ELVIS PRESLEY - “Way Down”
Elvis’ first posthumous Number One is like a miniature of his career: a brilliant beginning, a saggy middle, and it ends way too soon. Elvis comes out fighting, swaying and swaggering over a roiling disco boogie - when the brass stabs in on ”all of my resistance” it’s a genuine thrill. His voice is still iconic: its slurs and mumbles an economical, broadstroke sketch of Presley past, but born of expertise as much as laziness. ”Way Down” is let down by its chorus, whose jauntiness sweeps all tension away and whose ending dispels any momentum: the song’s components just never really fit together.
And then he’s left the building. With the rock’n'roll revival such a force in mainstream seventies pop it’s fitting Elvis got his own last word in - and “Way Down” is considerably better than the Showaddywaddy or Stardust efforts we’ve been through, even if it’s a minor entry in the King’s own record book. At the time of his death, by all accounts Elvis was a marginal figure - with the right medical care, maybe he’d have had a comeback or two in him. Maybe not.
A strange thing about Elvis Presley is that his figure in decline has become an archetype as strong as his younger self. It can be hard to feel his direct impression on pop, harder the further away we get from the event zero of his emergence, but if he no longer defines pop he still encompasses it. Few began so blazingly, sold out so totally, returned so fiercely, collapsed so gracelessly: Presley anticipates every pop story. 5
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Billy Smart on July 8th, 2008
Has anybody got a copy of Val Hennessy’s punk history to hand? There’s a remarkable editorial from (I think) the Standard included which says - from memory - that Elvis might have been misguided and wrong, but he had hope on his side, unlike these despicable, evil, punk rockers, with their seditious mission to destroy all that decent people hold dear!
Favourite seventies Elvis moment, by the way - the “Whoo hoo hoo!” in ‘Burning Love’. An exhausted man having as much fun as a fit young one, but with rather more risk of damaging himself (further) through doing so.
DJ Punctum on July 9th, 2008
Of course, one has to remember that Jimmy Savile quickly reminded us in the People (or was it the Sunday Mirror?) that the Elvis he knew was no junkie. And there’s a PJ Proby song called “Elvis Wasn’t The White N****r, I Was” but maybe best not to go there.
rosie on July 9th, 2008
… and the really strange thing is, even after playing this to myself a dozen times over the last few days, when I see a reference to it the first thing that plays on the jukebox in my head is Donovan’s Legend of Atlantis
DJ Punctum on July 9th, 2008
The great lost Elvis movie of course has to be Village Blues where the King plays Rusty Rutgrinder, a rock and roll singer who suddenly quits his job, gets kidnapped and wakes up in a strange seaside village. Number Two (Bill Bixby) explains that he has been brought here to explain why he quit (”this ain’t no Disneyland, boy”). Angry, Rusty attempts to escape but is defeated by a wacky weather balloon (Buddy Hackett). However, he meets and falls in love with fellow villager Stella Stevens and together they decide to set up a big roustabout barn dance on the beach. The film ends with Rusty cheerfully telling his new lady “well honey, uh guess uh’ll be stayin’ here,” before leading the cast in the big finale “You Can’t Get Over A Rover.”
intothefireuk on July 9th, 2008
I remember the day Elvis died. There was a terrific thunderstorm and an absolutely torrential downpour. The rain relentlessly thudded against my front room window as I heard and assimilated the words ‘Elvis is dead’ coming from the radio. Did it matter ? It shouldn’t have. Elvis represented our parents, he was out of date, out of style and now, out of luck. More notable for his musical movies and his subsequent iconic regalia than his ground-breaking musical past. For some reason though, it saddened me greatly. Maybe because although I did not relate to him, he was a fixture, he’d been there as long as I could remember. He was an absolute God to some and suddenly he was gone. Way Down was too little too late to save him, I don’t dislike the record, I can’t, but it hardly represents his best work does it ? …although an inevitable number one for obvious reasons, none of them musical. Bolan would shortly follow him skywards and it really did feel as though punk was indeed rock’s grim reaper.
Waldo on July 9th, 2008
# 54 - Of course Leo Mckern wanted no part of “Village Blues”. Instead he pissed off to appear in “Help!” where the Fab Four suddenly quit their jobs only to wake up in Pontins in Prestatyn to find Wilfrid Brambell demanding to know why they quit and they meet and fall in love with felow camper Doris Hare and then they…
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DJ Punctum on July 9th, 2008
Patrick Cargill was approached for a cameo role but expressed dismay at his one line of dialogue: “XO4? That’s nearly an armful!”
wichita lineman on July 10th, 2008
Space’s Magic Fly did knock Elvis off the no.1 spot in the NME chart and - as if to hammer home “the King is dead, long the live the Korg” - no.2 was Jean Michel Jarre’s Oxygene.
Simon Bates’s Golden Hour the next morning was all Elvis - that’s how I heard the news. I taped it. Did anyone else? Slightly odd selection, but this was my introduction to Ain’t That Lovin’ You Baby, His Latest Flame, and A Mess Of Blues among others. No Suspicious Minds, which hadn’t yet made the legendary grade of the pre-army recordings.
Billy Smart on July 10th, 2008
The other phantom NME Chart number ones of 1977; God Save The Queen, Ma Baker, You’re In My Heart, Rocking All Over The World.
DJ Punctum on July 11th, 2008
To complicate matters further, here are the Radio Luxembourg-only 1977 number ones: I Wish, Going In With My Eyes Open, Red Light Spells Danger, Evergreen, Fanfare For The Common Man, You Got What It Takes, Wondrous Stories (!) and the official Xmas number two which I’ll leave until we get there.
Billy Smart on July 11th, 2008
I’m looking forward to that! A great and glorious single…
Billy Smart on July 11th, 2008
What on earth was ‘Evergreen’, by the way? It’s too early to be the Bunnymen or Will Young (or even Hazel Dean)
wichita lineman on July 11th, 2008
“Love, ssssoft as an easy chair”. Y’know, Barbra Streisand, from the remake of A Star Is Born. Written by Paul Williams who came up with lots of lines as good as that and better on Rainy Days & Mondays, Let Me Be The One, We’ve Only Just Begun and a bunch of other Carpenters hits.
wichita lineman on July 11th, 2008
Oh yeah, DJP, do you have a book of the Luxembourg charts? Wondrous Stories! I know Tom’s gutted that there SL2/Everybody In The Place/Raving I’m Raving just fell short of being breakbeat no.1s, but a prog no.1 would have been deeply strange.
Billy Smart on July 11th, 2008
Ah right, that’s a better title than “Love Theme From A Star Is Born”, which is what it’s called in the reference books. I’ve never knowingly heard that one.
DJ Punctum on July 11th, 2008
Two prog number ones if you count ELP!
I have several books of Luxembourg charts, namely the variously coloured Collins diaries in which I used to write them every Tuesday. If only I could find a publisher…
wichita lineman on July 11th, 2008
If you’re serious, Backbeat or Helter Skelter might well do it. You ever seen First Hits? It lists the music sheet charts (am I among friends here? I know this might sound scary) from 1946 to 1959, which were broadcast on Luxembourg. Boxtree published that in 1989 and I’m guessing your note books would have wider appeal! Well, I’d buy it, naturally.
Luxembourg’s sig tune for their chart rundown was the Sauter Finnegan Orchestra’s Doodletown Fifers, making this the earliest in a chain of highly evocative instros from At The Sign Of The Swinging Cymbal to Whole Lotta Love to Yellow Pearl.
DJ Punctum on July 11th, 2008
Doodletown Fifers also used as the theme tune for Jimmy Savile’s Double Top Ten Show until he changed the title and format to Jimmy Savile’s Old Record Club following which Ramsay Lewis’ version of “The In Crowd” was used.
Erithian on July 11th, 2008
Lineman - yes, you’re among friends. Here’s a link to a site listing the US number ones from 1890 - yes, that’s 1890 - onwards, based on sheet music sales listings from Variety and other magazines:
http://freespace.virgin.net/sharon.persky/US%20number%20one%20singles.html#1890s
wichita lineman on July 11th, 2008
Ooh, good spot. Was the Double Top Ten Show half the length? I only remember The In Crowd and that hollow feeling it gave me when I realised it was another seven days before I’d be able to get five-points-for-the-title. But at least I’d got to hear Grapefruit’s Dear Delilah/Badfinger’s No Matter What/Helen Shapiro’s Tell Me What He Said for the first time, and had the opportunity to try and find them in Beanos the following Saturday. Can’t buy that thrill.
DJ Punctum on July 11th, 2008
Yes, I think the Double Top Ten Show was only an hour long, mainly because it was followed by another hour of Savile’s Travels. In those days it was easy to fit 20 records into one hour since the show drew from fifties and sixties charts and still leave room for ten points Uncle Ted/going down one place at a time as befitting a good re-CORD/Clifford Richard Mr Forever Guy etc.
Erithian on July 11th, 2008
Jimmy Savile on Sunday afternoons was an education in itself. Moments such as hearing oddities like Johnny Dankworth’s “Experiments in Mice” from the 20 Years Ago chart, then being all excited hearing “Metal Guru” and thinking “wow, I haven’t heard this in ages!” - when it was on the Three Years Ago chart!
DJ Punctum on July 11th, 2008
And again he played the WHOLE top ten - so much better as a programme and as a snapshot of a specific time than “picks.”
Billy Smart on July 11th, 2008
Have you noticed that Dale now isn’t doing new releases or the number one LP anymore, either? No more does he have to play ‘The Sound Of Music’ through gritted teeth every third week.
Also we don’t get the useful corrective balance of Phil Swern putting in some of his own non-charting enthusiasms (such as Anne Peebles or The Impressions) which added a sense of balance and representativeness to the programme, I though.
DJ Punctum on July 11th, 2008
To my mind Capital Gold’s From The Bottom To The Top show now knocks POTP into a cocked hat.
Case in point: last week’s Gold show played a Top 20 chart from February 1983 in full, with Eddy Grant (who was at number two in selfsame chart) as studio guest. Dale featured the same chart some months ago but concentrated on playing on all the boring/slow entries - it was all “Up Where We Belong” and Phil Collins and as my wife says it was like a Young Conservatives playlist from hell. Whereas hearing the full chart was an instructive (re-)education, a retrospectively bizarre world where Orville the Duck and Wylie the Wah! seemed to fit in equally with inscrutable but palpable logic.
Waldo on July 12th, 2008
DJP - Who was “Dignified”, the guy who used to ride shotgun on Saville’s chart show at some point?
DJ Punctum on July 12th, 2008
Dearie Lord, Dearie Lord, God rest my SO-WEL young Waldo groovy geezer guy geezer, now then, now then, that there “Dignified” was none other than Dignified Don, a.k.a. Savile’s producer Don George (who may or may not still be around); he came after Uncle Ted and before Graham Archive and specialised in indecipherable tannoy/intercom-style remarks/banter with the Jewellery Rattler.
Waldo on July 12th, 2008
Aha! Thank-you for that, Charty. “Indecipherable” is right. Dignified’s newscaster accent was sort of West Country, wasn’t it? I could never understand what he was doing there but now I know. I felt he was probably present just to calm the child-friendly Saville down. He failed. Jimmy used to dock points when you didn’t “open brackets” on song titles (Zager and Evans, par example) and I’ll also never forget the 1970 Christmas TOTP when he and Timmy Bannockburn were scoffing chocolates whilst actually introducing performances. I was 9 and talking with your mouthful was about as bad as it got. Fucking disgusting.
Perhaps I should have guessed that Don was Jimmy’s producer. Wossy has his own producer on Saturday mornings. It’s a moronic bloke who sounds exactly like Dudley Moore and he hangs on JR’s every word, constantly dissolving into helpless fits of giggles. It used to be too much to bear (and I can’t stand Ross at any price in any case) but in recent times, the acolyte has tended to give some back but it’s still pretty grim.
I personally think both Ross and that other clump, Evans represent everything that is wrong about broadcasting. It’s all very well saying “there’s always the off switch” but the fact is, we’re all paying for these clowns. And BOY are we paying!!
Billy Smart on July 12th, 2008
TOTP Watch: 25th December 1970. Hosted by Saville & Blackburn. In the studio were; Marmalade, Mr Bloe & Pikettywich (all the biggest stars!), plus a lot of repeated footage.
26th December 1970. More high spirits from Saville & Blackburn. In the studio; Christie, Dana, Hotlegs, Jimmy Ruffin, Mungo Jerry & The Kinks, plus Pan’s People - interpreting ‘Spirit In The Sky’
Neither show survives.
vinylscot on July 13th, 2008
Been away for a few days so sorry for my late appearance on this thread. Most of what I wanted to say has already been said.
I was in a youth hostel in Charlbury near Oxford when I heard, on the Wednesday breakfast show. I went up to London that day, and went to Rock On in Kentish Town Road for the first time. They were already re-pricing their stock…
“Way Down” wasn’t a bad song, and would probably been a sort of middling hit, but not as successful as “Moody Blue”. Around this time there was a gloriously OTT live version of his “Unchained Melody” floating about (Canadian 7″ on white vinyl), which might have been a better follow-up to this than his rather mediocre (and even then overly cheesy) “My Way”. Even at the tender age of 16 I wondered why the record company didn’t cash in better.
From some of Marcello’s comments, I am surmising he has read Robert Graham and Keith Baty’s terrific “Elvis - The Novel, (The Life He Should Have Led)”, which has him playing with John Lennon, and The Clash, , inventing the cheeseburger, shooting Colonel Tom, being a super-hero in Memphis, appearing in movies such as 1961’s “Little Girls Grow Up Fast and Grope Me” and recording classic, otherwise unknown tracks as “A Life Without Helicopters”, “On My Inflatable Dolphin” and “That Darned Shark.”
Mark G on July 14th, 2008
Yeah, it’s a ’spoof’ very much in the style of a similar one, “Paperback Writer” by Mark Shipper.
FT's richard thompson on August 18th, 2008
It was my 15th birthday and 42 seemed old then, no one at school seemed upset about his death just schoolboy jokes like Elvis died his hair then he died himself, i remember all these teds crying in church in the paper, before there was a church of Elvis in the states, or was there one back then? I found the double top ten show to be educational as well, prefer from the bottom to the top to pick of the pops.