Interesting that some of the people on here crying foul about Elvis being crowned the King Of Rock N Roll are the same people crying foul about other singers being called the King Of Pop instead of Michael Jackson.

pezdispenser said:

He wasn't just an imitator. He LOVED that music and was very respectful of it. And performed it very well. He didn't sing those songs to cash in on the backs of black songwriters and musicians. He did it because he had a passion for the music.

Harlepolis said:

You really are proud of your ignorant racism, aren't you? "Strange Fruit" was written by a Jewish school teacher. Was Billie Holiday ripping of white or jewish people?
[Edited 9/14/06 23:34pm]

NDRU said:

I like Elvis, but his version of Hound Dog is just goofy. :lol.:

Justin1972UK said:

I've wondered about that too. I don't know that he did quite get it. That was still relatively early in his career, and he was a good upstanding, surprisingly sheltered church boy. All it would've taken is someone to lean over and go, "Pst! Hey, E. You know prisons aren't ever co-ed, right?" and we'd have never heard this song from him.

uPtoWnNY said:

That's some very odd logic. According to this, cats like Steve Cropper, Duck Dunn, Jim Stewart, Wayne Jackson and Packy Axton could haver never been part of STAX, "the Memphis Sound", the deepest of all soul music. Were all of the racists because they grew up in the Jim Crow days?

Tessa said:

Like it or not, it took a white face to make that sound mainstream. If it hadn't been Elvis it would've been someone else. It's wrong, but that's how it was.(is)


As a sidenote to this "who owns rock n roll" debate, I think it's important we not forget the influence white hillbilly music had on it either. Rock is everybody's music, dammit.

Harlepolis said:

I really have to disagree with you here. Elvis already had a huge impact when he was still recording his first cuts at the Sun Studio im Memphis. Rufus Thomas, without a doubt one of the true innovators of soul music, was around at Sun at that time and he is known to have said many times how impressed he was by the young Elvis. Even before becoming a big star, Elvis was very respected in the Memphis music scene.That was way before the media hype.

And I am sorry, you are truly insulting the judgement of icons like JB, Jackie Wilson, Al Green, B.B. King, etc when you accuse them of "Uncle Tomming" only because they show their respect for a white artist who you seem to dislike. First you accused the white media of not knowing about black music, and now you accuse true innovators of soul and blues of not knowing their shit either.It seems like that you have made up your mind and nobody would be able to make you think differently.

I am by no means an Elvis fan. I own thousands of records, but I don't have a single Elvis album or 45. And believe me, I've had a hard time accepting that he truly is the legendary artist the media has hyped him to be. It's usually the modern day soul fans who don't know much about the man's legacy and influence who put his legacy down. But people who were around him, saw him or worked with him back in the day think very different. For example, when Elvis was to record an album at Stax studios on McLemore Ave in Memphis in the early 70s, everyone felt honored. And we are talking about cats who have created a serious soul music legacy themselves. Guys like Al Jackson and Steve Cropper were even hoping that Elvis would use them as sidemen on the sessions, because they admired him so much. And don't forget, we are talking about artists who grew up in the same Memphis and who have worked at the same time as Elvis.

James Brown even looked at Elvis as a true Soulbrother, because both of them had their first big hits around the same time, had a very similar and groundbreaking show act for their time. He truly loved Elvis and once said that he would have been much more accepted by the black audience if it wasn't for the seggregation at that time.

I have personally worked with a lot of soul music legends, including James Brown, and I have never heard one bad word about Elvis. None of the artists has ever felt like that "he ripped black people off" or "he stole rock'n roll". There's only admiration and respect.

After doing some research on Elvis, I came to the conclusion that Elvis was simply a white country kid who loved r'n b and gospel music, which was very unusal for a white person at that time, especially in the south. He happened to be very talented, and he happened to be lucky, too, meeting the right people at the right time (i.e. Sam Philips and the Colonel). So do you blame Elvis for taking the chance? At least he took a lot of his money and gave it back to his community in Memphis, black and white.

One word on Timerlake, who gets dissed here a lot as well. Very true, he used to be nothing but a boy group product. But as a kid from Memphis, he has the Memphis soul blood boiling in him. Only recently, he has purchased the entire Stax catalogue from Fantasy Records to make sure the legacy of Stax gets proper respect. That shows that he has true love for soul music and it speaks volumes that it's a white artist who bought the Stax catalogue. Why did no black entertainer buy it, although it was up for sale for years?? Granted, Justin' music is nothing innovative or special, but he's - like Elvis - a white kid who loves soul and funk music. And when he matures and is threw his pop hype, I can see him producing some more serious music.

And guess what, I too am one of those white kids loving soul music. I make my living of soul music as well. Do I steal it? Did Jerry Wrexler, Jim Stewart, Astelle Axton, Dan Penn, Steve Cropper, Duck Dunn, Ahmet Ertegun, Spooner Oldham steal r'n b music because they made their living of it and were not black? I think not. In fact, they've all made a serious contribution and without these people, the legacy of soul music would have been a different one.

Harlepolis said:

I agree with you here. You even forgot the infamous Paul Whiteman (isn't his last name ironic) who dubbed himself "King of Jazz" in the early 30s. And it was also strange that the first Jazz record ever was cut by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band - an all white group.

But the fact is, Elvis never called himself the "King of Rock'n Roll". You cannot blame him for a title the media gave him. Michael Jackson, on the other hand, very happily accepted the term "King of Pop".

Graycap23 said:

To my knowlegde, it wasn't a COVER but IMSPIRED by an earlier Rufus Thomas song of a similar name (I guess Rufus was hung up on dogs).

Tessa said:

MrSoulpower said:

MrSoulpower said:

which was itself a response song to Big Mama Thorton's (?) Hound Dog.

Tessa said:

Elvis didn't do the music cause he had a passion for it. He was the biproduct of CEO's going "if I could find a white guy with the feel of a black guy I could sell a LOT of records!" (this is an exact quote from Leonard Maltin I think but I can't remember the name of the label head he was quoting) He was the first purposefully manufactured "star". Just like Idol. BUT he did have to have a talent for rhythm and a magnetism (ie: good looks for girls).

Hound Dog was a Leiber/Stoller song. I think they wrote it for him. Rufus Thomas' song was a response to this, and was intended to make fun of Elvis. Big Mama Thornton's was a cover recorded after the Leiber/Stoller original was released. It had nothing to do with Elvis or Rufus.
[Edited 9/15/06 1:25am]

pezdispenser said:

The Rufus Thomas song in question was "Bear Cat (Answer to Hound Dog)", released on Sun 181 in 1953. It was actually an "answer" song to the 1952 release "Hound Dog" by Willie Mae "Big Mama" Thornton (on Peacock 1612), not an answer to the Elvis tune, which was released a year after Rufus' tune, in 1954, on Sun 210. Rufus making fun of Elvis therefore is another legend, as his tune was recorded before that of Elvis.
[Edited 9/15/06 1:34am]

Justin1972UK said:

Wow talk about perspective. I will NEVER heard that song the same way again.

Tessa said:

I'm sure he did love the music, but the point is doors were opened to him that would have been closed were his skin a litle darker. Just as with Eminem, his love for hip hop, and his talent are plain to see, but as he said himself in one song, "Hmmm, let's do the math, If I was black I woulda sold half, I didn't have to graduate from Lincoln High to know that!" The same was true for Elvis.

whoknows said:

This is only a half-truth. Back in 1954, whites who "sympathized" with african american music were written off by the white establishment as "lost". While he had it easier than blacks, he took a great risk. Once again, try to put yourself in the Memphis of 1954 and not 2006.

But I do agree that eventually Elvis had it easier after the media couldn't ignore his impact anymore. But this impact would not have happened, had he been without talent. When he was first played on the radio in Memphis, people believed he was black, because he had a "black sound" and he was played on black radio networks. Only through the Colonel he was marketed as a white artist - or he might have ended up in obscurity, like the Mar-Keys.
[Edited 9/15/06 7:14am]

MrSoulpower said:

That phrase "white establishment" is a very vague one. The people who would have scorned him for embracing black music ultimately weren't the ones in charge of the star making machinery. The music industry couldn't have cared less whether or not Elvis was "lost". They knew he would have a much further reach than any black artist at the time could have had. Bill Haley had demonstrated that 18 months earlier and he wasn't even good looking. The phenomenon of white artists scoring with cover versions of black songs was also well underway and clearly very lucrative. You can understand why record execs at the time would have creamed their pants when they saw Elvis.

whoknows said:

True, but it wasn't until the music industry figured out that the white audience (which at that time was considered the only audience) would buy records of a white singer trying to be black that this sound became culturally acceptable. There was (and still is) the industry on one hand, which only knows one color - green. And the society and its culturally acceptable norms.

MrSoulpower said:

Certainly, many were offended by Elvis, but this discussion is more about the unfair advantages given white artists over black ones rather than whether or not those white artists were universally loved. Also, the industry had already figured out there was a market for white artists sounding black before Elvis showed up. Sam Philips had been saying for years if he could find a white boy who "sings like a Negro" he could make a fortune. Rock and roll was also in the mainstream for at least a year before Elvis broke big in 56. Tutti Fruity, Rock Around The Clock, etc had already been massive hits. The industry was poised to find an Elvis; someone good looking, young, and white enough to really capitalise on this new phenomenom. That's not to take anything away from Elvis's talents, but his success and his reputation as The King have not been earned on merit alone.

pezdispenser said:

Why do you assume they manufactured Elvis? His earliest recordings (now called the Sun Sessions, recorded in 1954) are already in that style, and it's doesn't sound like a guy experimenting with a new style, it sounds like a guy who had been doing it for years.

Sam Phillips of Sun records (not exactly a CEO for a major label, but a guy with a tiny studio) supposedly said this, and when Elvis arrived at Sun Records Sam knew he'd found his guy. I think they both got really lucky to have found each other.

Elvis was manufactured later, in the 60's when he made all those ridiculous movies and turned his back on rock & roll in favor of drugs women & money. He made a worthy attempt to save himself artistically in '68, but by then it was too late.
[Edited 9/15/06 11:11am]

whoknows said:

Wow!

Good god almighty

I guess "calling a spade, A SPADE" in this site stirs up the heat.

Well, what do you expect? This is a perfect "different folks with different thoughts" situation.

Am I a "proud ignorant racist" coz I don't relate to most of the stuff thats been said in this thread? So much for freedom of speech

And funny that the word 'racist' get thrown in here loosely(without the least knowledge of its background). Beside, you don't even know me at all to make such a judgement. In fact, none of you do

But hey lol guess I'm not the only one in here who lacks 'prespective'. It takes a lil' honesty to bring the foolishness out of people which is always good, coz then you'll tell whose the square and whose the sharp ones.

MrSoulpower: Soul icons don't speak for me. In fact nobody does. Just becoz they said what they said, don't mean I gotta except it. Regardless, much props to you for sharing your thoughts.

Anyway ya'll!

As you've just acknowledged, this discussion has moved way beyond the initial topic. If the discussion were still simply "Is Elvis great?" then your argument that the white mainstream saw Elvis as "lost" would be irrelavant to that discussion too.
[/quote]
Rock Around The Clock wasn't mainstream??? Tutti Fruity wasn't mainstream?? Elvis himself was pushed into the mainstrream only in 56 with Heartbreak Hotel, by which point the rocka nd roll phenomenon was already in full swing.

MrSoulpower said:

Rock Around The Clock wasn't mainstream??? Tutti Fruity wasn't mainstream?? Elvis was pushed into the mainstream only in 56 with Heartbreak Hotel, by which point the rock and roll phenomenon was already in full swing. Elvis became it's poster boy. Again, that's not dismissing his talent, but just acknowledging the facts.

Harlepolis said:

They don't have to speak for you. They spoke for themselves, and you've called that "Uncle Tomming" because you didn't agree with them. Fact is, it's people with serious credentials, who have worked with Elvis or experienced his work first hand, who give him credit for his legacy. We are talking about soul, blues and funk musicians of all color.

The race card and "he ripped us off"- debate is usually being pulled by people who know very little of him, and - ironically - have not been affected by his work. I used to think like you do - until I actually investigated the man and his legacy. I still don't like his music too much, but I respect him for what he left the world.

whoknows said:

In 1954, rock'n roll had enjoyed some hits. But mainstream? Let's have a look at the most successful songs of the year 1954 (source: Billboard):

"Oh My Papa" - Eddie Fisher
"Secret Love"- Doris Day
"Make Love To Me" - Jo Stafford
"Secret Love" - Doris Day
"Wanted" - Perry Como
"Little Things Mean A Lot" - Kitty Kallen
"Sh-Boom" - Crew-Cuts
"Hey There" - Rosemary Clooney
"This Ole House" - Rosemary Clooney
"I Need You Now" - Eddie Fisher
"Mr. Sandman" - The Chordettes

Doesn't look like rock'n roll to me, more like the whitest white pop America had to offer. In comparism to mainstream America's sound that year, "Hound Dog" sounds like "Cop Killer" compared to "White Christmas".

MrSoulpower said:

Errr, Elvis broke through in 56, so wouldn't it be a bit more appropriate to give us a breakdown for 55 rather than 54. It was in 55 that rock and roll broke through. Giving a best sellers list from the year before that is disingenuous to put it mildly.

MrSoulpower said:

Wrong again! Because they generalized a WHOLE group into being influenced by Elvis.

"every black solo entertainer copied his stage mannerisms"

Disneylandish to the 8th power

whoknows said:

We were talking about when Elvis recorded first and released his first material, and that was "That's alright Mama" in 1954. In 1956, Elvis already dominated the charts - which proves my point.