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Aug. 23rd, 2022 09:40 pm1. I've discovered this marvelous six-eight hour Ken Burns style documentary by HBO Documentary Films, entitled "Elvis - The Searcher", and the focus is completely on his musical career, how he created music and what took him away from it and the struggles he had with the industry - it's clearly the inspiration for Baz L's Elvis film.
I stopped part II at the half-way mark - because it's almost 10 pm, and I don't want to stay up too late tonight. Early wake up call and all that.
I've kind of fallen down the rabbit hole on Elvis. I think it's partly, because I find something about his story relatable - and there's something about him, an undefinable something, that makes me think of my Dad. He kind of looks like him - six foot (my father was six foot three), blue black hair, and dark brown eyes. Also driven and came from poverty, and worked hard. Other than that - the comparisons fail, of course. But they were contemporaries, and both got drafted into the Army around the same time and around the same age. I'm not alone - my mother did too - she's been hunting down youtube videos on the film and on Elvis.
What's relatable - is how the world gets in the way of creating and sharing art. In Elvis' case it was the industry and bad managers, who put their own self-interest above Elvis's. I can identify - I have bad managers as well, who are, alas, doing the same things. My father used to call it "managing up" as opposed to what they should be doing "managing below or equal too".
My Dad had another saying - some folks are good at managing a position, others people. The Colonel was good at managing a position and had no business managing people. He gaslit Elvis, and isolated him. And why Elvis cowed to him - was never completely understood - except that he really didn't know anything else, and had no one who he trusted enough to get out him away from him. The Beatles for the most part had each other, and they had troubles with bad managers who mis-managed him, just imagine being a kid and getting caught in that trap.
What I did not realize...is that Elvis in 1970 did Sixty-Seven shows or thereabouts, and in 1971, one hundred and fifty, and in 1972, one hundred and sixty-seven. Dear God. How?
A music critic of the time, John Landau, wrote that he saw Elvis in Boston in concert, and that Elvis ruled and owned that stage - that he had the uncanny ability to know exactly how far to go on stage and how to pull in his audience.
Elvis is often dismissed - because he wasn't a song-writer or composer of music, but he was a phenomenal artistic talent. He could scale up and down the note register just for fun with his voice, go up and then down again. Not many folks can do that. He could change his voice to fit a song. And he knew how to arrange and remaster music almost intuitively. He was also wildly eclectic in his tastes - he loved opera, blues, rhythm & blues, country, gospell, pop, swing, big band, blue grass - and blended those styles. Also he had terrible stage fright, was terrified to go up there, but once he did, he relaxed and got caught up in the act of creating music.
John Lennon once famously stated "without Elvis, there would be no Beatles". Other musicians from Freddie Mercury to David Bowie to Led Zepplin to the Rolling Stones have said the same.
In 1966-1970 he revitalized his career by going back to Memphis and having Chips Taylor, a record producer and arranger - help him choose new music and change his sound, make it more contemporary. In 1966, he put out a gospel album.
But unfortunately, many people only know him for the bad movies he was forced to do from 1960-1965, which he couldn't get out of, despised making, and was contracted to do - it was a money making machine for the Colonel up to a point. And it almost destroyed his music career and destabilized him emotionally and creatively. Gospel was how he worked his way out of it.
Also he's known for the demoralizing Vegas shows, which while fun to start, became isolating and demoralizing after a while. He did two shows a night, one for the dinner crowd and one for the night crowd. The audience was mainly high rollers who were older folks that he couldn't quite connect with as a performer. Also, as one of his friends and musicians comments - "you are stuck in a hotel room in between shows, no one to talk to but the people doing it with you, not getting outside, and going on constantly being asked to perform - it can get demoralizing after a bit". So he went on tour and did ...well over 100 shows each year. To put this in context? Around the same time, the Rolling Stones only did 24 shows. The Beatles did 32 concerts in 1964 at their height of popularity. Madonna - 19. High profile bands did between 50-100 a year. And Elvis did this in his late thirties.
The documentary is a must for anyone who considers themselves a music critic or music geek or music historian. It really delves into the historical changes in the music industry and how things evolved.
It's also haunting, much like Baz L's Elvis film, and weirdly comforting in a misery loves company sort of way. I kind of identify with Elvis in an odd way - the loneliness, the desire/drive to get my art out there, the insane obstacles in the way. And dealing with bad managers, and not knowing who to trust.
The documentary also - clearly is where Baz L got a lot of his inspiration and content for his film. So a good portion of it is actually fairly accurate.
2. Sigh. Work.
( where I whine about my work place )
Today overheard a co-worker bemoaning the idea of socialism and how he is not a socialist, supports capitalism and the American Way of Life.
The kicker?
( Read more... )
3. Wales is enamored of James Baldwin's Another Country, so was Chidi. I probably should read it at some point, but considering I'm in a reading slump and can barely focus on the Fantasy that I'm reading entitled "Spin the Dawn" (which is an interesting take Asian mythology and folk tales), I don't think I can read Baldwin. Not in the right headspace. I just want to listen to music - reading is kind of beyond me. I kept drifting to sleep on the trains today, trying to read. (Too much reading of dry material in my job.)
I stopped part II at the half-way mark - because it's almost 10 pm, and I don't want to stay up too late tonight. Early wake up call and all that.
I've kind of fallen down the rabbit hole on Elvis. I think it's partly, because I find something about his story relatable - and there's something about him, an undefinable something, that makes me think of my Dad. He kind of looks like him - six foot (my father was six foot three), blue black hair, and dark brown eyes. Also driven and came from poverty, and worked hard. Other than that - the comparisons fail, of course. But they were contemporaries, and both got drafted into the Army around the same time and around the same age. I'm not alone - my mother did too - she's been hunting down youtube videos on the film and on Elvis.
What's relatable - is how the world gets in the way of creating and sharing art. In Elvis' case it was the industry and bad managers, who put their own self-interest above Elvis's. I can identify - I have bad managers as well, who are, alas, doing the same things. My father used to call it "managing up" as opposed to what they should be doing "managing below or equal too".
My Dad had another saying - some folks are good at managing a position, others people. The Colonel was good at managing a position and had no business managing people. He gaslit Elvis, and isolated him. And why Elvis cowed to him - was never completely understood - except that he really didn't know anything else, and had no one who he trusted enough to get out him away from him. The Beatles for the most part had each other, and they had troubles with bad managers who mis-managed him, just imagine being a kid and getting caught in that trap.
What I did not realize...is that Elvis in 1970 did Sixty-Seven shows or thereabouts, and in 1971, one hundred and fifty, and in 1972, one hundred and sixty-seven. Dear God. How?
A music critic of the time, John Landau, wrote that he saw Elvis in Boston in concert, and that Elvis ruled and owned that stage - that he had the uncanny ability to know exactly how far to go on stage and how to pull in his audience.
Elvis is often dismissed - because he wasn't a song-writer or composer of music, but he was a phenomenal artistic talent. He could scale up and down the note register just for fun with his voice, go up and then down again. Not many folks can do that. He could change his voice to fit a song. And he knew how to arrange and remaster music almost intuitively. He was also wildly eclectic in his tastes - he loved opera, blues, rhythm & blues, country, gospell, pop, swing, big band, blue grass - and blended those styles. Also he had terrible stage fright, was terrified to go up there, but once he did, he relaxed and got caught up in the act of creating music.
John Lennon once famously stated "without Elvis, there would be no Beatles". Other musicians from Freddie Mercury to David Bowie to Led Zepplin to the Rolling Stones have said the same.
In 1966-1970 he revitalized his career by going back to Memphis and having Chips Taylor, a record producer and arranger - help him choose new music and change his sound, make it more contemporary. In 1966, he put out a gospel album.
But unfortunately, many people only know him for the bad movies he was forced to do from 1960-1965, which he couldn't get out of, despised making, and was contracted to do - it was a money making machine for the Colonel up to a point. And it almost destroyed his music career and destabilized him emotionally and creatively. Gospel was how he worked his way out of it.
Also he's known for the demoralizing Vegas shows, which while fun to start, became isolating and demoralizing after a while. He did two shows a night, one for the dinner crowd and one for the night crowd. The audience was mainly high rollers who were older folks that he couldn't quite connect with as a performer. Also, as one of his friends and musicians comments - "you are stuck in a hotel room in between shows, no one to talk to but the people doing it with you, not getting outside, and going on constantly being asked to perform - it can get demoralizing after a bit". So he went on tour and did ...well over 100 shows each year. To put this in context? Around the same time, the Rolling Stones only did 24 shows. The Beatles did 32 concerts in 1964 at their height of popularity. Madonna - 19. High profile bands did between 50-100 a year. And Elvis did this in his late thirties.
The documentary is a must for anyone who considers themselves a music critic or music geek or music historian. It really delves into the historical changes in the music industry and how things evolved.
It's also haunting, much like Baz L's Elvis film, and weirdly comforting in a misery loves company sort of way. I kind of identify with Elvis in an odd way - the loneliness, the desire/drive to get my art out there, the insane obstacles in the way. And dealing with bad managers, and not knowing who to trust.
The documentary also - clearly is where Baz L got a lot of his inspiration and content for his film. So a good portion of it is actually fairly accurate.
2. Sigh. Work.
( where I whine about my work place )
Today overheard a co-worker bemoaning the idea of socialism and how he is not a socialist, supports capitalism and the American Way of Life.
The kicker?
( Read more... )
3. Wales is enamored of James Baldwin's Another Country, so was Chidi. I probably should read it at some point, but considering I'm in a reading slump and can barely focus on the Fantasy that I'm reading entitled "Spin the Dawn" (which is an interesting take Asian mythology and folk tales), I don't think I can read Baldwin. Not in the right headspace. I just want to listen to music - reading is kind of beyond me. I kept drifting to sleep on the trains today, trying to read. (Too much reading of dry material in my job.)