{"id":117876,"date":"2016-06-14T09:59:00","date_gmt":"2016-06-14T13:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=117876"},"modified":"2020-06-18T08:05:04","modified_gmt":"2020-06-18T12:05:04","slug":"r-i-p-chips-moman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=117876","title":{"rendered":"R.I.P. Chips Moman"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/g_mehr1_7037129_ver1.0_640_480.jpg\" alt=\"g_mehr1_7037129_ver1.0_640_480\" width=\"640\" height=\"453\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-117877\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/g_mehr1_7037129_ver1.0_640_480.jpg 640w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/g_mehr1_7037129_ver1.0_640_480-100x71.jpg 100w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/g_mehr1_7037129_ver1.0_640_480-200x142.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/g_mehr1_7037129_ver1.0_640_480-400x283.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><br \/>\n<i>Elvis Presley and producer Chips Moman, American Sound Studio, Memphis, 1969<\/i><\/p>\n<p>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.commercialappeal.com\/entertainment\/music\/music-titan-chips-moman-is-dead-at-79-35315a2e-5feb-5bbe-e053-0100007f82f0-382850711.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">RIP to the great music producer, songwriter, and studio owner Chips Moman<\/a>, who was an essential and crucial part of the thrilling warp-and-weft of the Memphis music scene in the 60s and 70s (and beyond), whose work at STAX resulted in hits for many of the artists (many of whom needed an injection of new energy into their careers &#8211; a Chips specialty). But the list goes on and on. He recorded and produced Dusty Springfield&#8217;s still-legendary album <i>Dusty in Memphis<\/i>. One of Moman&#8217;s gifts was to stroll into the career of an already-developed artist and help them revolutionize themselves, take risks, move into new and bold directions. I mean, come on, Dusty Springfield recorded this album at Moman&#8217;s American Sound:<\/p>\n<p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ZlSIsU9fjuU\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\n<i>Correction: Moman did not produce &#8220;Dusty in Memphis,&#8221; although it was recorded at his studio. The album was produced by Jerry Wexler, Arif Mardin, Tom Dowd.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>Chips Moman is probably most famous for his work with Elvis Presley in a marathon 12-day session in 1969 (the only time they worked together). In 12 days at Chips&#8217; American Sound Studio, Elvis recorded 36 tracks. Yes, you heard right. These tracks are intricate and beautiful, diverse and complex, with amazing orchestration and arrangements. A revolution, especially coming at the tail-end of a decade where his music output was chaotic, random, and dominated by the soundtracks. <\/p>\n<p>Chips Moman ushered (pushed, really) Elvis into a modern sound. An adult male sound. A guy with responsibilities, a daughter, a marriage, a social conscience, an awareness of the world, and relatable human problems &#8211; of which &#8220;Suspicious Minds&#8221; is probably the best example. <\/p>\n<p>Elvis&#8217; songs up until &#8220;Suspicious Minds&#8221; often existed in a generic world of love and puppy-love and horndog-lust. It was his <i>performances<\/i> that made them unique. &#8220;Suspicious Minds,&#8221; though &#8230; it&#8217;s complicated, it&#8217;s dark, it&#8217;s <i>grown up<\/i> in other words and &#8211; perhaps inadvertently &#8211; tapped into the anxiety and paranoia of the late 60s, which ended up have real resonance in the early 70s, with Watergate and all the rest. Suspicion everywhere.  <\/p>\n<p>But all of the tracks still shiver with relevance and freshness, as well as a sense of the risks being taken. Or, maybe you need to know about what a huge risk Elvis was taking putting himself into a newcomer&#8217;s hands &#8230; how &#8220;not done&#8221; that was, how much the Colonel hated\/feared\/resented what was happening, how DIFFERENT Chips was than all the &#8220;Yes Men&#8221; around Elvis &#8230; Once you know all that, the tracks sound even more revolutionary. Elvis taking off the chains that bind. <\/p>\n<p>And so it is no surprise that some of Elvis&#8217; greatest hits &#8211; ever &#8211; were recorded during those 12 days.  Now, &#8220;Hound Dog&#8221; and &#8220;Don&#8217;t Be Cruel&#8221; and &#8220;My Baby Left Me&#8221; and &#8220;Baby, Let&#8217;s Play House&#8221; are in the history books as some of the most important rock &#8216;n&#8217; roll ever recorded, due to how they cracked apart the culture&#8217;s complacency, letting in a tsunami of the New. But when you turn on the radio today, you&#8217;re far more likely to hear &#8220;Suspicious Minds&#8221; than &#8220;Hound Dog.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>In the late 60s, Elvis was perceived as a has-been. People had affection for him still, but The Beatles had arrived, the Stones were rising, the world was changing, and Elvis was trapped in his movie contract, not touring, and his songs &#8211; many of them excellent &#8211; were buried on a mishmash of albums. He was no longer an &#8220;event&#8221;. He put out a gospel album that sold a bazillion copies, but he wasn&#8217;t at the forefront anymore. It drove him crazy, although publicly he was a good sport about it, and did end up covering quite a few Beatles songs.<\/p>\n<p>\n<img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/elvis-looksatbeatlesmag.jpg\" alt=\"elvis-looksatbeatlesmag\" width=\"917\" height=\"765\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-117889\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/elvis-looksatbeatlesmag.jpg 917w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/elvis-looksatbeatlesmag-100x83.jpg 100w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/elvis-looksatbeatlesmag-200x167.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/elvis-looksatbeatlesmag-768x641.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/elvis-looksatbeatlesmag-400x334.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 917px) 100vw, 917px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The 1968 &#8220;comeback special&#8221; was an important signifier of what was to come, and, in that particular situation, producer Steve Binder played a similar role that Chips Moman was to play a year later: making Elvis really GET how much of a &#8220;has-been&#8221; he really was &#8211; or, at least, that that was the perception, and perception is reality. Steve Binder made Elvis go stand outside with him on Sunset Boulevard. People walked by and nobody mobbed Elvis. They didn&#8217;t even turn and look at him and it freaked Elvis OUT. As Dave Marsh said so beautifully in his book (which I talked <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fanofwords.com\/sheila-omalley-interview-fav\/\" target=\"blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">about at length here<\/a>), if there was one thing that Elvis wanted, more than anything else, from the very beginning, it was to be &#8220;an unignorable man.&#8221; After the Sunset Boulevard debacle, Elvis was like, &#8220;Oh hell to the NO&#8221; and proceeded to blow the roof off with his performance in that special. <\/p>\n<p>\n<img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Elvis__Presley_cambeak_special_13.jpg\" alt=\"allvip.us elvis presley comeback special\" width=\"1500\" height=\"886\" class=\"size-full wp-image-117885\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Elvis__Presley_cambeak_special_13.jpg 1500w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Elvis__Presley_cambeak_special_13-100x59.jpg 100w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Elvis__Presley_cambeak_special_13-200x118.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Elvis__Presley_cambeak_special_13-768x454.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Elvis__Presley_cambeak_special_13-400x236.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1500px) 100vw, 1500px\" \/><br \/>\n<i>Elvis Presley during what is now known as the &#8220;comeback special,&#8221; 1968.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>\nChips Moman barged into Elvis&#8217; own complacency, already shattered by the comeback special, during  the recording sessions at American Sound only a couple of months later. He wanted Elvis to move on into the modern world, with new tracks, new songwriters, a new sound, a sound that MOMAN would choose, not Elvis, not the Colonel, not movie people who were financially invested in Elvis doing &#8220;same ol&#8217; same ol.&#8221; Moman was a producer, damned proud of it, and he was not about to be bossed around. HE was in charge of the sessions, not Elvis, not the Colonel, and definitely not Elvis&#8217; entourage. This took some balls, Moman was up against an entire Elvis industry, a rigid monolith at that point, as well as the way Elvis normally worked. Elvis was so talented he took it easy. Even when &#8220;taking it easy&#8221; he was better than most. But when he was pushed? Like Sam Phillips did at Sun? Like Steve Binder did with the television special? Like Chips Moman did in 1969? He moved MOUNTAINS. <\/p>\n<p>The list of songs Elvis recorded at American Sound, under the guidance of Chips Moman, is, frankly, astonishing. Those 12 days resulted in two full albums, the main one being <i>From Elvis in Memphis<\/i> (voted #190 on Rolling Stone&#8217;s list of 500 greatest albums of all time) with tracks to spare. <\/p>\n<p>\n<img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/ftd975060.jpg\" alt=\"ftd975060\" width=\"508\" height=\"511\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-117881\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/ftd975060.jpg 508w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/ftd975060-100x100.jpg 100w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/ftd975060-200x200.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/ftd975060-398x400.jpg 398w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 508px) 100vw, 508px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>\nA short list of tracks on these albums:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Long Black Limousine&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;Kentucky Rain&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;Power of My Love&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;True Love Travels on a Gravel Road&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;Any Day Now&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;Stranger In My Hometown&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;From a Jack to a King&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;You&#8217;ll Think Of Me&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;The Fair&#8217;s Moving On&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;Without Love (I Have Nothing)&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;Rubberneckin'&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;Suspicious Minds&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;In the Ghetto&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>12 days. Remember that. <\/p>\n<p>There have been reams of commentary about those sessions. How Chips worked. How he helped Elvis to focus. How he banished the &#8220;entourage&#8221; from the room. How he got push-back and how he then insisted: this was not the way HE worked, with all of Elvis&#8217; friends on the periphery. And Elvis &#8211; interestingly enough &#8211; was not one of the ones who pushed back. Elvis was an Alpha Dog, all right? He was the #1 Guy in any room he walked into. The musicians at American Sound felt it, and all testify that that was the case. These guys played for everybody and even they were blown away by what Elvis brought, just by walking into a room. But what comes along with true Alpha Dog status (and not the more toxic wanna-be version, where throwing your weight around comes out of insecurity) is that you RECOGNIZE other true Alpha Dogs. And Elvis recognized Chips Moman as the Leader. It took about 20 minutes for Elvis to get it, to realize: &#8220;Oh. Okay. This guy is a little different. This guy is the Alpha in this particular situation. Sure, I&#8217;ll go Beta for him, and save the Alpha Dog stuff for my performances.&#8221; Elvis did just that, and &#8211; in collaboration with Chips Moman &#8211; ushered in yet ANOTHER revolution in Elvis&#8217; revolutionary career. <\/p>\n<p>A small sample of what happened in those twelve days:<\/p>\n<p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Wb0Jmy-JYbA\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<i>Elvis, performing &#8220;Suspicious Minds&#8221; a year later, in Las Vegas<\/i><\/p>\n<p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/kWj6ugyHEnE\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<i>One of Elvis&#8217; sexiest and dirtiest tracks. And that&#8217;s saying something. <\/i><\/p>\n<p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/1Z7lCAw_fhQ\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<i>I have written about this track before and how moving I find it, how essential this track is to understanding Elvis and what he &#8220;brought.&#8221; In Gillian Welch&#8217;s song &#8220;Elvis Presley Blues,&#8221; she writes that when Elvis went onstage his &#8220;soul was at stake.&#8221; That&#8217;s true in the grinding-sex songs, it&#8217;s true in the gospel, and it&#8217;s also true in the ballads, like this one. Stunning performance.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/7xRneCrahEw\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<i>Magnificent. Coming a year after Martin Luther King&#8217;s assassination &#8211; in Memphis, an event which devastated Elvis &#8211; it still carries such depth, such eerie depth<\/i><\/p>\n<p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/2Ox1Tore9nw\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<i>A huge hit. Elvis rarely addressed politics or controversial issues in his music. Not because he didn&#8217;t have political convictions and opinions &#8211; he did &#8211; but because he didn&#8217;t see it as his role in the world. At a press conference before his Madison Square Garden performances, he was asked by a female journalist about his attitude towards &#8220;women&#8217;s lib&#8221; and Elvis replied, simply but firmly, &#8220;Honey, I&#8217;m an entertainer.&#8221; lol He was asked about the Vietnam War and his answer was the same. &#8220;I&#8217;m not going to talk about that.&#8221; He was asked about the controversial situation in the songwriter community, with songwriters pulling their songs out of the publishing companies &#8211; a development that hamstrung people like Elvis who didn&#8217;t write his own stuff. In answer to that question, Elvis lied smoothly, saying he hadn&#8217;t heard about it &#8211; when he most certainly had, and he was extremely concerned about it. But his answer was classic: &#8220;I don&#8217;t know anything about that. I&#8217;ve been in Hawaii workin&#8217; on my suntan.&#8221; Oh, Elvis. THAT&#8217;S a rock star. But here in &#8220;In the Ghetto&#8221;: he addressed cyclical poverty and racism. Having someone like Elvis sing a song about such a topic was extremely radical &#8211; especially in 1969, when America was on fire. Having someone like Elvis sing a song about such a topic was radical then and it&#8217;s radical now. This was Chips Moman&#8217;s influence.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>RIP to Chips Moman. Without him, we wouldn&#8217;t have so much, SO MUCH. His impact has been incalculable. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Elvis Presley and producer Chips Moman, American Sound Studio, Memphis, 1969 RIP to the great music producer, songwriter, and studio owner Chips Moman, who was an essential and crucial part of the thrilling warp-and-weft of the Memphis music scene in &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=117876\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17,23],"tags":[2095],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117876"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=117876"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117876\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":183597,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117876\/revisions\/183597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=117876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=117876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=117876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}