42 years ago today, Elvis Presley died.
We will always miss someone who sings like their “soul is at stake,” to quote Gillian Welch’s haunting song. Almost no one lives every moment – onstage or off – like their “soul is at stake.”
As Dave Marsh wrote in his Elvis book:
There is no explanation. And if one listens closely to songs like “Hurt” and “I Can Help” and “If I Can Dream” – if one listens clear back to “Mystery Train” and “Blue Moon” – that’s what is truly heard: A voice, high and thrilled in the early days, lower and perplexed in the final months, seeking answers where there are none, clarity where there is none, cause where is only effect.
Somewhere, out of all this, Elvis began to seem like a man who had reached some conclusions. And so he was made into a god and a king. He was neither – he was something more American and, I think, something more heroic. Elvis Presley was an explorer of vast new landscapes of dream and illusion. He was a man who refused to be told that the best of his dreams would not come true, who refused to be defined by anyone else’s conceptions.
This is the goal of democracy, the journey on which every prospective American hero sets out. That Elvis made so much of the journey on his own is reason enough to remember him with the honor and love we reserve for the bravest among us. Such men are the only maps we can trust.
Elvis was a man who knew he had a talent and he lived his life to the full on an off the stage but for him there comes a time when he was making changes in his life, as late as 1977 these changes were happening, new Girlfriend Ginger Alden people leaving his inner group, new music movies maybe for him to explore! Then he passed away so sudden, left
this World but he is still here! through his family friends, and his Fans always xxx
Myra xxxxx
“37 years ago today, Elvis Presley died.”
If that was posted in 2015, surely that would be “38 years ago today, Elvis Presley died.”
Cheers, Piers. http://www.ElvisInfoNet.com
Ha! Yes, of course. Thanks!
Love his descriptions of who Elvis was and what he did.
Gillian Welch is wonderful. She seems transported from the 60s to me, in a really good way. I say Happy Ruination Day every April 14 and nobody knows what I’m talking about.
Happy ruination day! Ha!
She is definitely the real deal.
ELVIS WAS A VERY SPECIAL HUMAN BEING AND AN EXTRAORDINARY ARTIST. I BELIEVE WE’LL NEVER SEE ANOTHER LIKE HIM ANY MORE. I’M LIVING TO SEE THE DAY HE’LL HAVE THE SAME EXPOSURE THE BEATLES HAVE IN THE WORLD’S MEDIA, OR MAYBE MORE, WHICH HE FULLY DESERVES. BY THE WAY, WHY DO WE HAVE COMPLAINTS THAT HE NEVER WROTE ANY SONGS, AND WE HEAR NOTHING ABOUT SINATRA? AND WHY WE’RE TOLD HE TOOK POSSESSION OF BLACK MUSIC AND NEVER HEAR A WORD ABOUT THE BEATLES’ USE OF AMERICAN MUSIC? I THINK THAT THE ANSWER TO THE LAST QUESTION WOULD BE OBVIOUS AND RIDICULOUS AND THE RESULT OF AN ABSURD QUESTIONING THAT IS BEING MADE NOW AND THEN. KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK. THANK YOU.