiches; George Jones, for driving a lawn mower on the highway; and Elton John, for dropping nearly half a million dollars on flowers in less than two hours. Congrats to all who are still alive to tell about it. ...
- Kill a rat: And 100 other things to do this year
By Tim Dowling
(Guardian, January 1 2004)
...
26 Celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Fender Stratocaster, the Moog synthesiser and, according to some, the birth of rock 'n' roll itself: both Bill Hailey's Rock Around the Clock and Elvis Presley's That's All Right Mama were recorded in 1954.
27 Tell everyone you know that rock 'n' roll actually dates from the 1951 recording of Rocket 88, written by Ike Turner, but often wrongly ascribed to Jackie Brenston, who did the vocals. Don't forget to mention that the pioneering fuzzy guitar sound was caused by a damaged amplifier which fell off the back of a truck on Highway 61.
28 Indulge in the new rock 'n' roll. No one can be sure what will officially become the new rock 'n' roll of 2004, but current contenders include gout, pipe-smoking, nudity, Latin, hockey, wind power and fixed-interest mortgages. Competition to be the new black is also stiff, with blue, very dark grey, fat stripes, shiny and moss-covered all still in with a chance. ...
- DONNA'S RELATED TO THE KING - AND SHE'S COMING HERE
By I-CHENG CHAN
(Evening Herald, January 1 2004)
Elvis fans in Plymouth are soon to welcome the next best thing to The King himself - his cousin. Donna Presley Early, who spent her teenage years living with Elvis and his family at Graceland, is to come to the city next month on the day before what would have been the legend's 69th birthday. She will be sharing memories of her cousin, who starred in the 1964 film Kissin' Cousins, at the official launch of the forthcoming show Jailhouse Rock The Musical, premiering at Plymouth Theatre Royal in February before being staged in London's West End. The stage musical adaptation of Presley's classic 1957 feature film has been written and directed by the creators of Buddy. ...
- Thousands rock and roll in New Year's festivities
By Bill Ellis and Michael Lollar
(Commercial Appeal, January 1 2004)
Elvis smiled, happy to be back on Beale Street as one of the night's many New Year's Eve performers. "I'm glad to be here alive to do it," said the not-so-dead singing icon, who also offered thoughts on the emerging year: "Stop all this fighting and craziness that's going on."
OK, so it was actually popular Elvis entertainer Radford Ellis and one of his weekly shows, "The E Factor," at The Pig on Beale. Yet, if ever a street were meant to usher in all things musical for the new year - notably the 50th anniversary of rock and roll, sparked by one Elvis Presley - it was Beale Street, where thousands gathered Wednesday to bury the blues and revel the old year out. Kevin Kane, president of the Memphis Convention & Visitors Bureau, said it appeared to be "the biggest crowd I've seen down here." ...
- Family fun on First Night: Wilmington and Dover draw large crowds for New Year's Eve events
By MIKE BILLINGTON and PATRICK JACKSON
(News Journal, January 1 2004)
Thousands of Delawareans rang in 2004 under the glow of fireworks at big public celebrations in Dover and Wilmington on Wednesday evening. Clear, cool weather helped bring people out to both First Night events, the annual alcohol-free street party designed to attract families with rides and live entertainment. The parties started in the late afternoon and ended early enough for participants to get home safely and tuck the kids into bed. ... Jesse Garron, hair styled in a pompadour, belted out "Blue Suede Shoes" from inside a tent in Rodney Square as several hundred people crowded in to see him and his backup singers perform a tribute to Elvis Presley. ...
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