Elvis at 70

[ForrestGump]

This is one artist's rendering, the most likely I've seen yet:



What would he be doing if he'd survived the '70s? Would he still be performing live? What kind of music would he be producing, if any? More movies? The serious roles he always wanted to do more of?

Hard to say, but in the world of reality, he's been dominating the UK charts in recent weeks, too, putting upstart new 'artists' in their place with original recordings (no remixes, this time) of of his #1 UK hits. These rereleases have done phenomenally well, especially considering that -- by now -- just about everyone in the UK must have heard the songs over and over if not actually owned them at some time. Elvis even had the 1000th #1 single on the British charts -- "One Night," issued 47 years after it was recorded and 45 years after its first release, became the 1000th #1 since the single charts began, in 1952. "Jailhouse Rock," the 999th number one, hit #1 one day after Elvis' 70th birthday, a date also notable as being one day before the 49th anniversary of Elvis' first RCA session (the session that produced "Heartbreak Hotel").

Here's how, to the best of my knowledge, Elvis has been doing Over The Pond over 27 years since his death (these songs, by the way, entered the chart at their highest positions):

Jailhouse Rock (1957) - #1
One Night (1957) - #1
A Fool Such As I (1958) - #2
It's Now Or Never (1960) - #1
Are You Lonesome Tonight? (1960) - #2
Wooden Heart (1960) - #2
Surrender (1960) - #2
His Latest Flame (1961) - #3
Rock A Hula Baby (1961) - #3
Good Luck Charm (1962) - #2
She's Not You (1962) - #3
Return To Sender (1962) - #5
Devil In Disguise (1963) - #2
Crying In The Chapel (1960, released 1965) - #2

They're still going -- still scheduled to release a few more. "Crying In The Chapel" came in at #1 just a couple or three days ago. The tally so far looks like three #1 hits, seven at #2, three at #3, and one at #5. Not bad -- another 14 Top Ten (Top Five, actually) debuts for Elvis, bringing his UK total to 74, with a record 21 number ones (four more than the Beatles). He also now ties with John Lennon for having the most (three) different songs at #1 on the UK charts within a month.

Elvis lives!

[mrbill]

1. oh nooooo, the king looks like jay leno......

n/t

[ForrestGump]

2. I was thinking more Lorne Green...

[mrbill]

3. it's that chin.....

n/t

[ForrestGump]

4. Yep, Elvis had a fairly long chin on himself

But I think ole Jay's in a league by himself. Well, except for perhaps having this dude for company:

[Left Is Write]

21. Ooh! Robbie Rotten! He's creepy.

[ForrestGump]

23. Sportacus kinda concerns me, too, though

:-)

Dude's on some powerful uppers...

[BurtWorm]

16. Elvis was Jewish?!

:wow:

[ForrestGump]

18. Elvis was Jewish. Sort of. At least by Jewish law, I believe.

His great-great-grandmother was Jewish...on the maternal line, so I'm not sure whether that makes him Jewish under the matrilineal law or not or if there're mitigating factors. Regardless, along with Cherokee and various British-Isles ancestry, he had a Jewish heritage. His mother knew but I don't think she ever told his father because many of the Presley men (Vernon included, to an extent, I think) were at least somewhat anti-Semitic. Elvis grew up liivng upstairs from a rabbi, in the Memphis projects, and remained fascinated by Jewish law and lore and counted among his Memphis Mafia and other close associates a few Jewish people. He didn't tolerate overt anti-Semitism (or racism) from the more neanderthal of his hangers-on.

Elvis was heavily into Eastern philosophies and the kind of thing that might be called 'New Age' or 'new-thought religion' these days but that was then considered 'occult.' Among his interests were various forms of Jewish mysticism (his partner in seeking wisdom through all of these books and so on was himself Jewish).

He had a Star of David and a cross carved on his mother's grave marker and in the '70s he designed and wore a pendant that combined both symbols -- when asked why he ahd the Jewish and Christian symbols intertwined he made light by saying "I don't want to miss heaven by a technicality." On tour during his last year, Elvis wore a 'chai' pendant at every concert.



Wearing the chai pendant at the last concert.

Oh, yeah...in an unreleased 1970 concert rehearsal he and the band launched into a spontaneous "Hava Nagila," though that's more a pointer to Elvis' general acting-the-fool.

Here're some relevant links:

http://www.pallorium.com/ARTICLES/art25.html

http://www.somethingjewish.co.uk/articles/77_searching_for_elvis_.htm

http://www.elvispresleynews.com/article1097.html

[BurtWorm]

29. So he was an achtaroon.

Very interesting. Someone should write a book about this. Maybe you?

[ForrestGump]

32. Looks like somebody already did

And a documentary -- wouldn't mind catching it one day.

Achtaroon? I like that. Sounds like a wild animal call..

[Montauk6]

5. That's creepy!

I never saw much of a resemblance between him and Vernon until now!

[ForrestGump]

7. I guess so -- didn't really notice it 'til you said that

Though his features were a pretty good mix of both his parents':

http://www1.ndr.de/container/ndr_style_images_default/0,2299,OID900112,00.jpg

Wherever they came from, Elvis' genes must be pretty powerful -- both Lisa Marie and her 15-year-old daughter look way more like Elvis than they do any of their other DNA contributors.

[Midnight Rambler]

6. There's a place in Texas called "Little Graceland"

In my dad's hometown of Los Fresnos, TX, there's this guy named Simon Vega who was stationed at Ft. Hood and in Germany with Elvis. He's turned his home into a mini-Elvis museum called Little Graceland, which is a state landmark. Every year he holds a festival on Elvis's birthday and one for his memorial. If any of you Elvis-loving DUers are ever down in South Texas, you might want to check it out.

http://www.lfpd.net/Chamber/Little%20Graceland.html

[ForrestGump]

8. Cool!

I love South Texas, anyway, so I'll have to make my way down there before too long. Thanks!

[johnnie]

9. That's the closest I have seen

I would hope by now he would have stopped dyeing his hair.
It's pretty amazing he is still hitting the charts in the UK all these years later. I guess that says something about Elvis.

[ForrestGump]

10. Yeah, usually people who do these kinds of things

just take a 1977 concert photo and make him bald. Dude....

His hair went gray back in the '70s -- his father's genes, maybe -- and his hairdresser tried to talk him into letting it grow out. Hard to imagine, but an Elvis with long, silver hair might have been quite a sight. Sure worked for old Leon Russell (who, to my mind, looked far cooler with white hair than in his younger days).

Yep, Elvis is still tearing up the music scene. The most amazing thing about it is that these are the original mixes. Good music doesn't ever really go away....but getting repeatedly back to #1 after almost 50 years is an extreme that maybe only Elvis could pull off.

[SOteric]

11. OhMyGhodd! That looks

like the bastard child of Lorne Greene and Jack Palance. :wow:

[ForrestGump]

12. You mean

Lo' Jack? :P

[SOteric]

14. *snarf*

[DS1]

20. He travels the Universe doing one-handed pushups

;-)

[elperromagico]

13. It's likely his hair would have thinned out at least a little.

It happens to most men as they reach old age. They may not go bald, but there is a little less to play around with.

The big problem in that picture for me is the eyes; it's a common problem in films when trying to age younger actors: the eyes aren't properly "aged."

My other problem is that the face isn't nearly wrinkled enough. If Elvis had lived through the 70s - with all of his myriad drug addictions - and become some sort of Betty Ford Clinic celebrity in the 80s, I suspect his face would show it far more than that picture implies. That is, unless he'd had plastic surgery.

As for where Elvis would have gone musically, I suspect he would have continued down the road he was heading at the time of his death. The pop hits were few and far between in the 70s, but the country hits were many. Elvis could have been tops in the country music scene if he'd lived. I just can't see him following the flash-in-the-pan pop music phenomenons of the 80s and 90s.

Of course, he still would have sold out Vegas. Maybe he would finally have toured the world.

Or maybe it's better that he died when he did.

It's "what if," but it's a fun game nonetheless.

[ForrestGump]

15. Yeah, he'd probably have lost some of his hair, though his father

had a thick head of hair until he died (aged 69). I know that male pattern baldness is a sex-linked trait on the maternal line, but Elvis' hairdresser said that his hair was still in good shape after 40 despite an increasingly unhealthy life and a lot of physical maladies.

The eyes bother me a little, too, but not for the same reason: they look vaguely like they belong on an Asian person...somehow just not quite right on this face. Actually, look at some of the Japanese publicity shots and album covers for the 1957 releases of "Jailhouse Rock" and "Elvis' Christmas Album" and you'll see that somewhere along the line someone actually changed Elvis' eyes to make him appear somewhat Asian. Pretty funny.

I have met people way older than 70, though, who still have very 'young' eyes. If Elvis had survived, maybe he would've been one of them. He definitely had that twinkle in his eye when things were going well for him.

Don't know about the wrinkles. His father wasn't very crinkled even at 69, after years of serious health problems, and he was a bit of a hellraiser at times. If all else failed, though, yeah, Elvis would probably have resorted to a bit of plastic surgery.

I agree that Elvis would have become primarily a country performer, had he lived. Country changed, anyway -- he was one of the major forces in it changing, for that matter -- and by the early '80s what was once country rock fit squarely in the country fold. I imagine he'd have still done some rockers -- when the mood hit him in the '70s, he proved he could still do it ("Burning Love," "Promised Land." "T.R.O.U.B.L.E.," etc) -- but he hadn't really been interested in rock 'n' roll for years. Truth be told, he wasn't even much into rock 'n' roll in the '50s...his interests remained, throughout his life, the influences that helped him be one of the creators of rock 'n' roll and its foremost icon: blues, gospel, and country, and the mixing thereof (which is where it really gets 'Elvis,' rock 'n' roll being just one facet of that mixing). I could definitely see him doing more gospel, and at least one stellar blues album, but I agree that the rock/blues/gospel/pop-infused songs that he put out so consistently in the '70s would have taken him primarily down a country road. No question that he would have remained disengaged from the trends of the day, whether disco or grunge.

Would've been a triumph for "Live Aid" to get hold of Elvis, huh?

World tour! World tour! If only....

Vegas as it is today would probably lure Elvis in again, but he was well and truly sick of that culture and the daily grind by about 1974, if not before, and the Vegas gigs he did over the next few years ate at his soul. I think he'd have taken a break from Vegas for at least a few years. As it was, in 1976 he only did one two-week stint there (as opposed to the early-'70s routine of two seasons of a month each, with two shows every night -- occasionally three shows -- and no days off for the entire month). In 1977 he was supposed to open a big convention cneter late in the year but otherwise was not, to the best of my knowledge, scheduled to perform there. Of course, life on the road during a year when he should have been taking a break -- he never had one, unless you count the Army -- was arguably more harmful than any Vegas gig. A world tour would have forced him to exercise willpower again and shape up, I'm sure. Might have saved his life. Might at least have extended it. America was closing in on him by 1977.

[Floogeldy]

17. That rendering is way too kind

He would have a lot more wrinkles than that.

}(

[VOX]

26. True. He looks better there than he actually did at 42.

His age at his death.

[redqueen]

19. Awwwww

:(

[NV Whino]

22. I was priveleged to have seen a live performance in Las Vegas

I don't remember the year, except that I experienced the Saugus earthquake in Las Vegas the day after the concert. Scary watching those Las Vegas buildings sway and the earthquake wasn't even near Las Vegas.

I was coerced into going by two friends since I wasn't really an Elvis fan. But I've never regreted it. He was truly a great performer.

We had been told if we tipped the guy at the door when we entered (to go to our cheap seats), that he might move us closer after the show started. So we three, foxy, twenty something females tipped the guy at the door a big five bucks. He said he woud see what he could do.

So we got seated at our postage stamp table, ordered our requisite three driniks apiece and the warm up act came on. But no door guy. So we shrugged and said, "Five big ones down the drain."

As the warm up was finishing, the door guy came by, told us to pick up our drinks and follow him. We ended up at one of the front tables with a few celebrities. Charo sat across from me. Me? I leaned on the stage. What an experience.

[ForrestGump]

24. The Sylmar earthquake of 1971?

That was February 9, so it sounds like you saw Elvis a couple of weeks into his engagement there. I've got some of those shows taped from the soundboard (more taped from the audience) and can send you one -- only have one with me, the rest being in storage in another state -- if you'd like a belated aural souvenir. The one I've got handy is from January 28, two days after opening night, but it might conjure a few memories. Just lemme know, anyway...



Funny, actually: somewhere I've got a tape of Elvis talking, by telephone, to a Denver policeman (he befriended a bunch on the 11/70 tour) in the early Spring of 1971. Elvis mentions being in the International Hotel during that quake, that hit at 6AM:

Ron Pietrafesco: Any problems with the earthquake?

Elvis: No...no. That hotel almost fell over, that's how much it was rocking back and forth. Went to bed at 6 AM...Cilla was there, the bed was moving...I got up and walked down that hallway with a flashlight in one hand and a gun in the other. The chandelier over the dining room table was shaking back and forth. Weirdest thing in my life, Ron.

Ron Pietrafesco: I think that happened the Monday we left. When Priscilla came in? We
saw her at the airport when we left.

Elvis: Yeah, right. The next day, it happened. I opened the door thought the wind was blowing...no wind was blowing. The weirdest thing!

Ron Pietrafesco: Here in Denver they're not as bad. It's a wild feeling.

Elvis: Weirdest thing I've ever had. The big hotel was moving...I was headed for the elevator in my underwear.

[NV Whino]

31. Yes, it was the Sylmar earthquake

That would be so cool to have a tape of that performance (or close to that performance). e-mail me.

I, too, was staying at the International on the 21st floor. Elvis was in the Penthouse. Unlike EP, my friend and I got up, got dressed and went down 21 floors in the elevator. Dumb thing to do. When we reached the lobby, we, the doorman and a couple of cabbies stood and watched the buildings sway. The second friend spent the night elsewhere with her current squeeze--a member of Waylon Jenning's band whom she had met when Waylon and crew played a little dive in Torrance a year or so previous--before anyone knew who he was.

[ForrestGump]

34. You realize, of course, that now you can post a topic titled

"I slept under Elvis (and the earth moved) -- ask me anything." :o

I'm glad the elevator made it! Imagine if Elvis made it to the same elevator in his underwear at the same time. Talk about embarrassing celebrity encounters...

(especially considering that he customarily wore no underwear)

[Robeson]

25. This ones from St. Andrews University.....

...and is a lot less flatering. Go to link below:

http://www.ananova.com/entertainment/story/sm_376158.html?menu=entertainment.latestheadlines

[ForrestGump]

27. I doubt he'd let his hair get like that, and

I must say that this is a fairly decrepit-looking 66-year-old, based on septugenarians of my acquaintance and familial ties. It's a bad picture, but if you squint your eyes up so that what looks like leprosy fades away, it's not out of the question. But his hair would likely be better, whether naturally or otherwise. Elvis' hair was a legend unto itself...

These skirt-wearing porridge-munchers call themselves experts at this sort of thing?

[Robeson]

28. Yeah, or I would think that he'd have enough money to help....

...himself NOT look like that. Plasic Surgery, hair transplants and Lipo have come a long way since the 70's....

[underpants]

30. LORNE GREENE????

:bounce:

[Maddy McCall]

33. I don't know. The smirk is just a little too photoshopped.

And I bet he would have kept his jet black hair.

No matter what he would have looked like, he would have always remained THE MAN.

This is almost as eerie to look at as watching Giant, to see what James Dean would look like in his older years.

:(