Elvis Presley

Almost everybody believes Elvis Presley "made" his songs. He wrote almost none of them.

And knowing that does not diminish him: it explains him. Elvis was not a songwriter, he was an interpreter, and one of the greatest who has ever lived. He took other people's songs and, with his voice, his body and a magnetism that cannot be taught, turned them into something new: into the sound of an entire era.

His first professional recording, "That's All Right", was a cover. So was "Hound Dog", the one that hit like an earthquake in 1956. His gift was not writing the song; it was a very rare alchemy: taking someone else's tune and transforming it into a moment in history.

The other half of the gift

That gift was real and it was scarce. But it cannot be told honestly without the other half.

A good deal of what Elvis transformed came from Black blues and rhythm and blues artists. "That's All Right" belonged to Arthur Crudup; "Hound Dog" to Big Mama Thornton, who for her original version received a single cheque for five hundred dollars. And all of it happened in a segregated United States, where a white boy could carry that music to radio stations, stages and audiences that were barred to the people who had created it.

Elvis loved that music, grew up with it and genuinely revered it. And at the same time he benefited from a colour line he did not invent, but which opened doors for him that stayed shut to others. Both things are true: he was a genuine channel that carried Black music to white America, and he was the beneficiary of an injustice. Here we do not pick one to cover up the other; both stay on the table.

The fire, in any case, crossed every border. In Chile, a fourteen-year-old Austrian boy fell in love with him and recorded the country's first rock and roll.

The King who said no

There is one gesture of his that sets him apart from almost any star.

On 20 December 1957, a few weeks after "Jailhouse Rock" had spent seven weeks at number one, his draft notice arrived. He was the most famous man in the country. The easy road was right there: the Army offered him a place in Special Services, singing for the troops, staying a star in uniform.

He said no. He served as an ordinary soldier, for almost two years, posted to Germany, giving up the highest point of his career. In the middle of that time his mother, Gladys, the person he loved most in the world, died.

The King set down the crown and picked up a rifle like any ordinary lad.

A song from the same side

Twelve years later, John Fogerty wrote "Fortunate Son" with Creedence Clearwater Revival, one of the greatest protest anthems in history.

It is sung in the first person by someone who makes it clear he does not belong to the privileged class: he is no senator's son, not one of the fortunate from birth. It is the voice of the poor boy sent to Vietnam to put his body on the line while the ones with money and connections find a way to wriggle out of it.

The song does not name Elvis, but Elvis was exactly that unfortunate son. He came from no cradle of privilege; he was a desperately poor boy from Tupelo who had risen from the very bottom to become king. When he was called up, he had no senator father to fix him a cushy posting. His fame would certainly have been enough to hide behind, and he did not use it.

Fogerty sang for the ones who put their bodies on the line while those at the top wriggle out. Elvis was one of the ones who put his on the line. And Fogerty earned the right to sing it: he himself received his draft notice and served in the reserve.

Was it all marketing? Around it, yes, there was an image play: his manager, "Colonel" Tom Parker, stage-managed every photograph of Elvis in uniform. But almost two years in Germany, with his career on hold and his mother dying in the middle of it, are not something you endure for a campaign. That it was gift-wrapped does not erase the fact that Elvis really did go.

The man beneath the crown

What came afterwards was sadder.

John Lennon let fly a cutting line: "Elvis died when he went into the army." It was not entirely fair, but it was not entirely false either. He came back, made a heap of forgettable films, had a glorious television comeback in 1968, and then came Las Vegas, the rhinestone suits and the myth.

And little by little, the loneliness: the pills, the seclusion, the weight, the wear and tear of being the most famous man on the planet without being able to walk down the street.

Even so, right to the end the boy he had once been showed through in the small details. Priscilla Presley has said the King did not collect expensive fragrances: he always wore the same cologne, one from the chemist's, the kind any bloke from the neighbourhood might wear. With all his fortune, faithful to a cheap bottle.

He died on 16 August 1977 at Graceland, aged forty-two. The interpreter who had given a generation its voice ended up alone, consumed by his own legend.

Remembering all of him

Elvis did not write his songs. He did something rarer and harder to explain: he took what already existed and made it everyone's, made it an era. And with his life he did something similar with a duty: he took the most ordinary obligation of any citizen and, being the King, fulfilled it as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

If you put on "Hound Dog" or "Jailhouse Rock", you are not listening to a songwriter. You are listening to an alchemist, the man who turned other people's songs into the pulse of the fifties. He deserves to be remembered whole: the alchemist, the soldier, the unfortunate son who did not hide, and the lonely man beneath the crown.

Sources

Elvis Aaron Presley (Tupelo, Mississippi, 8 January 1935 – Memphis, Tennessee, 16 August 1977). He was essentially an interpreter, not a songwriter: his first single, "That's All Right" (1954), is a version of the song by Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup, and "Hound Dog" (1956) is a version of the rhythm and blues number recorded by Big Mama Thornton in 1952; much of his early repertoire adapted music by African American artists, in the context of racial segregation in the United States. "Jailhouse Rock" reached number one on Billboard in October 1957 and stayed there for seven weeks. He received his draft notice on 20 December 1957, obtained a deferment to finish filming "King Creole", entered the Army on 24 March 1958 and left active service in March 1960, after being posted to Germany; he declined the option of serving in Special Services as an entertainer for the troops. His mother, Gladys, died in August 1958. His manager, "Colonel" Tom Parker, handled his image during his service. "Fortunate Son" (1969), by John Fogerty for Creedence Clearwater Revival, from the album "Willy and the Poor Boys", is a protest against class privilege during the Vietnam War; Fogerty was called up and served in the Army Reserve at bases in the United States. The line "Elvis died when he went into the army" is attributed to John Lennon. The 1968 television special marked his return to live performance. Priscilla Presley has said in interviews that Elvis wore a drugstore cologne. He died aged 42 at Graceland; his decline was associated with isolation and the use of prescription drugs. Externally authored text, edited and verified for Rebobinados. Interpretations of the meaning of his work are offered as the author's reading. No song lyrics are reproduced, for copyright reasons. Information drawn from Wikipedia, History, Fox News, Ultimate Classic Rock and other press coverage.