this was on EIN, but it was too long to post all of it...here's the link..
http://www.elvisinfonet.com/interview_mac_davis.html
franny
The first time that I met Elvis was when I went over to the Live A Little, Love A Little filming where Elvis sang the song to the girl around the swimming pool. I felt humbled in the presence of the great one. I was a teenager and he was my idol as a kid. I was a Fifties child. He and James Dean were my heroes. The first time I saw Elvis play live was in the Fifties in the parking lot of the Hub Motor Company in Lubbock, Texas. Elvis was standing on the back of a flatbed truck performing. Then he came back a year later and he filled up the Lubbock County Fairgrounds and I saw him at that show too.
Anyhow, so I got invited to the soundstage where Elvis was lip synching "A Little Less Conversation" for the movie. In those days everything had to be done in slow motion. If Elvis messed up and missed a lyric or the director said, "We want to take that again," it took the full length of the recording backwards while they were rewinding. So if Elvis was two minutes into the song and he messed up, it took another two minutes to rewind it and start over again. When there was a mistake, Elvis would stop and go to the piano. It was an all night affair. It just went on and on and on. At that time the Colonel was sitting there next to the stage in an old theater seat and the Memphis Mafia guys had put a stool out there to put his feet up on. He had a big cigar in his mouth and he called me over to him. He said, (imitates Colonel's brusque manner of speaking) "Are you the boy who wrote this song?" And I said, "Yes Sir." He said, (imitates the Colonel) "Come here a minute." I went over to him and he said, (imitates the Colonel) "Let me rub that curly head of yours." I said, "What?!" And the Memphis Mafia boys were nodding like if he wants to do it let him do it. So I kind of bent over and he reached up and rubbed my head and went, (imitates the Colonel) "All right boy; you tell everybody that the Colonel rubbed your head, you're gonna be a star." (laughs)
Moving ahead to 1980 and I'm opening at the Hilton Hotel in Las Vegas and the Colonel came in for opening night. They said it was the first time he had been there since Elvis had passed away. He came in and brought me a great big old picture of Elvis that he had taken off his office wall or something. (laughs) It was a copy of a huge velvet painting of Elvis that was on plywood, and he had signed it in huge letters. He told me. "This is my favorite painting of Elvis." But, of course, it wasn't the original, it was just a copy. He signed it. "To Mac Davis, whose curly head I once rubbed and told he was gonna be a star." And it was signed "the Colonel." He signed it right across the picture. That was the Colonel.
There's not much to say about "Clean Up Your Own Backyard." It was just a song that I wrote. I had written the song entirely and had the title. I'm still fuzzy how Elvis got that one and used it for The Trouble With Girls.
"Memories" was my first top ten record. It was the first big one that I had. It was written specifically for Elvis and the TV special. Billy (Strange) and the director, Steve Binder, said "We want to bookend this section where he's looking back over the years of rock and roll. " They said that they wanted to bookend him singing his old hits of the Fifties and wanted a song about looking back over the years.
I sat down in Billy Strange's garage and spent the whole night writing that song. I wrote it on guitar. We had to do this so quick. We only had a 24 hour window to get it down, get a demo on it and get it to Elvis. They were moving real fast. I couldn't wait to sing it to Billy the next morning. I stayed up all night out there in his garage and the next morning when he got up I sang it to him. If I'm not mistaken, it was either that same day or the next day we did a little demo of it and they took it to Elvis and he decided to use it.
Good one, I've enjoyed Mac's music for a long time, & I'll admit to watching the Mac Davis Show many summers ago.Plus, I'm from Texas, & my oldest is attending Texas Tech in Lubbock living in an apartment on Mac Davis Lane
(no, really she is). Love to read about how the writers are inspired to write the music they write. I'll have to look into getting that book.
Ohhhhh Lord Its hard to be Humble .......
When your perfect in eve-rry wayay!
I loved the Mac Davis show, and play "hard to be humble" to my kids all the time. I loved the part of the show at the end when he would go out into the audience and have two people pick topics for songs then he'd mix them together and improvise a song on the spot. He's a great guy.Originally Posted by Lisarose
Good one, I've enjoyed Mac's music for a long time, & I'll admit to watching the Mac Davis Show many summers ago.
Got my family, my kids, my books and my music, I'm good, yeah, I'm good.....
Thanks franny.
elvislady
Mac Davis, in another interview, tells a good story of how he was about to leave the Memphis theater because he went down and sat next to Elvis and began to talk to him, during a movie change one of the guys took Mac aside and told him you can't set next to Elvis. Elvis saw him leaving and asked him why so MAc told him what he was told. He says Elvis says nah come back down and talk somemore and he asked Mac what can I do to let yo know I mean it. Mac said give me your private phone number. Elvis said Okay but did not know his private line number- he had to call one of the guys to give it to Mac. Mac said he never used it but loved the gesture. I think that interview was on the Elvis World Japan website.
I loved that part of the show, too. I remember snippets of a song he created about a washing machine & making love. It ended with "we got hung up in the wringer"
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