Here you get a glimpse not of the life he led but of the things he felt and the movies he might have made.
There is nothing like it in any of his other films – certainly not in anything since “King Creole.” There is a moment of interiority, however stylized, a moody dreamscape to which Elvis lends himself as if he had somehow found his way into a Gene Kelly musical. But it is only when he actually begins to sing (after a minute-and-a-half of voice-over mood shots), that we sense the quiet, earnest sincerity that belies the stagy showiness of the rest of the film. Just listen to what Elvis brings to this beautiful Doc Pomus-Mort Shuman composition if you want to experience the core of vulnerability that lies at the heart of his music.
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If you want to spend the day with Elvis, both Last Train to Memphis and Careless Love are Now Available as e-books.
This seemed like it might really be fun. It was a lot of fun to put together anyway!
Here’s an erratic, eccentric collection of video clips to accompany the book, available at the time of posting anyway, and subject to addition, subtraction, suggestion, and revision – but whichever the case, it should in the end simply lead you to discover – lead me to discover, too – more music.
This is the first of four installments, covering the first section of the book: “Honky Tonk Heroes.” Once we’ve posted all four, we’ll put them together in one giant Lost Highway video playlist!
Part 1: Honky Tonk Heroes
ERNEST TUBB: THE TEXAS TROUBADOUR
“Waltz Across Texas" and “Walkin’ The Floor Over You”
Two of Ernest’s most iconic songs, delivered in typical sledgehammer fashion.
It doesn’t hurt that he is joined by a young, energetic Merle Haggard, taking his place as an honorary Troubadour on “Walkin’ the Floor Over You” and clearly inspired (like nearly everyone who met him – or saw or just heard him) by Ernest’s transparent sincerity.
This must have been around the time that I am writing about in the book, when Ernest, old, ill, suffering from emphysema, would still wait around the high school gym that was hosting his latest show until the very last autograph was signed.
HANK SNOW: STILL MOVIN’ ON
“I Don’t Hurt Any More”
Once again the kind of wonderfully straightforward and unembarrassed emotion that seems almost anomalous in our ironic world, delivered in Snow’s distinctive style. (Listen to Elvis’ right-on imitation on The Million Dollar Quartet session.) It comes with the usual bonus of Hank’s beautifully articulated acoustic solo – and dig the cornstalks!
**note: the video that was originally selected has disappeared from YouTube, along with the cornstalks. Above is similar take from a couple of years later
“I’m Movin’ On”
This is it. The Birth of Rock ‘n’ Roll (more or less, one of many – on the country side). Elvis recorded it on Elvis Country, as a tribute to the star with whom he first went out on tour in early 1955. It appears to have been filmed prior to its even being recorded by Hank in March 1950.
DEFORD BAILEY: PAN AMERICAN BLUES
“Pan American Blues”
Here’s DeFord Bailey, back on the Grand Ole Opry stage after an absence of many years. One of the earliest stars of the Opry (his original version of this song actually kicked off the first broadcast to officially use the “Opry” name in 1927), he was treated like a mascot and dropped in 1941, ostensibly because he wouldn’t “learn new songs.” But DeFord could play all day, on harmonica, banjo, and guitar – he took his inspiration, he said, from his solitary childhood out in the country, where he would listen to the birds and the trains going by and imitate all the sounds around him. When I met him, through James Talley and social worker David Morton, his great champion over the years (it was largely through David‘s efforts that he was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2005), he was living in a public housing project on Edgehill Avenue in Nashville, where today a plaque proclaims his one-time residence.
RUFUS THOMAS: THE WORLD’S OLDEST TEENAGER
“Walking the Dog”
How can you beat this (well, Rufus anyway)?Rufus was the self-proclaimed “World’s Oldest Teenager” when I met him in the mid-1970s, he was still the World’s Oldest Teenager when he died at 84 in 2001. He inspired the Sweet Soul Music Festival in Porretta, Italy, where in the 1990s, little kids called out “Rufalone,” as they ran after him in the streets. Rufus, as Jerry Wexler might say, was “a stone gas.” Or, to put it another way: Rufus vincit omnia.
BOBBY BLAND: LITTLE BOY BLUE
Bobby and B.B. King: Medley
Don’t miss the great Soul Train intro by Don Cornelius.
You can’t miss the graciousness and affection that both men display. The first time I saw them both was at a Battle of the Blues in 1966 at Louie’s Showcase Lounge, a lively but little room despite its name, in Boston’s Roxbury section. The spirit was not all that much different from the one exhibited here, except that it was abattle, with no duets contemplated or joined, and Bobby’s squall vanquishing B.B.’s falsetto, at least for that night. (When Bobby ended with “Stormy Monday” and fell to his knees at the lyric cue, the women could not be held back from storming the tiny stage.) The easy trade-offs here are no less enthralling, the vocal mastery no less assured – and dig the jackets, too!
T-Bone Walker: “Don’t Throw Your Love On Me So Strong”
T-Bone was Bobby’s main man, as he declares in the chapter. And not just because T-Bone originated “Stormy Monday” either. For the whole sound. He was B.B.’s main man, too – hell, he was everybody’s main man. Check out the way he holds his guitar, like a keyboard around his neck, and note the familiar chord progressions, too. And while you’re at it, check out B.B. and T-Bone together in the next clip, with BB’s jazzy, T-Boneish intro, not to mention “the great Lloyd Glenn,” as B.B. properly introduces him, on piano.
