Reply With Quoteit's a pity he didn't do more blues as he had a definite feel for it
I was thinking had Elvis recorded more blues on par with the many country songs he recorded he would have been inducted into the Blues Foundation blues hall of fame. Just think Elvis in the Rock n' roll, country, gospel, rockabilly, blues hall of fames. Elvis blues catalogue is very limited something like only 14 real blues songs. I was thinking these are some of the blues songs he should have recorded I started this discussion on another board and got only a few replies I was hoping for a whole lot more.
I can just Imagine Elvis recording an all blues album with the american studio band in 1970 songs would include
hellbound on my trail
Baby please don't go
Hard time killing floor blues
The thrill is gone
Dust my broom
Sweet home Chicago
The sky is crying
Red house
I can't quit you baby
Further on up the road
Smokestack lightning
who do you love
stone crazy
I just wanna make love to you
Boogie chillen
Got my mojo working (Elvis version is too vegas to me I would like a more blues rock version)
Turn your love light on (A few more songs)
A 10 song soul blues album recorded at stax in 1973
Grits aint groceries
I pity the fool
Frosty
Just a little bit
Did somebody make a fool out of you
(a few more songs)
As a follow up to the Moody Blue and Elvis in concert could have been a country acoustic blues album featuring 12 songs
Crossroad blues
Mojo hand
Give me somme of your pie
(A few more songs)
Do you agree with me that Elvis should have recorded more blues songs and done some blues albums? why or why not
Do you like my song choices what blues songs would you have liked Elvis to record?
I look forward to hearing from all of you on this post
I hope I get a lot of feedback and replies
it's a pity he didn't do more blues as he had a definite feel for it
he sure had a feel for blues music and he had a reall soulfull edgy voice an all blues album would have been great but there are so many things elvis should or could have done
I think I`d be willing to part with a kidney for that album!.......I think it`s a shame he didn`t record more blues music, I think that if it hadn`t been for the movies he would have...given the huge rise in interest in the Blues in the early to mid sixties.
Can we put "House of the rising sun" on there as well??!!!
Woohoo Jack....but hang on to your kidney.Yes House of the Rising Sun would be a must along with the rest you posted Brian.
Diane
Although he didn't record as many strict blues songs as country, he had a blues element in all of his music. I don't think a lot of Elvis' Country music sounded strictly country either. I just call it "Elvis" music. He was basically a Soul singer with everything he recorded.
In 1984, he received the "Keepin the Blues Alive" award with Sam Phillips
from the Blues Foundation.
Yes it's a pity that Elvis did not record more blues, although there have been several compilation albums of his blues recordings, so there is enough material available. On the other hand, Elvis was into many other types of music, like country, gospel, and even soul (Memphis 69 recordings have tremendous soul influence). It's marvellous how musically interchangable he was.
You'll Never Walk Alone!
I didn't know that ''House of the rising sun'' was a blues song I thought it was an old folk song that the Animals recorded, I guess it's true you really do learn something new everyday. Do you or anyone else have any other suggestions for blues songs for Elvis to record, I would love to hear them.Originally Posted by SleepyJack
I think I`d be willing to part with a kidney for that album!.......I think it`s a shame he didn`t record more blues music, I think that if it hadn`t been for the movies he would have...given the huge rise in interest in the Blues in the early to mid sixties.
Can we put "House of the rising sun" on there as well??!!!
"Rainy Night in Georgia"
I'd be in Heaven!
"When the Night Comes Falling"?
Last edited by Merry; 07-09-2008 at 04:41 PM.
I always thought of Rainy night in Georgia as a ballad and not a blues song
I see what you mean about "House of the rising sun"......most of the versions I`ve heard treat it more as a folk song....I had The Animals version in my head when I answered..and, to me at least,that sounds like a blues song..maybe not in the strictest sense...but there`s blues in there!
As for other suggestions.........Try and imagine Elvis doing Muddy Waters` "Mannish Boy" at one of the sit-down shows for the `68 special.....Woooo-eeeee.....aint that a man!!!
"The Thrill is Gone" and "Before You Accuse Me" come to mind.
Letīs just say Elvis had the blues, some people have it some people donīt, Elvis had much more blues in his little finger than many others most recognized blues artists, specially white ones, as Joe Cocker put it: Elvis is the greatest blues singer in the world.
Also Jimi Hendrix, which by the way did saw Elvis live in '57, pointed out Elvis gifts as a blues singer, so did the one an only Mr. Howlin' Wolf.
Elvis loved blues music, its been said he had an huge collection of blues 45's, and blues music was a definitive influence on his way of singing, yet, he seemed to recorded much more often any other kind of music, but abyways, every time he dare to touch any blues classic it turned out to be a diamond recording through Alīs mike, or Samīs mike or whoevers mike, from Sun Records classic single: Milkcow Blues Boogie, to his finest early 60's Reconsider Baby and Feel So Bad, to even christmas blues Merry Christmas Baby.
Sure, I guess almost evrybody, both fans and critics will agree that some more blues tracks from Elvis Presley would have been one of the most apreciated gifts that he could had delivered, and that a '73 Blues album as follow up to '71 Elvis Country and '72 He Touched Me would had been just the most, a wonderful trylogy on American music. Yet, from my point of view, that blues album, those more blues songs that Elvis never did, are not in the same category of the long list of Presley greatest never dids, like the Word Tour, the decent movie, getting out of drugs etc.
It doesnīt go into that list to me because blues was surely something very special for Elvis, and when he did a blues song in the studio it was always a very special moment, and event, either if it was a sudden incendiary jam or Elvis getting serious about one song, like saying, just one moment, this is a very special song I want to do, lets get it right. It was a matter of inspiration to him, so you canīt ask him for more, he did recorded the blues songs he did, like a writer that did just said what he had to say about that, you canīt force, not that I would had like more of course, and yeah sure, not that he could not had locked him self in the studio with only blues on his mind, but I guess he never got the feeling for that, as he did for gospel music.
But anyway, what other song I would had liked, wow, what a great question, and what a great thread as Im a huge blues fan, and oddly, I became a blues fan because of Elvis.
I have always liked to heard Elvis trying into some Robert Johnson stuff, seems that everybody did that except Elvis, "When You Got A Good Friend", "Love in Vain" "Come on in to My Kitchen" and "Preaching Blues". This would had sounded good either from the Nashville '70 sessions of while in Sun Records, its country sounding blues, rural blues as it is known. He should have tried some John Hurt stuff too for this sound.
Some songs for the '60 or '66 Nashville sessions some Chicago blues: Sonny BOy Williamson's "Checkin' Up On My Baby" "One way Out", Willie Dixon's "Do the Do", "You Need Love", John Lee Hookerīs "Boom Boom", Boogie Chillenī".
For Stax '73: T-bone Walker classic "Stormy Monay Blues", B.B. Kings "The Trill is Gonne" and "Until Im Dead and Cold", Maggic Sam's "You Donīt Love Me", Howlin' Wolf's "Moaning at Midnight".
I donīt know I can keep going and going with all the songs I would have liked to hear in Elvis voice, but the true is, Elvis knowledge and taste in blues was kind of diferent from the most predictable Clapton, Mayall, or and The Rolling Stones themselves, the british rock/ blues scene that bringed blues back to the american audiences, Elvis, as he grew up in Memphis and did not depended on imports to made for his contact with the blues, seemed to choose some more obscure artists to cover, so its hard to tell which other blues songs he might do if he had lived.
It does sound too Vegas when you hear the dubbed version from the Love Letters Album, they ruined it with those honrs, try to find the undubbed version, the studio Jam just as it was (CD: A Hundred Years From Now on the Essential Elvis series) it does sound fantastic from my point of view.
Elvis did recorded the song Just a Little Bit at Stax in '73, it was released in the album "Raised on Rock", had a great guitar solo from James Burton, the Elvis version of this song its great and underated.
Yes I know Raised on Rock but I didn't really like Elvis version he was in poor voice to me during the July Stax sessions. I would have liked for Elvis to rerecord the song and do it in a slower soulful way
One thing that always struck me about Elvis and blues was how his style always seemed to lean more towards blues when he was playing guitar than at other times....the sit-down shows from `68 for example......also the recordings from Vegas in `69...songs like "Baby what you want me to do"...he just seemed to slip into blues territory when he was playing.
Yes I know, seems to be the only one session where his voice was not at his best, all the songs he recorded during that session could have sounded better if they were done in December, but yet, the arrangments of many of the songs he did there are very cool for me, Find Out Whats Happenin', I Got a Thing ABout You Baby and the blues song Just a Little Bit came to my mind. I stilll do like Elvis arrangment of Just a Little Bit despite of his mushy voice then. I do like it more than Magic Sams '68 version and Jerry Lee Lewis '73 version.
A matter of taste anyway.
Apart from that, donīt you find alarming that between all the country and gospel music compilations, all the Love songs and Greatest Hits compilations, there had only been a very few Blues compilations, Reconsider Baby '85, and the Japan import Elvis R&B around 00'. And I belive there is another R&B recently in the import world, but nothing important.
And I bet you that in the coming Elvis compilations from BMG we will get another Love songs, another Greatest Hits, another greates Country songs, and another Gospel even. But no Elvis Blues.
If you are able to do an Elvis Blues 2 cd compilation, which ones would be your choices?
Last edited by Raised on Rock; 07-11-2008 at 09:54 AM.
He loved that bluesy lick in "Baby What You Want Me to Do"
Joe Cocker once said that Elvis was the greatest white Blues artist.
I agree with the idea of a 1973 Blues album as part of the Country / Gospel / Trilogy. As a matter of fact, when interviewed in 1973, he said that he wanted to do a Blues album (you should include R&B and Soul in Elvisī own definition of Blues music) but, sadly, 1973 Stax sessions did not bring much (Blues) music.
On the other hand, it is not that complicated to create your own 1970/1971 Blues album thanks to both Nashville and TTWII studio sessions. Here is a possible track list:
1- Mystery train / Tiger man (studio instrumental jam)
2- Merry Christmas Baby
3- Thatīs all right, mama (july 1970 rehearsal)
4- Whole lotta shakinī goinī on (undubbed)
5- The fool
6- I washed my hands in muddy water
7- Stagger Lee (july 1970 rehearsal)
8- Got my mojo workinī (undubbed)
9- Iīll be Home on Christmas day (blues version)
10- Stranger in my own home town (july 1970 rehearsal)
11- Whatīd I say (july 1970 rehearsal)
BONUS TRACKS:
12- Santa Claus is Back in Town (aug.1970 rehearsal)
13- C.C. Rider (live, feb.1970)
Last edited by jeanno; 07-12-2008 at 08:33 AM.
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