How come modern (and "Golden Oldies") acts draw a bigger audience than Elvis?

[jadedragon61]

I think it all comes down to colonel-onomics. If he thought, for whatever set of reasons (his cut being firstmost),that the smaller joints turned a better profit, then he booked them . I think there's no question that EP could fill any joint, the colonel just didn't want to book those places.

The weak excuse given by the colonel for never doing a world, or at least European, tour was "security concerns" - the fact is that he couldn't get the same miser's cut as he did in the US where he knew every part of the field.

[poormansgold]

Maybe Elvis like smaller places better, I know He had trouble with few smaller places with sound, liked King wings PLace in K'zoo mIchigan, i been in that place the sound is bad still.
The European tour nothing real do with security, Colonel was Ban from Holland, because from bad busineses deals, That's True Reason Elvis Didn't
Come To Europe.
Tom

[srj1967]

The European tour nothing real do with security, Colonel was Ban from Holland, because from bad busineses deals, That's True Reason Elvis Didn'tCome To Europe.

I have to disagree here. The Colonel didn't have to go overseas; he could have just sent Elvis with the musicians and the Mafia. His status as an illegal alien had nothing to do with Elvis. The Colonel would have simply stayed home while Elvis toured the world.

I've always believed this theory, and it's one that Sonny West told me he also believes. He said, "There are two reasons why Elvis didn't travel the world in the '70s ... the drugs and the guns. Elvis and the Colonel didn't have the medical connections overseas and Elvis was paranoid about not having access to his medication. And not even Elvis could have got his guns into other countries, and he liked to carry them in the later years."

The Colonel didn't have any medical connections in other countries, so Elvis would've been presumabley climbing the walls without his pills, and understandably so.

I guess we'll never really know, but that's what I've always believed anyway. I think the drugs - and perhaps general laziness on his part - kept Elvis from visiting other countries for a tour.