Author: Presley, Elvis

Format: Original recording remastered

PartNumber: CDRCA67883

Release Date: 03-05-2005

Details: Product Description This 2 CD set is an essential companion to the remarkable television special Elvis By the Presleys. Using some of Elvis's best-loved and most emotionally affecting tunes, the collection charts all the romance and drama of life behind-the-scenes with Priscilla and Lisa Marie. The double CD "ELVIS BY THE PRESLEYS" contains 32 tracks including number one hits "In The Ghetto," "Suspicious Minds," and "Heartbreak Hotel," legendary gems like "Trouble" and "Always On My Mind," and the new classic "A Little Less Conversation" which put Elvis back on the charts more than 25 years after his death. The rarities disc includes previously unreleased private recordings and Elvis at work in the studio recording "Jailhouse Rock" and "Too Much Monkey Business". Amazon.ca This 32-track, double CD set--a companion to a television special--is marketed as the King's "most emotionally affecting tunes," songs he connected to his real-life romance with his wife and daughter. Well, that's a novel repackaging ploy, especially as this collection contains "Heartbreak Hotel," a song Elvis recorded in 1956, well before he met Priscilla. However, the second disc, a collection of rarities, is far more interesting, beginning with "It Wouldn't Be the Same Without You," one of the four known demos Presley recorded before winning his Sun contract. His tone here--pure and almost girlish--is the sweet sound of a boy who would be Dean Martin, not a revolution in the making. Private recordings of "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" and "Baby What You Want Me to Do" are so "living room" as to seem deliciously voyeuristic. But the most fascinating glimpse here comes as an alternate take of "You'll Be Gone," a song Presley wrote in 1962 with friends Red West and Charlie Hodge. Utterly awful, it finds him meandering into the squishy no man's land that characterized much of the period. He played it for the visiting Priscilla, who said she liked his rock 'n' roll stuff better, and, crushed, he supposedly never tried to write a song again. That was history's loss, but Priscilla ended up being a better A&R director than anybody else Elvis had around him at the time. And not a bad album packager it turns out, though the "rare, never-before-seen family photos" promised in the booklet don't quite cut the mustard. --Alanna Nash

UPC: 828766788327

EAN: 0828766788327

Model: CDRCA67883

Languages: English

Binding: Audio CD

Item Condition: UsedVeryGood