The Year of Living Elvisly

Too Much Monkey Business

2012-01-07T17:00:00.000Z

Bequiffed Elvis monkey of Kachin
The Elvis monkey is among a couple of hundred species previously unknown to those that know about these things highlighted in a new WWF report on the Greater Mekong area of South East Asia. It might also be reported as the noseless Michael monkey no?

Too much monkey business for me...

My friends say I'm acting wild as a bug...

2011-04-06T11:23:00.000+01:00

Elvis Presley's Face Seen On Bug!!!
It's well known that Elvis has been seen many times since his 'death', but could Elvis actually have been reincarnated? Maybe all those little bad deeds sent him down the scale a few stops (see Greil Marcus's fabulous Dead Elvis for a discussion of Elvis - devil or angel?).

Winston Jansen's Stinkbug Elvis

Amateur photographer Winston Jansen of Singapore fortunately had his camera handy for this extraordinary siting. The stinkbug, wondering around the 'forests' (according to The Telegraph) clearly has Elvis's face. Perhaps it's evolutionary - no longer do bugs try and scare off predators, they entertain them.

Picture: Winston Jansen, filched, with love.

Welcome To My World 5: Finland, Finland, Finland,

2011-04-01T15:58:00.000+01:00

The country where I want to be...

As Monty Python once said of the northerners with a long term love of the King and his influence on Finnish music is apparently quite strong. You may remember the eccentric professor whose album of Elvis covers in Latin made the world news (future post).

So, when I came across a notice for the imminent release of Elvis: Suomessa in Finland (Elvis in Finland) I asked contemporary archaeologist and Finophile James Dixon to pick up a copy for me on his summer trip. I confess that I did not realise until it arrived that the album that James sent me, Elvis: Suomessa in Finland, is actually volume 2. Volume 1, released just before Christmas 1987, featured Finnish Elvis covers from the 1960s, and represented Elvis’ early popularity in a Finland that was, like the rest of Europe, going through extreme social change. Volume 2 continues where 1 left off, but with only a few 1960s hits, before we move into the 1970s and ‘80s and then the ‘90s. It “wishes to celebrate the long road of The Official Fan Club of Finland”, 25 years of keeping Elvis alive in Finland.

The cover of this wonderful compendium features a superimposed Elvis head on a neatly suited man who has a map held out and is asking directions from a 1960s Finnish policeman. They are standing outside Helsinki’s marvellous Helsingin päärautatieasema (Central station), designed by the great Finnish national romantic architect, Eliel Saarinen, who abandoned his original design for modernism. Elvis wasn’t Finnish, and never went to Finland, but if he’d got there he would have felt comfortable enough in his beige suit to ask for directions from a friendly cop. The back cover shows Elvis, jacket nonchalantly thrown over one shoulder, sitting in Senaatintori square. A Finnish Jackie O lookalike stares opened mouthed, her sunglasses in her hand.

Some of the songs are straight covers – complete with exact fade-out, if slightly more plucky guitars, like Eero Raittinen’s tribute to Elvis, Epailet Vain (Suspicious Minds). Others are much more, um, Finnish? I love drawling, plucky, Loputon Blues (A Mess of Blues) by Topi Sorsakoski. Topi didn’t know the song, and when the band started singing it, he said “Is this an Elvis song?”. Jussi, the singer “looked at me and went: ‘F****ng hell!'”, it says in the liner notes, although when I compare with the Finnish version, actually what Jussi said was “v**u, -tana!”. Translations on a postcard please. But the first track is my true favourite, growly, roary, whoopy, fun and just a little bit dark – Kaikki Hyvin Mama (That’s Alright Mama) recorded by Rauli Badding Somerjoki in 1985. He died in 1986 a proper rock'n'roll death. And Ma Eroon Paase En (Gonna Get Back Somehow), recorded by Danny in 1968 is so fabulously late-60s, its almost unrecognisable as an Elvis song. Not sure why, but I like that. All in all, it’s a really fun album. Lots of steel guitar, wah wah, lounge sounds, echo microphones, and Finns!

Big thanks: James Dixon and Saini Manninien

Just for Old(ham) Time Sake

2011-02-01T19:32:00.002Z

Grumpy old Elvis fails to win Oldham & Saddleworth by-election
The Bus Pass Elvis Party (also known as the Militant Elvis Anti-Tesco Popular Front, Elvis Defence League, Elvis Turns Green Party, Grumpy Old Elvis Party, Elvis & The Yeti Himalayan Preservation Party) failed to really make an impact on the Oldham & Saddleworth by-election, winning only 67 votes, despite a set of manifesto pledges that would turn a lib-dem green with envy then red with rage (before he changed his mind).

David Bishop, aka. Lord Biro, of Nottingham did have stiff competition however - never mind quite a strong Labour candidate, Loz Kaye, from Manchester, standing for the Pirate Party Of The United Kingdom, and a candidate named The Flying Brick, from Ashbourne, Derbyshire, for The Official Monster Raving Loony Party. Bishop is a retired painter decorator, now a poet and artist.

The Bus Pass Elvis Party also failed to win Kettering in the general election, stood at Tatton, and is generally an example to us all. Hopefully it is making some headway in this fabulous campaign:

Thanks: Emma Dwyer
Pics: http://lordbiro.wordpress.com/about/
Hear: Elvis singing Just For Old Time's Sake

Merry Christmas Baby (2)

2010-12-24T22:33:00.001Z

Gold lame Elvis found in crib!

It’s that time of year again. The Daily Mail has given out its Elvis sings Christmas cd, free! with the poisonous rag. Perhaps you are playing it now as the turkey roasts and the snow turns to ice. The fire is aglow. The tree is overburdened with tatty decorations made by small children, and surrounded in torn wrapping paper.

And in the Graves-Brown household, fimo golden Elvis has taken his rightful place at the cribside in the Nativity scene, replacing last year's Jailhouse Elvis. In these days of austerity and cuts, how joyous that an extra position has been created, and one of more substance and respectability. After all, we need all the wise men we can get.

An Elvisy Christmas to one and all.

Thanks: PGB

Welcome To My World 4: Farhad Darya in Helmund

2010-11-30T22:58:00.000Z

Home Is Where The Heart Is: peace and love and the Afghan Elvis
John Simpson seems to think that he was the one that liberated Kabul, but Farhad Darya might also stake the claim. It was his song, Kabul Jaan, that was played over Radio Afghanistan announcing the fall of the Taliban and the liberation of the city. He became a peace and goodwill ambassador, representing Afghanistan at home and abroard. Farhad Darya has been living in the USA since 1995, having left Afghanistan as an exile in 1990.

Why he has been dubbed the Afghan Elvis, I'm not entirely sure. Patriotism and global reknown I suppose. I'm not really sure it's that apt - I think he might just be Farhad Darya - an exiled Middle Eastern superstar who has infused his enthusiasm for his homeland into his very successful music. Music which finds a home among the millions of exiled Middle Easterners across the world. Farhad wears his beliefs on his record sleeves, and has contributed to the recent album of music by musicians who have been persecuted or exiled from their homelands, Listen to the Banned. He has recently started a tour of Afghanistan, despite the dangers that accompany such a venture: Farhad's concert in Herat on the 30th September was bombed, wounding many, and the Taliban has started a recent campaign of attacks on music shops. But on Friday 19th, Farhad Darya performed at the Karzai Stadium in Lashkar Gah, Helmand Province, in front of 5000 fans; one of the biggest events to take place in Afghanistan.

Tickets were distributed free. Karzai himself, who had intended to go, instead opted for Nato in Lisbon. British forces have claimed the success of the concert as testiment to the success of their presence - very few British troops were present, while the British trained Afghan National Police took control.

The chief of police claimed Farhad's presence as a sign of the safety of the city. But surely, it's testament to an indefatigable patriot who thinks globally and acts Elvisly.

Welcome To My World (3): Chile underground

2010-11-23T11:27:00.000Z

Mine! Elvis underground
Edison Pena, 34, spent nearly four months 700 metres down in the San Jose mine, in Chile's Atacama desert this year, after tunnels collapsed. He was lifted out, 14th of 33, on October 13th in a claustrophobic capsule to face friends, family and round-the-clock media.

Edison conquered some of his fear and panic by running - up to eight kilometres a day - through the mine's tunnels in his boots and helmet with lamp. When contact was made, and after essentials - food, water and clothing - were sent down to the men, they were able to ask for other items. Among that material was Elvis music, requested by Edison Pena. It's a moot point as to whether Edison wanted it as sing-song material to keep the spirits of his team up, or whether he wanted to retreat into an Elvis acoustic bubble.

On emerging from his incarceration in the Earth Edison Pena was invited to run the New York marathon - which he completed in under six hours - not bad for someone who's been 700 metres underground for most of the training period. Before his run, he appeared on the Late Show with David Letterman. On being asked about Elvis, he mimicked listening to the King on headphones, he liked to listen alone, and sang a few bars of Suspicious Minds. As the studio band's keyboard player picked up the tune, Edison was quick to respond, and stood up to perform (go to 3:48 if you just want Elvis, watch the whole thing if you want a bit more - sanitation, the vernacular use of 'funky'). Last night, he performed Summer Nights alongside Olivia Newton-John (who incidentally went to my school) at a concert in Santiago. He's now been invited to Graceland with a significant other for Elvis' birthday in 2011.

Pic credit: Worldwide Pants

While underground, Pena engaged in correspondence with the BBC's Panorama team. In one of his letters, very often full of darkness and anxiety, he wrote: "I think that now I'm more human. I think I'm loving everybody more, I believe in touching people. I think I love myself much more." In running the marathon, he wanted to encourage people to do what they can do. It's a hazy but rather wonderful philosophy. Think globally, act Elvisly.

Pics: http://www.batangastoday.com/chilean-miner-edison-pena-on-the-late-show-with-david-letterman/5251/ and http://www.sustainabilityninja.com/eco-news/chilean-miner-edison-pena-finishes-new-york-city-marathon-44077/

Welcome To My World part 2: Transfrontera-MexAmerica-Everywhere

2010-11-20T17:17:00.000Z

Think globally but act Elvisly: El Vez at the 100 Club
"Live it up and love it up, amigo, life begins when you're in Mexico" says Elvis in Fun in Acapulco, but for many Mexicans, life is about getting by, US style, within and without the confines of the borderlands and the grey areas of hypocritical immigration policy: "Yes I'm trying to go, get out of Mexico" sings one of El Vez's personae in his take on Suspicious Minds. El Vez - also known as the Mexican Elvis - hadn't toured England for ten years so it was a rare privelege to have him in Oxford Street's legendary 100 Club on a balmy June night. El Vez with a twist because this fifty-year-old King is returning to his roots. El Vez was touring with his tribute to Kiss, in preparation for a tour of Spain supporting the band.


Little Kiss from El Vez's website: http://www.elvez.net/evFrameset.html

Now, if you're a little jaded by late Elvis delivered in jumpsuits compered by convicted fraudsters, here is an agile, hilarious, talented, sartorially splendid and political Elvis with cojones. Political? Did I say political? Yes! So political he ran for president in 2008 and will do so again in 2012: El Vez for Prez - according to the Mayan Calendar 2012 is also the end of the world! So, Vote for EL VEZ ... what do you have to lose?!?!? is the campaign mantra. "If there's any hope for America, it lies in revolution; if there's any hope for revolution it lies in Elvis Presley becoming Che Guevara." El Vez is the next best thing.

The crowd at the 100 Club are a mixed bag - a few glamorously adorned 50s-stylettes with their chaps, a rock chick who may not exactly be willing but is dutifully humouring her Kiss-tattooed rocker boyfriend. A few long-standing El Vez fans who may have been waiting ten years for this. There are no apparent Welsh female Elvis fans but who knows? On come the Elvettes - El Vez's version of Mills & Boon - two matching very lovely backing singers, one older - she's been with him for years, and one younger, a recent exile from the world of academic animal sciences apparently - and the Memphis Mariachis, El Vez's band. Then bounds on the man himself - Robert Lopez - who's punk beginnings are ever present in the energy and attitude of the show. He's all gold suited and beautifully accessorised by the Elvettes. He kicks off with a phrenetic whiz through Chicanized Elvis - Huaraches Azules (Blue Suede Shoes), then Burning Love, then His Latest Flame (Marie's the Name) or Mara se llama su neuva flame, which morphs into the Ting Ting's That's Not My Name and then into Hey Mickey.

As El Vez shape-changes into James Brown, and break-dances The Night Train, those still expecting an ETA are surely combusted or converted. Then he's off again. The Mariachis and the Elvettes keep the beat and then the girls are off too, but there's no let-up. El Vez is back, in gltzy blue, followed by the girls. The tempo calms, and we are given that impersonator favourite, In The Ghetto, oh hold on, En El Barrio. In El Barrio, Estaban cruises, joins a gang, for there's one thing that he can't stand, and that's to have to join a Mariachi band, en el barrio. Then from Bossa Nova we go to Champagne super novas and then back to the ghetto, you gotta work to keep up with El Vez. In "'Think Globally, But Better to Act Elvisly': Elvis and El Vez", Hanjo Berressem has written that El Vez's hybrid musical flexibility, with its nuanced appropriation of anyone from Toni Basil to Oasis to mariachi to metal, is a "a pleasurable camp process: a joyous mixture of images, in which the blurring of representational and cultural borders allows for a critical position that operates from within the predominant images and thus out of the host cultures. The camp identity is that of a multiply split personality, operating in the over-coded no man's land between cultural lines and demarcations." We can argue about Americanization and globalization, but these are borderlines that we recognise. It is a pleasurable camp process, but in no way a light one. Camp has a history of transgressive reflexivity and reflectivity.

You ain't nothing but a chi-hua-hua. Then he's a tiger, then he's in leather. The Elvettes strut their stuff. And then after a brief detour via the Clash and Alice Cooper, we get started on Kiss, Black Diamond. The excited Kiss boyfriend shows the Elvettes his ink, including a giant KISS across his back.

El Vez decries the US immigration policies. Not least in a reworked Suspicious Minds in which the young Mexican wannabe immigrant is caught in the wire fence:-

I'm caught in a trap, I can't walk out

Because my foot's caught in this border fence.

Why can't you see, Statue of Liberty,

I am your homeless, tired and weary.

We can grow on together, it's Immigration Time.

And we can build our dreams, it's Immigration Time.

The Elvettes are splendidly statuesque, El Vez is in starts and stripes. Tonight, his response to Arizona's draconian anti-immigration policy which allows police to violate civil liberties willy nilly, is delivered in the vehicle of Nina Simone's Mississippi Goddamn, or Arizona Goddamn. El Vez uses Elvis (e los otres) as a recognisable and blank plate in which to surreptitiously, but also extravagantly place another kind of all-American dish - one that is peculiarly palatable to the sector of society that claim a protestant pedigree, but oddly unrecognised where it concerns the workforce that are really 'taking care of business' - the labour forces who are often drawn from immigrant labour.

Walking out, after a last blast of mariachi music, in case we forget, into the warm Oxford Street night, El Vez's good-humoured but culturally and globally prescient mission is still ringing in my ears, in the heart of London's music-land, I wonder who is this super-human ubermensch, so culturally situated yet so universal? I leave the definition to Michelle Habell-Pallan:

He has ‘r-o-c-ked across the USA and all over Europe’, and is referred to as both a ‘modern multicultral hybrid of Americana and Mexicano’and a ‘Cross-Cultural Caped Crusader singing for Truth, Justice and the Mexican-American way’. Rolling StoneMagazine considers him to be ‘more than an Elvis Impersonator ... He is an Elvis translator, a goodwill ambassador of Latin Culture’ in the US and Europe. He is the long lost Chicano punk rock hero who has found his way home to Graciasland, Aztlán, USA; the Pocho Elvis, one who can’t speak Spanish, but ‘loves la, la, la raza’; the revolutionary Latin lover who makes alienated Hispanics proud to be MexAmerican. He is the thin brown duke who makes explicit the connection between Elvis Presley, David Bowie, César Chávez and Ché Guevara in Las Vegas inspired espectáculos (spectacles).


El Vez touches my chest

Thanks: Angie
Pics: Pen77, except where stated
Refs: Hanjo Berressem, 2001, "'Think Globally, But Better to Act Elvisly': Elvis and El Vez" in Amerikastudien/American Studies, 46: 3, 436.
Michelle Habell-Pallan, 1999, "El Vez is 'Taking Care of Business': the Inter/National Appeal of Chicano Popular Music" in Cultural Studies, 13: 2, 195-210.
Josef Raab, 2003, "Symbiose, Hybridisierung und Entgrenzung in der Zeitgenossischen Mexikanisch-Amerikanisch Kultur" in Abgrenzen oder Entgrenzen: Zur Produktivitat von Grenzen, Markus Bieswanger et al. IKO. 171-195

Welcome To My World: World Cup extra!

2010-11-03T17:56:00.001Z

Paul the Octopus, the eight-tentacled thwarter of football dreams, aqueous predictor of scores, ultramarine World Cup pundit, has an agent who works hard. Says he (the agent, I doubt the octopus can speak which may thwart the cephalopod yet),

“One of the most exciting things is that he has a record deal in place for an album, called Paul The Octopus Sings Elvis.”

I have nothing further to add.

Source: http://www.worldcupblog.org/world-cup-2010/paul-the-octopus-does-elvis.html

Welcome To My World: International Elvis

2010-11-01T00:11:00.002Z

Part 1: Elvis World Cup, Cardiff, 4th July 2010

Firstly, I must apologise for my absence - my computer broke. Now, we're back in action I am starting a short series of posts on Elvis, here, there, everywhere. I've already mused on the King's Irishness, and a little on his appeal to the Welsh. Wales, there's a good place to start. Wales in the context of the Elvis World Cup.

Behind every succesful Elvis enterprise in these isles is an amiable chap in a Hawaiian shirt. His name is Peter Phillips and he has it well wrapped up in Wales. Wales, with its natural resource pool of Elvis fans is just so, well, Elvisy.

So it was that an unwitting photographer from Brockley ended up driving me to Cardiff one July day on the (as it happens unfulfilled) promise that we might get to see the sea. In the week preceeding, Tredegar, Porthcawl, Cardiff and Bridgend had hosted various Elvii performances. The day before, an open-top bus toured Cardiff with an awful lot of Elvis wigs, aviators and jump-suits.We arrived for the final. St David's Hall wasn't full exactly full - Wales is suffering from the recession - but a jolly crowd of the usual suspects for this kind of thing. Yes, the Welsh women in abundance - home territory.

There were supposed to be twelve Elvii, but Simon 'The Rebel' Patrick, mysteriously representing Spain, was a no-show. Perhaps their success in the football World Cup had waylaid him somewhere. Or perhaps he just wasn't Spanish.

Each Elvis gets two songs on each, there's already been a gospel heat and an 'own song' heat. They're judged on movement, stage performance, singing, and their overall tribute. Then the judges - led by Executive Judge, Terri Grant, 'the most respected Elvis judge in the business' - narrow it down to three. They get another chance and then we have a winner. 'Elvis is gone,' says Terri in the programme notes, 'We are not looking for perfection, but someone who has put together a respectful tribute to Elvis'. Terri has been judging Elvis competitions independently for ten years now so she should know. Your compere for the evening is after-dinner speaker, Brian Voyle-Morgan.

Dean Mack, representing Wales, isn't there either - but you couldn't have the home nation Elvis-less, so Darren 'Graceland' Jones of Cymbran steps into the breach. Darren 'Graceland' Jones isn't very mobile. But those jumpsuits can be difficult customers. [Nevertheless, Terri says 'getting the moves right and relevant is important'.]

USA: James Wages. 47, from Texas. Up first, 'from the home of the brave and the land of the free' says, Voyle-Morgan, it's the 4th of July after all. Wages has been Elvising in Wales and sees some similiarities with Afghanistan, Merthyr Tydfil is a bit like Helmand province. This quip doesn't stop someone shouting "Sexy!" which is funny since my notes say "good but not sexy". There's no accounting dor taste. He wishes all his Elvis brothers luck and sings Polk Salad Annie and I'll Remember You. He's in a red jump suit and is older than Elvis ever was. He does the old scarf ritual to the detriment of the mental health of two young boys, one of whom gets a scarf while the other is stuck in a spotlight as Wages retreats, having run out of scarves.

Australia: Mark Andrew. Age 43 of Melbourne. 12,500 miles to sing Elvis in Cardiff. Not the worst trip in the world, said Brian Voyle-Morgan. Now, Polk Salad Annie, by Tony Joe White, was a staple Elvis number in the live shows of the 1970s and it is a staple of the Cardiff World Cuppers. As is Mark's other offering You've Lost That Loving Feeling.

Canada: James Gibb. Age 39, from Ontario. James has a great voice but he makes an odd Elvis.

England: Paul Molloy. 39 from Lancashire, currently residing in Manchester. Elvis got Paul back on track according to the notes, so the sinister shout, and the even more sinister way it silently sinks in, of (Welsh accent) 'David Cameron!', is a bit cruel. 'I think you came to the wrong theatre', he sweetly comes back. But never mind, the England flags are up and he does a rousing Heartbreak Hotel and Houndog. If I were Terri (who has big hair, big glasses and looks fierce) I wouldn't think he was mobile enough.

Germany: Oliver Steinhoff. Age, nevermind age, height: GIANT. The woman behind me, who is large herself, sighs, as Oliver does a gravitationally challenging pelvic thrust, 'Oh yes'. He's in a white suit and when he does the hackneyed 'I hope this suit don't tear up baby' during Suspicious Minds, I hope not too; I don't expect High & Mighty stock too many. And in case you're interested, he's also 39.

Oliver Steinhoff: Lichtburg Essen 25.01.2010

Ireland: Tom Gilson. Age, 40. We know him remember? The winner of the Irish nationals at Bundoran. 'Elvis means everything' says Tom, 'respect and consideration'. He's in his gold lame with a nice pair of white shoes. He moves like, like, er, Elvis! His Blue Moon of Kentucky and That's Alright Mama get everyone going. The Irish flags come out, unfortunately obscuring the judge's view.

South Africa: James Marais. 37 from Kraaifontein, Cape Town. What does Elvis mean to James? "Everything! He is why I am, and what I am, today." James does serious leg-jiggling and has purpose. He's in a white tassly suit and is big. He sings That's Alright and Lovin' You.

After-dinner speaker, Brian Voyle-Morgan introduces the band, Red Alert. "They don't play period instruments," says the photographer. It's true they don't, and maybe they should. He introduces the backing singers, "The two finest white backing singers", which doesn't sound as good as he intended. Mills & Boon hoist up their boobs and roll up the sleeves of their cardigans, and say "We are in fact black." They are in fact splendid. Is there a fan club? I may join. He compounds my dislike at this point by making a hilarious joke about how you couldn't possibly have lady Elvii. Possibly Terri would combust and St David's mightn't be the place, but by that token, can we really have 47-year old Elvii, or giant Elvii? Just throwing it out there, along with this from Elvis Herselvis: "Straight men are very intimidated by a woman impersonating Elvis. It is one of the last bastions of masculinity - the right to 'do' Elvis. ... I personally think he was very queeny, in the 1950’s he wore make-up and pink, on stage when that was unheard of behaviour for a straight man."

Italy: Ricky Rogers. 25 from Abergavenny. Yes Abergavenny, now living in Rhymney. Not Rimini, Rhymney. What to tell you about Ricky? He's in Comeback leathers, and occasionally there are flashes of Elvisy rrrrrr from Ricky, but then he loses his nerve and pulls his jacket down as if he's worried his belly's showing. Viva! Says Ricky, who does have a lot of home (Welsh) support here. Mills & Boon - you remember them from Bundoran too don't you? - are having fun. Yes, despite the ill-fitting leathers, Ricky is popular. Hound Dog and All Shook Up. Earlier, Ricky sang Heartbreak Hotel off the top of a bus. In the daytime he works in Ebbw Vale cash'n'carry. He's second generation Italian and was turned on to Elvis after watching Jailhouse Rock. He's rocked ever since really.

Malta: Gordon Elvis. 26 from Naxxar, now living in Tamworth. For Gordon, Elvis was a 'great loving man' and for Cardiff, Gordon appears to be the popular underdog. He is certainly the skinniest Elvis I've seen; in his white jumpsuit there's nothing to him, it might all slide down his non-existant snakehips if he keeps moving (tick) like that. He sings Walk a Mile in my Shoes and Bridge Over Troubled Waters and my companion says, 'here's the funny thing, I've got goosebumps'. Gordon has a fabulous voice. You can hear it and see him dancing here.

Scotland: Johnny Lee Memphis. 35, from Coalsnaughton, where he runs a health and fitness centre. We've met him before, downing gin before winning over Donegal. Johnny has a fanatical aunt Helen who introduced him to the music of Elvis, and Elvis is like the uncle he's never met, that he respects, loves and follows in the footsteps of. So Johnny Lee Memphis is in a tiger jump-suit, grr. He delivers a Big Boss Man and a My Way that do put him top of the league, if not in a league of his own.

We have a little break and Mike Nova - Bossa Nova Elvis - does a little turn. And then the judges are ready. Terri has spoken. We are down to three. Brian lines up the boys. It's not a suprise that Johnny Lee makes the break, and then Tom Gilson, who really has the monopoly on rock'n'roll Elvis. And here, Terri seems to have gone for ol' snake-hips - Maltese Elvis! It's a popular choice. He does have a terrific voice. They all get another number, and the pressure's on, they all pull a little extra out of the hat. Tom does a splendid Jailhouse Rock. Gordon Elvis gives us Polk Salad Annie (again), and his tassly belt slips off, "Come on you Malteser!!" someone screams. But Johnny, arrogant and catlike in his total self-belief delivers a flawless I Got a Woman with plenty of movement, stage performance (playing the crowd and the band), great singing and therefore his overall tribute is by far and away the best. Yes, you guessed it. Scotland has won the World Cup! "I can't believe I won. To come top in such a class field of Tribute artists is amazing", he said to his local rag. I don't believe he can't believe it, and am pleased he likes his trophy. It's like a real World Cup.

Johnny Lee Memphis: Scotland conquers Wales

The male voice choir strike up the national anthem. And off we go.

Thanks: Matthew Bookshelves and Angie.
Pics: Oliver Steinhoff: http://www.oliver-steinhoff.de/Elvis_Imitator,Double,Show/Bilder/Seiten/Lichtburg_Essen_25.01.2010.html#26; Johnny Lee Memphis: http://web.absoluteelvis.com/

Green Green Grass of Hyde Park: Radio 2's Elvis Forever

2010-09-13T19:07:00.000+01:00

Part 2: In which Moira Stewart appears, KT embodies the King, Big TJ plugs his new album, and Priscilla loves us....

And then... Moira Stewart. Sorry? Come again? MOIRA STEWART. Turns out Moira loves Elvis. Clearly she loves Chris. "Darling!" she says to him. "Everything is everyTHING!" she says to us. I had to shut Clare up with her Frank Butcher impression and avoided joining the naughtys with a chant of "Moira, Moira give us a song." Then Moira was busy loving Tony Hadley who loves Bridge Over Troubled Water. The man next to me said, emphatically, "Tony's not fat". It's true, Tony's not fat. I was there. Michael Ball however, who came on next to strut about delightedly while singing You Don't Have to Say You Love Me, opened his jacket seditiously to reveal a tummy. Just a little one. Some, not many, shouted "Off, off, off". Clare looked confused and slightly cross, "something's going wrong here". I'm inclined to agree. And then Marti Pellow came back. Chris said he was the star of the first half. It depends what you like. Everyone liked Marti's In The Ghetto. Then Scouting for Girls were back with Hound Dog and at this point I gotta say, why didn't they bring back Imelda May? Imelda's Hound Dog I would pay to see. Oh I paid to see theirs too. But Chris promised! I think we were over time and a couple of returns got cut. If one of them was KT Tunstall I'll be super cross because KT was tremendous. "She's the nuts," said Chris. I could have put it better but he's right. "Ah'right Hyde Park?!" says KT Scottishly, Quatro-attired. A Little Less Conversation even had the orchaestra's conductor, Mike Dixon, getting so groovy with his baton that he looked like he might spank her with the joy of it. Now, I like the JXL Remix, but the KT groove was just special, people. Special. I'd give her a picture but she wouldn't stand still. "Elvis was living through KT you can actually feel it!" says Chris. Amen, I shut my mouth and open up my heart.

Contactmusic.com

"Some know her best as Jenna Wade from Dallas. Some know her as Jane Spencer from the Naked Gun films. Some know her as an all round business whizz who can move and shake with the biggest and the best of them. We know her simply as Priscilla Presley". I'm sure Priscilla is used to adulation but she must have been quite surprised by the rapture (or not, she's a Scientologist after all). "Hello there, wow!" says she. The wave of people that she's talking about has grown - I guess latecomers and those floating about in the park on the last lovely evening of the year felt the call. Priscilla thinks Elvis might be a preacher if he were alive today. Priscilla is on to introduce the headline. She does so with the story of how Elvis wanted to hear the Green Green Grass of Home over and over. "Please, please, bring out Sir Tom Jones". Big Tom Jones bounces on with Run On. Run On is a traditional song, I'm not strictly sure it's gospel but happy to stand corrected. It is a fabulous song and Tom does it splendidly but can we just acknowledge it is an odd choice for Elvis Forever, unless, perchance, it happens to be on your new album, which in Tom's case is called Praise & Blame. Tom deserves another blog post and will surely get one sooner or later. In the meantime, I gotta tell you Jones the Rocker looks like a big curly-haired universal prophet. You can see his picture on Greek pots, Mayan wall-paintings, Benin bronzes, all in the British Museum. Tom loved Elvis and Elvis loved Tom. He strikes up "I've been travelling over mountains, through the valleys too". And the valleys cheer. Someone raises Y Ddraig Goch. Yay for Welsh Elvis fans.

Tom pays tributes to his old friends, the TCB band. And then I think he's ready to go off, but the audience loves Tom and Chris suggests another song. "Tom, Tom, one more" says Chris. Tom sounds a bit shocked, "How can we do one more?" Tom chats with the boys and manages a respectable One Night ("What key? Whatever key Elvis sung it in"). My dad would say, unkindly, that Tom Jones isn't concerned with keys. It didn't sound unrehearsed, unless you count the conflation of the lyrics of both versions. The audience get the hang of it and we all sing along. We love our one night with Tom and Elvis. Chris sounds a bit sheepish. I think he might be in trouble ("he's gonna kill me afterwards").

Well where can you go from there? I think you can only go one step further. Enter the King. On the screens to the side of the stage is Elvis himself, singing the Wonder of You. Elvis in Vegas, "play the song James", and there's young James.... and young Glen... (echoes of Elvis at Wembley). And we are all singing. "I guess I'll never know the reason why you love me as you do". And you've got to wonder. When Priscilla says, "This is what a happening is. I want you all to look around at each other, look in the back, look to the sides, and know that this is what happened in 1955, 56 57, whenever Elvis appeared." I look around, at the nine year old girl who knows all the words (including to Burnin' Love), the loved-up bikers, the four Geordies who are miles away, the ubiquitous Welsh women, the people in their stupid Elvis costumes, the good-looking rockabilly cats next to us, the bloke next to me who loved Suzi Quatro best.... Priscilla says "I want you to know that song really is for you. The Wonder of You! When he sang that song, believe me, he had all of you in mind". Priscilla gives Elvis's fans a little homage, and tells us that it was one of his dreams to perform in the UK, and that "he may not have fulfilled his dream of appearing here, but tonight he is here, with us in spirit". Someone unkindly shouts, you divorced him! (Let there be no doubt we all would have divorced him). Then we have fireworks and Elvis with Suspicious Minds (apparently a preview of Cirque de Soleil's Elvis show in Vegas which is coming here soon). Everyone comes on, KT is in a Tony and Suzi sandwich. Glitter explodes. And on the way out, everyone is pissed. There are stupid hats and a lot of hugging and bad wigs and light sabres. And you wonder what Elvis would have thought of it all. Or what he thinks of it, wherever he is.

Thanks: Clare, BBC Radio 2
Pics: Pen77, Contactmusic.com, PA

Green Green Grass of Home (well, Hyde Park): Radio 2's Elvis Forever

2010-09-13T18:43:00.000+01:00

Part 1: In which young men win over the audience, old men have already won them over, young women rock, Michael Ball undoes his jacket, Craig David wears aviators and Suzi Quatro zips up and unzips...

We weren't on time for Elvis Forever, Radio 2's electric-prom-fiesta-cum-tribute to the King in his 75th birthday year, but that's ok since it wasn't either. The crowd wasn't filling the arena, but there was no need for these four Geordies to set up camp quite so far from the stage. Even though the stage was the biggest outdoor stage ever built in Britain. Any minute it's going to have well over a hundred people on it. And for the next few days you lucky folk can hear them here.

The line-up was promising but I confess I wasn't at all sure it would be worth dragging long-suffering non-fan Elvisiate Clare to, but it just might have been the last Summer evening of the year, as if, I dunno, Elvis himself was shining down in his gold lame suit. 50,000 Elvis fans can't be wrong. Clare and I edged through the crowd as Scouting for Girls did a fairly faithful and perfectly respectable Blue Suede Shoes. Some of the more trad. Elvis crowd could be heard to mutter vague disapprovals of these young folk from South Ruislip. Then the personable Chris Evans, a cheeky and charming host, introduced Elvis' TCB band - Glen Hardin (piano) James Burton (guitar) Jerry Scheff (bass) Ronnie Tutt (drums), you know them, we met them before - in between eliciting Hallelujahs out of the audience. They were joined by Fran Healey, from Travis, I Can't Help Falling In Love With You. The next act, all George Clooney handsome ageing, already had a big fanbase in the crowd. Some of us still can't forgive that 18 week number one, but even Marti Pellow, reinvented as a crooner must have been taken aback at how well received his I Just Can't Help Believing was. Or maybe not given that he has the keys to the city of Memphis and an official Marti Pellow Day in Tennessee; May 9th in case you want to join in. After Marti, Imelda May. She deserves a new paragraph. And a picture. So here:

This Irish Rockabilly dude duetted with husband Darrel Higham at Elvis' actual birthday at the Ace Cafe last time Clare and I saw her, and has a new album, Psycho, out any minute. Here, with her band (including hubby) immaculately rocked out with trademark duochrome quiff, matching black and white stripes and red heels, Imelda brought some proper rock 'n' roll to the evening with My Baby Left Me. The half of the audience who had started to nod off to Marti Pellow woke up and whooped. She left a bit of a gap to fill for the sweet boy from the Guillemots, Fyfe Dangerfield, with a lot of hair and a lonely guitar. "Oh no, who's 'e?" said the fella next to me. I think you probably could quite easily make a mess of Always On My Mind - just you in front of thousands at Hyde Park - oh but he had the BBC Concert Orchaestra to back him up (which reminds me: if they were in Hyde Park being Elvisy, who was recording the Christmas edition of Songs of Praise in the Albert Hall?). Then comes a taxi driver, oh no, it's Tony Hadley. Nothing Spandau Ballety about his taxi-croony You've Lost That Loving Feeling and the Marti Pellow half of the crowd were happy again. Oh wait, who's this? Freddie Flintoff? "I just asked for a free ticket and I ended up standing here". Freddie introduced wee Jon Allen, no we didn't know either, and neither did the naughty element who chanted "Oo are ya? Oo are ya?". But the crumpled lad in his grandad's hat and cord jacket clearly meant that no one had to invite Rod Stewart. Uncanny. A whanged out Burnin' Love won over the unconvinced naughtys. I have to say the atmosphere was fabulous - good humoured Elvis lovers of all ages were very vocal. Perhaps something to do with the lax attitude to drink that the bag-checkers were operating. I suppose after you've tried to wrestle bottles of rosé from the first 50 nicely dressed 50-somethings form the shires you think you might as well let it go.

There was no mistaking the next dude. Are You Lonesome Tonight, the answer from many was, not anymore. Chris Evans, introducing the song, mentioned that Elvis recorded it because it was Colonel Tom Parker's wife's favourite. This elicited a big boo from the crowd, but it was all screaming and swaying for Craig David sporting big shiny Elvisy shades.

Elio Pace. I didn't know who Elio Pace was. Wikipedia informs me that he was born in Woking in 1968 to Italian parents. His Such A Night was fine. That's all I have to say. Then It's Now Or Never with Tony Christie. I was told to shush during this one by some older ladies. But surely not that much older. And to no avail because the other thousands of folk were singing along too. Then Tim Minchin came on. Unfortunately not to sing. He instead commented on Chris's shirt: "It's beautiful: it's Paisley, it's a shirt, it's everything a shirt should be. I agree. He introduced, autocued as it were, Nell Bryden. Nell Bryden is a trained cellist but realised after ten years at it that she was actually born to rock. She flogged a painting in the attic which happened to be worth a pretty penny and now she is on stage at Hyde Park looking rather fabulous also in Imelda May black and red and bequiffed. Her matching set has lovely big red fake flowers winding up her microphone and she has reclaimed for me the mid-life crisis song. It's much better sung by a fabulous lady. Yes, If I Can Dream, gender neutralised to "As long as I have the strength to dream..." followed by a raucous and rockin' Devil In Disguise with lovely male backing vocals. The rock 'n' roll fans woke up again.

She was followed by some a capella fellas who have apparently been the talk of Edinburgh this year, the Magnets, in all their beatbox glory. Return to Sender with a nice audience participation refrain and She's Not You.

And then Fyfe was back. Anyone he didn't win over in the first half must have found it hard to dislike his Love Me Tender. And if you were wondering whether the ubiquitous Welsh women were going to appear, it was here that one of their number shouted "Fyfe! You're gorgeous". Fyfe went down well. This time he was truly alone on stage apart from a big roady watching him dangerously. Alone? No! We were there. There were tears from the crowd and everything. He was quite pretty and looked ever so pleased with the whole of Hyde Park sweetly singing along with him. He jogged off with a big smile and a grateful wave. And entering stage left was Melanie Sykes. She of the Boddingtons. She won approval from the female crowd with her keen and slightly over-zealous description of Elvis' attractive assets. "And them eyes!" Calm down, says Chris, Priscilla's round there. "I know! She says he was better in the flesh!" Which was followed by the living legend Suzi Quatro. Who, can we say it on the BBC, is gonna kick some ass! She must have been quite pleased with the love. And she sure did rock, with the gents of the TCB band. Clad, as you'd hope, in the flesh, in leather and lace, complete with zip-up bum, the whole nicely set-off with a pink paisley guitar (which kind of matched Chris's shirt). Suzi is very little if you didn't know, but you'd hope her (un-gender reassigned) All Shook Up and Johnny B. Goode make some of the crooning retirees question their career decisions. I think Elvis would have been pleased (remember Suzi was a no-show at Graceland many moons ago). She even said "Play it James [for Suzi] one time!"

Press Association pic from the Daily Mail. It hurts but the pics are good.

Then there was a BBC interlude in which some radio 2 people had to guess the songs in the concert orchaestra's Leiber and Stoller medley. Clare got bored. I don't blame her. And then Jon Allen was back with his Rod Stewart-esque voice, gravelling a rocking Heartbreak Hotel. Clare's too young to remember Mica Paris. Mica Paris has an amazing voice and delivered a gospelly, soulful I've Lost You.

Help Me Make it Through the Night: Elvis saves the bedwetters

2010-08-21T20:39:00.001+01:00

Today's Guardian newspaper contains an excerpt from American writer and comedian Sarah Silverman's memoir, The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee, published by Faber & Faber. The book describes the trials and tribulations of a teenage (and pre-teen) bedwetter.

Writes Silverman:

On 16 August, 1977, Elvis Presley saved my life.

Poor Sarah, surprised into a sleepver at a friend's house, wakes up in her own customary warmth, but this time in her friend Heather's "way-too-sexy-for-a-six-year-old pyjamas" and sleeping bag.

I do the only thing a terrified zombie can do: I pretend it didn't happen. I get up with the other girls, take off my PJs like the other girls, and change into my clothes. They're so lucky to be able to move through life so effortlessly. I know at six how lucky they are – they probably still don't know.

Mrs Peters walks into the room, and before she can say anything, steps right on to the pile of my sexy urine-soaked pyjamas. My heart stops as I watch her face burn red like a Disney villainess.

"Who did this!?!?!" she screams, with a look of pure fury. I stand there, quietly enduring the world's youngest heart attack, wishing for my fear to somehow transport me. Am I supposed to answer? Is the onus on six-year-old me to fill this silence? And that's when it happens – Mr Peters comes in and grabs his wife, "Elvis Presley died!!!"

The news of the King's death overtook Mrs Peters, and I was spared. Somehow I got home without the other kids knowing what had happened.

In the same Guardian supplement, Enrique Iglesias invites Barack Obama, Michael Jackson, Abraham Lincoln and Elvis to his dream dinner party. Peach ice cream is hard to come by so I hope he's not intent on serving it.

Help Me Make it Through the Night here.

Anyplace is Paradise: Celebrate Elvis's death day at South London Pacific

2010-08-08T00:39:00.000+01:00

Yes, I'm advertising. But quite honestly there will be no better place in Britain to pay your respects to the King on Sunday 15th August, the day before his death-day, than South London Pacific - the finest Tiki establishment in all, er, South London (since the Blue Hawaii in Kingston closed). Every year the wondrous host prepares Elvis snacks, there will be Elvis dancing, and the closest you're going to get these last thirty something years to Big El, Black Elvis. Prepare to throw your knickers. I'll be away so if anyone wants to report, please do, and get me one of those dolls while you're at it.

South London Pacific 340 Kennington Road, London SE11 7SQ

Tel: 020 8 672 5972(info) info@hulaboogie.co.uk

SUNDAY 15th August 2010

Roll up roll up for HULA BOOGIE!'s Annual

ELVIS TRIBUTE NIGHT

with live performance from the astounding tribute artist

BLACK ELVIS

PLUS

Elvis & Elvis related vintage music all night

to keep you on the dance floor from resident DJs

the exotically glamourous

MISS ALOHA

& the very

REVEREND BOOGIE

PLUS

FREE ELVIS SNACKS!:

Authentically created from the Elvis Cookbook!

ELVIS RAFFLE:

Buy a ticket an you have a chance to win all manner of Elvis related items .. as well as Blue Hawaii cocktails

and

OUR STAR PRIZE:

Collectable

BARBIE LOVES ELVIS DOLLS

and there is more....

DANCE CLASSES!

JIVE: 7.30 - 8pm Get some moves down so you can rock n roll the night away!

HUKILAU HULA DANCE CLASS: 8PM - 8.10 join Miss Aloha's internationally sought after Hula Dance Class. (this is the only place in UK you can learn a hula dance regularly!)

and by special request

HANDJIVE CLASS: 8.10 - 8.15pm - Reverend Boogie will guide you through the classic 1950s novelty dance.

MUSIC, COCKTAILS, KITSCH SNACKS, BURLESQUE,

AND DANCING

'TIL PAST MIDNIGHT

WWW.HULABOOGIE.CO.UK

There Goes My Everything (or does it): August bits of Elvis for sale (or not)

2010-08-08T00:32:00.001+01:00

Paddy Power gives these odds on the winning bid for Elvis' white piano with gold trim, which is to be auctioned on 14th August along with an array of other Elvis goodies:

11/4     Under $500,000
9/4     $500,000 - $999,999
5/2     $1,000,000 - $1,499,999
5/1     $1,500,000 - $1,999,999
6/1     $2,000,000 - $2,499,999
3/1     $2,500,000 or over

Not quite what you're after? Pick yourself up a diamond ring, a Triumph TR-6 and many more bits of Elvis tat.

Doesn't tickle your fancy? How about disgraced former Governor of Illinois, Rod Blagojevich's life-sized statue of the King in white marble, to be auctioned if he doesn't pay his bills by August 14th.

Not for you, having been withdrawn from yet another auction, are autopsy tools that were or were not used on Elvis' body at the Memphis Funeral Home. A senior embalmer apparently took home the tools and had given them up for auction by Leslie Hindman Auctioneers, but following a threat of action by the funeral home, the tools have been returned. A spokesperson said that the tools had continued in use and it was not possible to verify the authenticity of these particular nick-nacks. Also in the lot was a replica of the 'John Doe' toe-tag, the original having been stolen by a fan. The tools were expected to have raised $10,000 - $14,000.

Thanks: Paul Graves-Brown
Pic: Ho/Reuters

Viva Las Vegas!

2010-07-29T23:08:00.004+01:00

Tom & Tanya get hitched

My friend and colleague Tom and the lovely Tanya have been immensely generous to my project by deciding to get hitched, in Las Vegas, by Elvis himself.

When I saw them on Monday night, Tanya was still unsure as to whether it would be young Elvis or Vegas Elvis who would do the deed. Tune in, tomorrow night at 9pm BST, to find out.....

http://www.702wedding.com/

Thanks: Tom & Tanya

Sing-a-long Viva to celebrate!

Post-script:

You missed it? Nevermind! Watch it again here. Over and over again.

It was young Elvis in his gold jacket. Tom makes small talk with the preacher-man and then in comes the lovely bride accompanied up the aisle by the King himself. Elvis plays Love Me Tender, Tom joins in. The minister does his thing, Tanya's emotional - cryin' in the chapel - but Tommo has his blue silk hankerchief (another colleague enviously commented 'I forgot the hanky at my wedding'). Elvis sings Can't Help Falling in Love. Tanya's smiling.

They exchange rings. The kiss is one that Elvis would be proud of. They all sing Viva! Then Elvis gets the lovely couple to give his bespoke Elvisy vows:

I promise
To love you tender baby
I will never leave you with suspicious minds
I will never leave you at Heartbreak Hotel
Or any hotel.
I will never step on your Blue Suede Shoes
I will never let you have Blue Suede Shoes
For I will always be
Your hunk o' hunk o'
Burning love
Baby.

Elvis plays them out to Blue Suede Shoes.

Ah, sweet sweet love. The lovely American trilogy are played out by Elvis to Blue Suede Shoes. Now, where can I find a pair of Blue Suede Booties?

Follow that dream: Elvis invades the blogosphere's combined subconscious

2010-07-08T21:28:00.001+01:00

Me and Sleep Talkin' Man face the facts....

This week, I woke up and mumbled that I'd dreamt that Elvis was dead. Then I fell asleep again. I don't remember the dream and my mumbling apparently wasn't very explanatory. I wouldn't have thought about it again had it not been for Sleep Talkin' Man. Yes, it seems that for Sleep Talkin' Man and I, the Sandman has been sprinkling a little bit of Dead Elvis into our dreams. Fortunately for Sleep Talkin' Man (an English man in the US) his wife, the wonderful Karen, records what he says during his sleep, and shares it with the rest of the world. STM (or Adam to his wife) seems to be taken over in sleep by either a foul-mouthed sociopathic narcissist, or his exaggerated anxieties. Makes great office reading if your colleagues don't mind hysteria. On July 7th, Adam mumbled,

"Elvis is dead. He is dead, I tell you! Buried and oh just a little bit smelly. Bad burger muncher."

Click here to hear.

And click here to Follow that Dream....

Thanks: Alice G

If I Can Dream (part II): El Tel off key but not as off key as England

2010-06-23T12:09:00.002+01:00

It's the Sun what won it
Is no doubt what we would have been hearing had England been a bit more glorious in the last couple of weeks. That esteemed organ is behind the rather marvelous idea of putting the England football team's (semi-finals of Euro '96) most enigmatic, most wheeler-dealer manager, Terry Venables, in front of an orchaestra to 'croon' Big E's middle-aged-man-and-football song (see earlier post).

In the video (a one minute ad for the Sun) Big El Tel walks out of the shadows swankily clad in an Englandy grey suit. Deep in his heart, there's a trembling question.... Terry is positively beatific, because out there in the dark - he thrusts a 'go on my son' arm forward into the dark and lo! - is the Royal Philharmonic Orchaestra backing him up. And it's not just them, while he can think, while he can talk, while he can (very Dagenham) stand, while he can walk, camera pans across the choir of young female lovelies and middle-aged round-toned male lovelies, and oh, isn't that Ian Wright winking, and isn't that 'Arry Redknap chirping away? And aren't they in Wembley Stadium?

Although the Guardian website uses Tel's efforts to suggest that all singing-for-England should be put to bed, you have to hand it to Terry, he's got a lovely gravel-road voice, and who better to create positive waves with which to inspire Three Lion-ness into the likes of Rooney and Lamps? It might have been kinder to give him an easier key to belt out his final dream but we all have to suspend a bit of disbelief and have a little dream for the sake of England vs Slovenia tonight. See Terry rather charmingly learning to sing here.

Pics: The Sun
Thanks: Emma

Doncha Think It's Time?

2010-05-13T11:49:00.003+01:00

35 hour Elvis isn't enough for Guinness
A world record attempt at non-stop Elvis failed last Friday as the Big E in question was advised to stop singing for the good of his health. Simon Goldsmith was attempting the world record for uninterrupted Elvis songs at the White Lion pub in Ufford, Suffolk.

Simon, who sings under the name Harry Isaac Presley and describes himself as a "low-budget Elvis tribute act", planned to sing for over 43 hours, 11 minutes and 11 seconds. He stopped after 35 hours due to concerns about his wellbeing.

He was raising money for a local hospice, in memory of his father. The world record still stands, held by Thomas Gothje of Germany.

Still, a pretty good effort from a fine and funny dude, and if you'd like to sponsor him go to www.justgiving.com/elvisworldrecord.

Photos: BBC; http://www.harryisaacpresley.co.uk/

Brown Eyed Handsome Man

2010-05-11T17:26:00.002+01:00

Elvis knows which side his bread is buttered on
So, our brief sojourn in an anarchic world where there is no settlement on who's in charge is nearly over. Yesterday, Gordon Brown announced his forthcoming resignation and it looks like the shiny faced blue one discussed in earlier posts is going to be the big man. Well, the Conservatives might have had some dodgy haggered geezer formerly of the Rolling Stones, and 'the fat one from Take That' but Gordon had Elvis.

Elvis, aka Mark Wright of Corby, Northamptonshire, was the surprise guest at a gathering that Gordon attended to support local candidate Phil Hope, and to make a few points about the NHS. After Gordon had left the building, Elvis flew in with 'A Little Less Conversation'. As he moved on to 'The Wonder Of You', the Prime Minister came back into the hall. Sarah Brown sang along, and Gordon shook Elvis's hand.

Thanks: Emma Dwyer
Photos: Peter Macdiarmid

How Great Thou Art: The rise of the Christian Elvis

2010-05-03T16:33:00.003+01:00

Apologies for radio silence. I am pleased to announce that Everyday Elvis has indeed been undergoing Elvisness, but without reporting. So to get back on the gravel road, I am delighted to introduce a guest post, by Elvisiate Clare, who accompanied me to see Elvis in Concert, at Wembley Arena, 27th February, 2010.

I never thought I would be going to an Elvis concert so to go to a second one was inconceivable this time last year.

Here is my previous experience of Elvis:

1/ At around nine years-old I developed a habit of listening to my dad’s Elvis album and walking around the living room imagining I was Elvis’s girlfriend, miming the words back at him and twisting my ponytail around my fingers to titillate him.

2/ At around 14 years-old I had a party. It was very very good. My sisters bought me Hooch to escape the embarrassment of my mum’s very devious plan of saying she would supply the alcohol for the party - information I coolly passed on to the rest of the prospective guests – only to pull out of the bag 1% beer with only an hour to go before anyone arrived.

Anyway that has nothing to do with Elvis but everything to do with the difference between sisterly and motherly love.

I was not all that generous with the Hooch and Bacardi Breezers and got very drunk. I remember vaguely my sister dancing to dad’s same Elvis album with the boy I fancied. At such a young age it is hard to understand your emotions and I wasn’t sure why that made me like him more. Now I know it was because he liked Elvis and not because he fancied my sister.

3/ A few months ago Pen77 wanted to go to the Ace Café to celebrate Elvis’ birthday. I didn’t really want to go but everyone at work said I should. I’m glad I did. The fans were glamorous and the band was amazing, unbelievable. I thought I was in a film. I wanted to go home, put on some red lipstick, a fifties pony tail and mime Elvis songs to Michael the Lift. He wanted to go to sleep. He won.

That night there was a raffle to see Elvis with his original band at Wembley. I made Pen77 check her ticket. She won and she only knew because of me. I felt proud. But then I felt a sense of horror. She would invite me. I would have to go to another Elvis night and not one with young sexy people but one with old fat people.

I had underestimated how many old, fat people you could put in one place, but Wembley is a pretty large venue.

Apparently these were the more typical fans witnessed by Pen77 at conventions. Imagine a woman in her forties, the kind who thinks it is OK to wear pink furry headbands. Maybe I’m just being cruel. I’m sure I’ll be corrected if I am.

I wondered if there was something about Elvis that made women connect with him. These people were too young to have liked Elvis at the time he was famous. So did they, like me, like Elvis because their dad did? Although it was never a bonding point between me and my dad I know the feeling of clinging on to any common ground – for a period of around two years we had many many conversations about the film Donnie Brasco. I even bought the French dubbed version to impress him. He doesn’t speak French.

The concert was pretty much like any concert I’ve been to in a big venue – Elvis was on the big screen and the band played along. As I am short I normally don’t have the luxury of seeing the performer on stage so it was a relief to know I wasn’t missing out on the “experience” or “atmosphere” as the big screen was were it was at.

The band were truly talented - Elvis's Vegas and touring backing band and singers, The Sweet Inspirations, The Imperials and the TCB Band. The highlights of the night for me were when they got to do their solos. However, I was not among friends with this view. The fans weren’t interested. They just wanted more Elvis on the big screen. They couldn’t get enough of Elvis. As soon as it was the band’s turn to shine, they got up to go to the loo.

Little did I know that the shock of the night was still to come.

The song that brought the house down. The one that got their arms in the air, their banners waving. The one that got them on their feet, embracing each other in celebration of greatness. It wasn’t Hound Dog, it wasn’t Suspicious Minds. It wasn’t even I Can’t Help Falling in Love. It was How Great Thou Art.

Thanks: None of this would have been possible without Michael the Lift or Pen77

Pictures: Pen77

Suspicious Minds: David vs. David

2010-01-31T20:48:00.005Z

Battle of the Elvisy poster-boys

Election time is approaching and airbrushed true blue Dave Cameron is starting to adorn billboards across the nation. You can tell he’s bad news from the fact that, given some sideburns and a quiff, he’s a bit more Gary Glitter than Elvis. The so nicely augmented billboard in question is in Hereford.

And is it just me or is David Beckham just a little Elvisy in his Sport Relief beneficence? Let him adorn your chest by ordering here: http://shop.sportrelief.com/, or visit your local Sainsbury's or TK Maxx.

Made me wonder if Becks has consciously been Elvisy. I couldn’t find any evidence, but some folk out west have photoshopped him up nice and rock-n-rolly. No Gary Glitter there. Big Dave C's team could learn something.

Thanks: Gavin Moss

Pictures: Hereford Times, Sport Relief, http://www.freakingnews.com/David-Beckham-Elvis-Impersonator-Pictures-32143.asp

Elvis's 75th at the Jailhouse, Ace Café

2010-01-21T15:20:00.004Z

The Ace Café was born and not made. In 1938, this archetypical motor café was built on the North Circular at the Stonebridge Park gyratory – where the North Circular meets the Harrow Road and the LMS railway. A pitstop for the new arterial road network that was transforming Britain. It was rebuilt in 1949 after the original building was bomb-damaged. Look at it, it’s a beautiful: utilitarian brick, 20^th-century transport trim, ocean-liner decorative, P&O smooth. It’s still full of hope for the future. Its popularity as a 24-hour stop for bikers gained it a certain reputation for leather and 100mph. During the 1950s, it became a hit with leather-clad rockers showing off their wheels. It put on the rising stars of the time, of rock‘n’roll and racing. It closed in 1969, the North Circular was rerouted and the Ace became a tyre fitting shop, before Mark Wilsmore, a former frequenter of the old Ace, put into action a grand plan to restore it to its former glory. The plan worked and in the early 21^st century, the café was rebuilt from the inside out, retaining its 1949 shell, and restoring its interior – long since partitioned, concreted, and generally un-aced. The new design even featured ‘the jailhouse’, a space for live bands and their dancing fans.

The Ace Café had been a place where the cult of the teenager had flourished; where hip young things dressed like Marlon Brando (a hero of Elvis’) and listened to the new sounds that were so shocking their parents. It’s since kept that rockin’ alive. Where else should Elvis celebrate his 75^th? It was a freezing night, the snow had turned to ice and I gave up the notion of driving. Creeping round from Stonebridge Park station from the North Circular onto the old North Circular meant avoiding black ice. I met Elvisiate Clare, already propping up the long service counter where the black and white checkered staff were jumpin’ like catfish in a bowl. The clientele were fabulous: the same leather-clad rockers who had lived their teenage years belting up and down while the coin dropped in the jukebox, but mixed up with immaculately turned-out, ridiculously cool, tremendously good-looking hepcats, sportin’ fine 50s gear. DJ Bill Guntrip played Elvis’s early records and already the dancefloor was rocking.

At 10.30, a raffle took place. Clare suggested I might want to look at my ticket – something I wasn’t doing given that I didn’t know where I’d put it, and the last time I won anything was circa 1982 when I won a chicken for my dad. Eventually I found it and bizarrely, ticket number 121 (me and Elvis, we’re like that) was indeed the winner. Clare screamed and Jailhouse me went up to the Jailhouse to claim my prize. I rather incredibly have two tickets to see Elvis in Concert in February. I’m taking Clare of course.

The band, The Memphis Flashers, featuring Darrel Higham on guitar, were brilliant. Elvis, without the impersonator. Higham doesn’t try to be Elvis but he has a great voice, great energy, and is an excellent front man. Instead of getting into Elvis via a series of karaoke kindergartens, he looks and sounds like he’s made of rock’n’roll. He was occasionally joined by the very lovely leopard-printed, psychobilly quiffed, rock’n’roll voiced, Imelda May, and once or twice by members of the congregation such as one of the aforementioned (Johnny Cashesque) hepcats who grizzled out a corking Folsom Prison Blues while his companions jived away. Darrel and the Flashers were entirely about rock’n’roll and rockabilly, with proper early Elvis down to a T and the odd interloper – Johnny Burnette’s Train Kept A’ Rollin’ (a personal favourite) and Bruce Springsteen’s I’m On Fire (least said, soonest mended) – thrown in to delight (or confuse). When the crowd called for Jailhouse Rock, Darrel sighed, Are you trying to kill me?, but got on with the job and pulled it off rather well. Jailhouse Rock is hard to pull off you know. It’s why so many ETAs stick to the late Elvis – after his voice was ruined.

Well. What a night. What a place. Super fun, super friendly. I shall definitely be returning when I’m hipper and hepper and altogether more of a cat. I advise you to do the same, especially if you have a classic sporty motor and are sporting a fine quiff (like I was). 17^th April for the Eddie Cochran tribute anyone?

Thanks: Elvisiate Clare (huge thanks), Mark Wilsmore & the Ace Cafe, Michael The Lift, James The Hair

Pictures: Pen77, http://www.ace-cafe-london.com/History.aspx, Clare

Happy Birthday to You: the King at 75

2010-01-08T11:41:00.009Z

At around 4.30am on January 8^th 1935 Gladys Presley gave birth to Elvis Aron Presley, around a half hour after his stillborn brother, Jesse Garon, in a two-room house in Tupelo, Mississippi. Elvis is 75 today, Friday 8^th January 2010. At Graceland, Priscilla and Lisa Marie will be making the annual birthday declaration and cutting his birthday cake on the lawn. It's Elvis Presley Day in Memphis, and the Estate is hosting a four-day bash there which you can follow online.

Across Britain Elvis fans will be making their own celebrations: from Middlesbrough's own Niall Southall, to a bring your own party in Glamorgan with Kurt Tallon, to Blackpool's major Elvis contest. In London, the Charlotte Street Blues Bar has hired Ian Coulson as ETA for the weekend, while one of the burgeoning underground supperclubs is hosting an Elvis’s Birthday Special with a menu derived from Elvis's Southern favourites cooked by his Graceland cook. The supperclub cook quotes David Adler, author of The Life and Cuisine of Elvis Presley: "Coincidentally, Elvis's favorite word of endorsement was 'burnt'. 'That's burnt, man' he would say, which could indicate either a good steak or a good performance". I’ve already got started on Elvis's birthday with a similar but less advanced personal tribute with friends Cat and Chris. An apocryphal story has Elvis living off fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches for seven days so I assembled the ingredients – sliced white bread, smooth peanut butter, ripe bananas – and the delicacy was washed down with El’s favourite drink – Pepsi Cola. Although Elvis didn’t drink much, we added a tot of Jack Daniels for the toast. At least it's from Tennessee. All I can say is those seven days must have been desperate times for Elvis. Banana vom, as my friends have christened elements of this sandwich, is not nice. The bite-sized chunks make it more palatable. I'll be continuing celebrations at the Ace Cafe on the North Circular.

If you're in the US, those nice Elvis fans at the Independent (who did a magazine special last Saturday on people making a living from Elvis - hopefully to be revisited anon) have collected a few little Elvis activities for you to do this weekend, including what promises to be an awesome spectacle in Las Vegas, Cirque du Soleil's compilation of Elvis toons and aerial daring Viva ELVIS which opens this weekend.

Happy Birthday Elvis, I love you, says Suzi Quatro at the end of her Radio 2 broadcast, part of the BBC's Elvis (radio and TV) Season. In Suzi Quatro's Elvis, Suzi visits Tupelo and audibly moved by Elvis’s humble beginnings, explores his Southern life, its sites, its people and Elvis's rise to fame, at the same time acknowledging her own debt to the King and putting right her 35-year-old regret at not accepting an invitation from Elvis himself (she didn't feel worthy). She ends with her new tribute single to the King, Singing With Angels.

Finally, Elvis as a living mega-star: Elvis Fantasay is one techno-geek's collection of Elvis assemblages that conjure a live Elvis into a 21^st-century mega-stadium. The marvelous birthday greeting from the crowd is seriously special. Imagine this at Anfield: http://www.youtube.com/user/elvisfantasay2010. Watch that space for a forthcoming interview with the King - his first in over 32 years.

Finally, finally, hear it here from the King himself.

Thanks: ChrisCat (for the birthday party), Stan, and Dan.

Pictures: Graceland lawn webcam

http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-4732-Celebrity-Travel-Examiner~y2009m8d14-Elvis-Presleys-birthplace-in-Tupelo-Mississippi-now-a-hot-tourist-attraction
Pen77

From a Jack to a King: Jailhouse Elvis heard in Jaxx Caff

2010-01-06T19:10:00.002Z

6th January: Perhaps in honour of Elvis' 75th birthday on Friday, Kenton and Cathy chat over the background music in Jaxx Caff. Jailhouse Rock in Borchester!

The Archers is Britain's longest running soap. Daily on BBC Radio 4, farming folk converge and bore the pants off half the population while the others can't turn them off.

Merry Christmas Baby: Jailhouse Elvis found in crib

2009-12-26T17:10:00.002Z

Wise men say....
Archaeologist Paul Graves-Brown, editor of the wonderful Matter, Materiality and Modern Culture, has kindly drawn my attention to his 'traditional' Elvis, posted outside the stable bare in the Graves-Brown Nativity scene. Jailhouse Elvis as Wise Man? (Incidentally, Paul adds, he would have made Elvis out of Fimo but he ran out).

Thanks & picture: Paul Graves-Brown
Merry Christmas Baby, I wish I knew the words: http://tinyurl.com/ComebackCrimboElvis

If I Get Home(ware) On Christmas Day

2009-12-15T19:06:00.003Z

Vegetable Elvis: last-minute Christmas gifts for the discerning Elvis fan

Emma was looking for a last minute Christmas present for her brother and came across this fruity piece of Elvisiana. Those fancy folk at Joseph Joseph have Warholed a vegetable King for the cookin' and choppin' Elvis fan. Gettin' back to roots.

And for the lonely Elvis fan whose feet get cold in their draughty attic room (yes, that's me), what could be more warming this Christmas than a Love Me Tender hot-water bottle?

Thanks: Emma
Pictures: amazon.co.uk - click on links

If I Can Dream: Elvis as Everyman

2009-12-10T23:12:00.003Z

6th December: John Bishop in Elvis Has Left the Building
Oxford North Wall

When Elvis Presley died in 1977, there were an estimated 37 Elvis impersonators in the world. By 1993, there were 48,000 Elvis impersonators, an exponential increase. Extrapolating from this, by 2010 there will be 2.5 billion Elvis impersonators. The population of the world will be 7.5 billion by 2010. Every 3rd person will be an Elvis impersonator by 2010. – Source: Caen, H., San Francisco Chronicle; October 27, 1993

Walking home on Hallowe'en night I saw an advert for John Bishop's touring stand-up show Elvis Has Left the Building. So on Sunday night, I was at the North Wall Arts Centre in Oxford for John 'Bish' Bishop. Bish is a Scouse comedian formerly Someone in Pharmeceuticals. He's been plying his new trade at Edinburgh for some time and this was his Edinburgh show. He's a chatty man and does a lot of audience interaction. A few too many jokes about porn for my liking. Unreconstructed is back I gather.

The show brings together a couple of strands - the idea of clinging to your dream and being middle-aged, through the McGuffin of Elvis at 42. Bish was presenting awards at an industry 'do' (Best Kitchen Utensils 2008 or some such) at the Dorchester Hotel in London. When his work was done he went to watch TV and drink nicked booze in his hotel room. A documentary about Elvis came on apparently citing the above statistic. One in three, says Bish, one in three, we're all Elvis.

But what hit him more was the fact that Elvis died at 42. Suddenly Bish understood why Elvis was fat. Because he was middle-aged and you get fat. And why Elvis wore jumpsuits. Because you're too old to wear fashionable gear and too young to dress like your dad. But why Elvis was still able to record with soul. When Bish shows his tour poster to his eleven-year-old son, son says 'Who's Elvis?' They don't have icons anymore, says Bish.

At the end of the show, Bish cuts footage of Elvis singing If I Can Dream, with the fulfillment of his own dream - playing centre-mid for Liverpool in a charity Reds all-stars match against a celebrity all-stars team. He gets to play in a team with Steve MacManaman, Jamie Redknapp and Peter Beardsley, take his dream shot against the goal at the Kop end, come off for Kenny Dalglish, and maybe, just maybe, impress his kids.

Reading the liner notes for From Elvis In Memphis, Elvis' 1969 home-coming come-back album ('Elvis gets soul'), I was amazed to read how the studio owner and house band, on learning that they would be recording with Elvis were underwhelmed to be working with a has-been, after all they'd just recorded Sweet Caroline with Neil Diamond. They proceeded to produce the album that contains Suspicious Minds, Rubberneckin', Long Black Limousine, In The Ghetto (if you like that kind of thing), and my own personal favourite Loved On Look. Elvis, returned to record in Memphis for the first time since the 50s.

Elvis as middle-aged hero - come-back kid - denigrated dad - poor second to Neil Diamond but still able to produce Suspicious Minds - Elvis as Everyman for those still dreaming.

Picture: http://www.johnbishoponline.com/page/tour2009/

Walk A Mile In My Shoes

2009-11-26T10:54:00.005Z

A Day In Hand reveal "The Tao of Elvis" and issue the Elvis Challenge (28th November)

Elvis as gay superhero. A Day In Hand is an organisation that encourages gay people (and straight sympathisers) to walk hand in hand with pride. Since homophobic attacks have seen a 14% increase in Britain since April and ‘gay’ has become a ubiquitous and seemingly acceptable term of abuse, A Day In Hand isn’t really the preaching-to-the-converted mission you might think.

This Saturday, 28th November, we are urged to listen to Elvis’s version of Joe South’s Walk A Mile In My Shoes and walk a mile hand in hand with someone of the same sex, bearing in mind the lyrics:

"Walk a mile in my shoes

Just walk a mile in my shoes

Before you abuse, criticize and accuse

Then walk a mile in my shoes"

A Day In Hand’s Tami Twarog describes her Elvis revelation:
When I drove across country to move to California I visited Graceland. Many of Elvis's favorite expressions were posted around the museum. One was “Don’t criticize what you don’t understand, son. You never walked in that man’s shoes.”

The expression stuck. I thought it is the perfect universal action towards peace. The first critical step in understanding another human being was to put yourself in their place. I bought an Elvis CD at Graceland and the song "Walk a Mile in my Shoes" escorted me for the rest of my drive across the USA.

Regarding A Day in Hand, I thought "What is the real goal?" Stop homophobia. Create understanding. We don't have to convert the LGBT community, or their friends. It's the stubborn bigots who need to come around. How do we do that? Pride parades? Maybe. That's good for us ... for visibility in the community. But will it make those who are homophobic come around? Probably not.

I once again thought of that Elvis quote. Maybe if they were to walk a mile in another man's (girl’s or trans’) shoes they would understand the plight and stigma that still permeates society today. Understand that for our gay brothers & sisters the simple act of holding hands can be a traumatic and even dangerous experience. Even to those who support the gay community, you can't really understand what it's like to live as a gay person until you walk a mile in there shoes. And so the Day in Hand Elvis challenge was born. Plus, says Tami, I love fat Elvis.

Gay Elvis is a multifaceted version. Not just sequins and tight trousers, no, but also embodying some kind of butch machismo (for some) while being the sympathetic comfort figure for others. Camp Elvis, butch Elvis, gay Elvis, lesbian Elvis. Here Elvis is a bridge to understanding, a dispenser of wisdom. More of this later.

For now, come Saturday, Walk A Mile In My Shoes!

Thanks: David Watkins and Tami Twarog of A Day In Hand, http://www.adayinhand.com/; and thanks Stan

Pictures: http://www.adayinhand.com/

Who Are You? (Who Am I?)

2009-11-24T12:07:00.002Z

We are all Elvis now: 8th November

“Was Elvis Irish?” asked Mary Ellen Sweeney in web magazine BellaOnline (the Voice of Women), “With his blue-black hair and bedroom eyes, he could have passed for ‘Black Irish’ any day of the week” she continues. Sweeney cites the migration of Irish men and the difficulties of Ireland’s 20^th-century past as the reason that Elvis had such an impact on ‘yearning’ Irish hearts. I don’t think it’s just Ireland – I think that yearning is an important part of his continued success. Elvis seems to fill a hole. Elvis is comfort.

Orla meets me off the bus from Bundoran in Galway. We stop for a Guinness but I’m too hungover and have tea instead. The shop across from the pub is called Wooden Heart. It sells wooden toys. I’m starting to see Elvis everywhere. Walking down the street I see a poster for a chubby Vegas Elvis coming to Galway in late November. In the bar where we eat, Love Me Tender is playing.

In episode 4 of the first series of Father Ted, ‘The Competition’, Fathers Dougal, Ted and Jack win the annual priests’ lookalike contest as ‘the Three Ages of Elvis’ (against Father Dick Byrne’s hilariously disturbing ‘Diana Ross and two of the Supremes’). Ted says, “We are all Elvis now, that’s the problem.” Sweeney may have been writing rhetorically but Elvis genealogists answered her anyway. The Presleys seem to trace their ancestry back to Paisley in Scotland, coming to America in 1745, but then there’s some Irish, more Scots, Norman French, high-class English, Jewish and lest we forget, Cherokee. We are all Elvis now.

Thanks: Orla

Picture: homepage.eircom.net/~cubs/tedpic.htm

Donegality (part 2): Hard Knocks

2009-11-23T15:21:00.000Z

13.35. Café Ceylon, Main Street, Bundoran. Elvis is eating a cheeseburger. Kraig Parker is sitting back in a western-style jacket – rodeo Elvis from Tickle Me – and aviator sunglasses. He’s given up on the mountain of chips. A man I take to be his Colonel Parker is praising Red Alert, the backing band. Kraig is reputed to earn up to $3 million a year as one of the world’s top ETAs. He started in 1995 after busting out some Elvis at an office party, then came 3^rd in a local competition and got himself an agent. He’s a graphic designer by trade but now travels the world as an Elvis headliner. He’s a little shorter and a little meatier than Elvis but last night when he played a little set between the Brit Elvises, it was clear that he’s in another class. There’s Elvis charisma, the moves are perfect and an Elvisian introspection – something about it not being him that’s funny, but us. He has a touch of the cool remove, unfathomable Elvis that is there in the performances and interviews. He’s a bit of a talismanic figure for the British and Irish Elvis conventions. I look at the Irish Sun newspaper to stop myself staring at him. Jedward have survived on the X-factor, Elvis quiffs and all.

Other than Kraig smoking his cigar as he strolls down the main drag, there’s not much Elvisness in Bundoran today. Kraig Parker seems to be the only Elvis braving the changeable weather. The landord of Teac Sean Rua says that they usually have traditional music but they’d booked a local Elvis for the festival. He’ll be on again tonight – it seems to go down well. I drink a Jameson's then a Guinness to make the hotel drinks more palatable. Up at the Great Northern, the warm up is well underway for the All Ireland Final. Last year’s winner, Ciaran ‘Eireann Elvis’ Houlihan, is delivering a barnstorming set including an American Trilogy duet with a young guy with Downs Syndrome (the Downs Syndrome Society is the chosen beneficiary of this and the Porthcawl festival). Then the judges – a judgemental looking lot that I must investigate further – take their seats front right of the stage and the show begins.

First up is Patrick Byrne who does a good, humourful Elvis. He’s tall and has presence in That’s The Way It Is gear. It’s a good start. The next two aren’t so good: Martin McCluskey doesn’t entirely cut it as GI Elvis and I chat with some home-town friends of Glasgow’s Johnny Lee Memphis (more later). Then Daniel Kirwin. He’s in a wheelchair and stays on the dancefloor, in front of the stage. Now, Elvis was never in a wheelchair so far as I know, but as soon as Kirwin opens his mouth, the dancefloor fills. He has a terrific rich Elvisy voice and he’s got good tunes. The crowd love him. He distributes a few yellow lei to the girls and leaves a happy crowd to thumping applause. The next two are also fairly forgettable (could be they’re too Vegasy for me to remember them) and I say to Glasgow Bernie that it’s got to be Kirwin but his money’s on Byrne. But there’s one more to go, and a lithe, slim Elvis in gold lame jacket and black trousers, with an acoustic guitar bounds onto the stage. He goes straight into the classic rock ‘n’ roll hits and embodies young movies Elvis on rhythm guitar. The dancers are back and it’s clear who the winner is. This is Tom Gilson, a 39-year old bookbinder who, according to the Irish Times, sings Love Me Tender to his wife at night. There are a few in the audience who wouldn’t mind that and he’s signing autographs as soon as he comes off. The judges results are in, victory indeed for Tom (Paddy Power had him a 6/1 contender). Byrne (11/10) is second. All six do a photo call and then Tom is on for a victory set. He goes forward to represent Ireland in the Elvis Tribute Artiste World Cup, in Cardiff on July 4^th.

I chat to a few folk. All but one say that they’re here for their partner. She/he loves Elvis so they came with. One woman who’s come from Porthcawl with her mother (because her own daughter, who usually does the accompanying can’t make it) says that mother thinks the Irish crowd are a bit raucous. Porthcawl is much more serious she says. I say that my perception is the Porthcawl crowd are the rowdiest. Away from home syndrome we agree. But Pat from Letterkenny has an Elvis tattoo. He’s happy to admit how much he loves the King. He looks close to tears when he talks about how Elvis is so strong in his household. He gives me a couple of DVDs I haven’t seen. We agree we’ll meet again at the World Cup in Cardiff.

There’s great craic tonight – much more lively than last night and much more of a home crowd. People have travelled to be here and it makes for a great event. Peter Phillips – the entrepreneur behind both this and Porthcawl, and also Tedfest, the annual Father Ted convention held on the Aran Islands – is greeted as a friend and is clearly a bit overwhelmed by his creation. But it’s interesting – he’s not representative of the crowd. He’s a historian and a writer and seems very English of a certain class. He stands out against a fairly earthy and homogenous crowd. I would say that difference stands out here generally, but difference of a certain kind – this is a kind crowd with a deep humanity judging by the importance of charity to the proceedings. But there’s also connoisseurship. People who love Elvis know the wheat from the chaff. Donegality is a word coined by CS Lewis ("to Donegal for its Donegality"), reclaimed by author Michael Ward to "denote the spiritual essence or quiddity [...] of a story [...] its peculiar atmosphere or quality; its pervasive and purposed integral tone or flavour; its tacit spirit" (from the A-Team Blog). There is a warm quality to the Donegality of Elvis tonight.

Thanks: Orla

Pictures: Kraig Parker, Bundoran; Tom Gilson; Pat's tat. All: Pen77

Hail Mary, full of Graceland

2009-11-16T17:35:00.006Z

Donegality (part 1): Miracle of the Rosary

Knock, West of Ireland International Airport, the week after an apparition of the Virgin Mary had been forecast in Knock Village. ‘A Boyle woman said she saw the sun change colour’ said the barman in the airport bar, ‘as long as they don’t bring the circus here.’ I sipped my coffee, waited for my Elvisiate host for the weekend, Orla, and felt like I’d come home.

In 2002 the Irish paper, Sunday People, wrote of Bundoran (Bun Dobhráin) that it was like ‘the back streets of Las Vegas only with cheaper hookers’. It has an element of surfer cool these days but off-season seaside is off-season seaside with quiet streets, raincoats, sad arcades flashing for attention, bookies and pubs doing the best business, while the recession means the town-limits extend for miles with empty and half-built holiday home housing estates. Where else would you hold the Irish Elvis festival?

Rocking up in Donegal’s Vegas on a dark, rainy November night, Elvisness didn’t look too abundant – cold, wet, no sign of the King – but a pub, Teac Sean Rua, had a little sign outside saying ‘Elvis here tonite’, and Orla stopped looking at me as if I’d invented it. We warmed up in a restaurant where the proprietor told us how big the festival had been last year – it’s first – with Elvises playing each other in a full-costume football match under sunny skies, the streets awash with a parade of Elvii instead of rain. He said if his daughter managed to get him a costume he’d wear it tomorrow.

The Great Northern Hotel, host of Las Bundoran, is a former railway, now golf-hotel that overlooks the Atlantic. Friday night was international masters night with Juan ‘He may be Elvis, but he still wants his mam to make his costumes (South Wales Echo)’ Lozano, Dean ‘The Official Best Welsh Elvis 2009’ Mack, Steve ‘The Rockin' Reverend’ Caprice, Mike ‘Thatcham man gets Elvis accolade (Newbury Today)’ Nova, Ben ‘Best Gold Lamé Jacket 2007’ Portsmouth and Marc ‘Forty-year-old gas meter reader (Glamorgan Gazette)’ George, all backed by Britain’s top Elvis tribute band Red Alert and Porthcawl’s splendid backing duo Mills & Boon. I’ll come back to them individually at a later date – suffice to say they are some of Britain’s top ETAs, having between them won the Porthcawl prize several times, and scored well in international events. Personally, I go for Mike Nova, but maybe because he got the young Elvis slot – the movie music and some earlier rock ‘n’ roll. The audience comprised (foretold by the Porthcawl bus parked outside) a strong Welsh contingent - familiar with Elvis convention etiquette. This was my first time at such an event so wasn’t sure how to play it. We sat at tables around a dancefloor at the head of which the Elvises performed on a low stage. Popular songs got dancers onto the floor; people filmed and photographed. A little ritual of winning a scarf from Elvis was in play: a woman approaches the stage, Elvis beckons her foreword, puts a scarf around her neck and kisses her and when one brave woman went, more would follow, so Elvis wears a number of scarves around his neck. The woman opposite us was from Dublin, she comes for her daughter she says, her daughter loves Elvis. They go to the hotel on the Red Cow Roundabout (a notorious accident hot-spot) to see all the Elvises that come, organised by the Irish fanclub. Her daughter returned from the Elvis tat stalls in the foyer with a tie printed with Elvis images. Ben Portsmouth’s own Colonel Parker came around, distributing Ben’s ‘Taking Care of Elvis’ stickers and little Elvis pendants. ‘Ben’s got some good scarves’, he said, 'You've got to be quick to get them.' Ritual. How anthropological. I thought I’d better initiate myself if this is part of living Elvisly. I was elbowed out of the way by some more demanding Welsh ladies, but got my scarf eventually. It came with a kiss from Ben Portsmouth. The noise, the competition, the demand, Ben’s costume (he was Comeback Special acoustic), the women, the manliness of sweat and leather, lends it flustering excitement. It could almost be the real thing. Almost.

We’d had enough of Vegas Elvis (except for Mike Nova and Ben Portsmouth all of them were That’s The Way It Is gaudy in jumpsuits) by the time Marc George came on all blue and spangly. I knew American Trilogy was coming and I’ll put my cards on the table – I hate it. On the way back we stopped into Teac Sean Rua where a red jumpsuited young guy was singing karaoke Proud Mary to a rollin’ rollin’ home crowd.

Thanks: Elvisiate Orla

Picture: www.lasbundoran.com/elvis_irish_festival.php?Action=Home &amp

Mike Nova by Pen77

Long Black Limousine (part 1): Dios de la Muerte

2009-11-15T16:17:00.001Z

November 1st Todos Los Santos/All Saints Day

At the British Museum in London. Latin madness including mariachi musicians, Mexican food, papier mâché altar offerings, dancing skeletons, crystal skulls...

In the shop, little retablo boxes were doing a roaring trade. Tiny boxes of clay, wood and papier mâché with little models inside them - domestic scenes, religious scenes, historical scenes. Retablo boxes arrived in South America from Spain as small portable wooden religious altars used to instruct. They took on a new form: florally decorated boxes with animated figures inside that incorporated indigenous beliefs but also reflected local, everyday life, and a more diverse view of death. In amongst the little collection in the Museum shop, the King. Elvis as the incomprehensible, veneratable dead. Elvis católico. Snake-hipped Elvis in the skeleton dance.

Elvis' death and the material and beliefs that have become attached to it is going to be a recurrent theme I think. Thanks: Freeo.
Picture: http://tinyurl.com/Elvis-Retablo

Everyday Elvis

2009-10-30T18:58:00.002Z

Falling asleep last night I heard on the radio that Elvis had slipped to 4^th on the Forbes ‘dead rich’ list – behind Yves Saint-Laurent at number 1, and new entry Michael Jackson at 3. Elvis is everyday – falling into your consciousness while you fall asleep, slipping into your unconsciousness when you walk down the street. Elvis is everything to everybody, manufactured and malleable – an enthusiasm or a passion, or just passing. Real and imagined. I am Elvis. You are Elvis. We are all Elvis now. This blog is an exploration of Elvis in the everyday – encounters with him, whoever he is, wherever they happen: with impersonators, Elvis Tribute Artists (ETAs), Elvis music in public places, Elvis conversations in private places, Elvis in the news, Elvis on the walls.... Sometimes I’ll look for them, but mostly I’ll let them happen. I’m situated and I’m skint so it won’t be universal – it’s Elvis in my everyday. But feel free to contribute – let me know where you see him, where I can see him. Come with me.