The Release of Elvis' Third-Best-Selling Single

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What is the greatest Elvis Presley song ever recorded?

You can get compelling arguments from his fans for maybe 100 of the King's recordings. He was a unique talent, of that there is no doubt, and he changed American pop culture forever.

Some will make the case that the single he released on this date in 1960, "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" was his greatest recording, and that is hard to dispute. It was definitely a big hit. But one thing that made it different from many of Elvis' hits is the fact that it wasn't a new song. It was written and published more than 30 years earlier — nearly a decade before Elvis was born, in fact.

Elvis' version wasn't the first to be recorded, nor was it the first to show up on the music charts. But it's the one people remember.

And I guess it is the one that I most associate with him.

As it is with any great recording artist, though, listeners can associate Elvis with many songs. He definitely could not be described as a one–trick pony.

Elvis recorded "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" in the predawn hours of April 4, 1960 as a favor to his manager, Col. Tom Parker. For what appears to be the only time, Parker influenced one of Elvis' recording sessions. Parker asked Elvis to record "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" because the song was Parker's wife's favorite.

The recording was done with Elvis and acoustic guitar, drums, bass and the backup group. Everyone else was asked to leave. With the lights turned out, Elvis performed the song with the iconic spoken portion. Not satisfied with the first effort, Elvis did a second take, then told the producer to discard it because "I can't do it justice."

Instead, they did a third take — which became the recording that was released on this date in 1960.

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RCA Records delayed the release by nearly seven months, fearing the song didn't complement Elvis' new post–service style (which was largely his old style enhanced by recent technological developments).

The listening public had no doubts. The song debuted at #35 on Billboard's Top 40 and was #1 before the end of November. It remained in the top position until January 1961. Three months after its release, the recording exceeded sales of 2 million worldwide and was certified gold. It was certified double platinum in 1992.

"Are You Lonesome Tonight?" became Elvis' third–best–selling single ever — behind "It's Now Or Never" and "Jailhouse Rock."

Whether it was Elvis' greatest recording is a matter of personal opinion, I suppose, but its success with the record–buying public is beyond question.

It was a good thing RCA Records reconsidered its original decision and released the single.

'Satisfaction:' The Triumph of the British Invasion

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If you weren't alive during the so–called British invasion of the mid–20th century and you would like an idea of how thoroughly and how quickly it succeeded in capturing the imagination of American youth, you really need look no further than the Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction," which was released in the Stones' homeland — the United Kingdom — 50 years ago today.

It was released in the United States nearly three months earlier.

Although there had been earlier reports in the American media of the popular music being made in England, the British invasion of United States pop culture generally is believed to have begun when the Beatles arrived in New York to appear on the Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964. By 1965, it seems the invasion was over, and the British performers were here to stay. America was where the money was. Media, too.

There is a pretty convincing case to be made for the significance of the year 1965 in modern popular music history. The Beatles had three of the top five hits of the year — "Help!" "Yesterday" and "Ticket to Ride" — but the Stones' "Satisfaction" was the top–selling single of the year, followed by America's Bob Dylan's "Mr. Tambourine Man."

If you listened to the radio in 1965, you heard some of the biggest hits ever recorded by The Kinks, The Who, The Supremes, The Mamas and the Papas, The Beach Boys, The Yardbirds, The Moody Blues, Marvin Gaye, James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Roger Miller, Tom Jones, Herman's Hermits, The Temptations, and the list went on.

I was a small child in those days, and many of my peers had older brothers and sisters who introduced them to the music of the time, but my experience was different. I was the oldest in my family but far too young to be interested in the radio, and my parents rarely listened to the radio (my father would switch it on in the car if there was a good football game being played). I suppose my exposure to the music of my generation would have been further delayed if not for the fact that my father was a professor at one of the three colleges in my hometown, and he and my mother typically hired his students to watch my brother and me when they wanted to go out for dinner or a movie or something else. Sometimes the students came to our house to watch my brother and me; other times, my parents dropped us off at the dorm, and I can remember hearing the music of that time echoing through the halls of the dorms.

Undoubtedly, that is where I heard many songs for the first time. It is probably why I feel as if I have always known the words to some songs — I heard them played over and over again when I was young.

(If brainwashing were as benign as simply implanting song lyrics into one's brain, I could probably support it. But, I suppose, that form of brainwashing already exists.)

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Speaking of which, it is funny how the brain functions, isn't it? I mean, every time I hear "Satisfaction," I remember — however briefly — when I saw "Apocalypse Now" and it was featured on the movie's soundtrack.

The Start of Phase 2 of Elvis' Career

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In the last two decades of his life, everything Elvis Presley did made news. If he was making a movie, it was in the news. If he recorded a new song, it was in the news.

When he was inducted into the Army, it was in the news.

There was kind of a news blackout on Presley for a couple of years while he was in the Army — although he did have ten top 40 hits between his induction in 1958 and discharge in 1960 so I guess some people hardly knew he'd been away — but once he was discharged from the service in March 1960, his career roared back to life. He had barely been discharged when he was rushed into the studio in the spring of 1960 and recorded two of his biggest hit singles, one of which — "It's Now or Never" — was released on this day in 1960.

It was an interesting thing, that song. It was conceived in almost a casual way. The melody was inspired by "O sole mio," an Italian standard from the 19th century, but the theme of the song was inspired by a recording that had been a modest hit a decade earlier, and the lyrics were written in half an hour by Aaron Schroeder and Wally Gold — who were assigned the task of writing the lyrics because they were the only songwriters in the music publisher's office when he arrived one day.

Yet the song wound up selling more than 20 million copies and is second only to "Hound Dog" on the list of Elvis' top–selling songs.

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In January, on what would have been Elvis' 80th birthday, Swide.com wrote about Elvis' Italian legacy and listed the Italian–influenced songs he recorded.

That was an impressive argument, but more persuasive than any song in Presley's musical library, even "It's Now or Never," was this observation:

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"Elvis, especially in the second phase of his career — from the '60s on — fell in love with the 'Bel canto,' became a balladeer and between his vocal influences he incorporated Italian tenors Enrico Caruso and his heir, Mario Lanza."

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There isn't really a doubt in my mind that his vocal style was suited for Italian ballads, and it was especially obvious, I thought, in his post–Army recordings.

Early in his career, it was often noted that Elvis sounded like a black singer — due, no doubt, to the musical influences of his Mississippi roots — which gave him enormously lucrative cross–over appeal. I don't know if that is true, but the numbers don't lie. He had three dozen #1 hit recordings in his career and made nearly as many movies.

He never really lost that — for lack of a better phrase — black sound, but it didn't seem to dominate his work as it had before.

Much of his work was accomplished after his return from the service, and it is clear to me that his performing style was toned down, less the Delta influence and more the Italian crooner style. He wasn't stationed in Italy, but maybe he was influenced by music he heard on radios in the barracks or live in the clubs of Germany, where he was stationed.

I'm not enough of an Elvis fan to know about that — but I do know that, around the time he recorded "It's Now or Never," Elvis appeared on The Frank Sinatra Timex Show. In addition to his Italian lineage, Sinatra's disdain for rock 'n' roll was well known; long before they appeared on television together, Sinatra said of Elvis' staying power, "Only time will tell. They said I was a freak when I first hit, but I'm still around. Presley has no training at all. When he goes into something serious, a bigger kind of singing, we'll find out if he is a singer. He has a natural, animalistic talent."

Sinatra may well have influenced the second phase of Elvis' career before the first phase had ended.

During his lifetime, Elvis' fans probably would have bought anything that he recorded and, even though the quality of his music tended to suffer after his time in the service, in all likelihood because of the his movie career, it is clear from even a casual listening that the style of his music was different, possibly due to a different ethnic influence than the one he had at the beginning.

He continued to sell records, as always, but they were different. Even "It's Now or Never" was different from what had come before. True, it became Elvis' second–best–selling recording — but it had none of the in–your–face quality of "Hound Dog."

A new age had begun.

Rockin' Around the Clock

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Sixty years ago today, Bill Haley and His Comets first released "Rock Around the Clock" — their signature song.

Several versions of this song have been recorded, but Haley's version is the one that comes to mind for most folks.

It wasn't the first recording. It wasn't even the first recording for Haley, who started out as a country/western yodeler. After he made his transition to rock 'n' roll, he and his band came to be regarded by many as being as influential on the youth of their day as the Beatles and Rolling Stones were 10 years later.

In fact, the anniversary of the release of Haley's recording seems to have reignited — in some quarters — the debate over whether Haley is the father of rock 'n' roll.

That is a debate I have been hearing much of my life.

When I was growing up, I was under the impression that Elvis Presley was the father of rock 'n' roll. Presley, of course, was born and raised in Mississippi, and he made his adult home about 100 miles away — in Memphis.

I grew up in the neighboring state of Arkansas; being a good Southern boy, it wasn't hard for me to accept that premise — especially since I always believed Southern blues strongly influenced rock 'n' roll, and Presley's style was obviously influenced by the blues.

But, while Presley did make some demo recordings in 1953, they leaned toward ballads. He didn't record his first real rock 'n' roll song until July 1954 — and, by that time, Haley had already released "Rock Around the Clock."

(In fact, the top–selling recording artists of 1954 were Doris Day, Jo Stafford and Eddie Fisher.)

If Presley wasn't the father of rock 'n' roll, I figured it had to be Chuck Berry. Similarly, Berry started out singing the blues. His first rock 'n' roll single, "Maybellene," was recorded and released in 1955.

According to Margaret Moser in the Austin Chronicle, Haley died "haunted, embittered, and neglected" in 1981.

"Haley bought into the pointless argument of who invented rock & roll," Moser wrote, "believing he deserved the title. He had a legit claim, too, having recorded the genre's first bona fide anthem, 'Rock Around the Clock.' The other firsts he deserves credit for have been marginalized along with his memory."

As Moser observed, "Rock Around the Clock" has been credited with being an anthem for the youth of the '50s, but, for a song that supposedly had such an influence on that generation, Rolling Stone only ranked it #159 on its list of the top 500 songs of all time while other songs from the '50s — Elvis' "Hound Dog," "Heartbreak Hotel," "Jailhouse Rock," "Mystery Train," "Suspicious Minds" and "That's All Right" and Berry's "Johnny B. Goode," "Maybellene," "Roll Over Beethoven," and, ironically, "Rock & Roll Music" — were praised more prominently.

Those songs may be better known, but they all came along after "Rock Around the Clock."

The song got its first real exposure when it was played as part of the opening credits for "The Blackboard Jungle" starring Glenn Ford, Anne Francis and Sidney Poitier. With the help of that movie, it shot to the top of the charts, where it stayed for eight weeks.

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I think the first time I ever heard it was when it was used as the original theme music for the Happy Days TV show. Haley's recording was part of the soundtrack for the movie "American Graffiti," too, but I don't think I saw that movie until it was shown on TV years later.

(There was no special reason why I didn't see it sooner, I suppose.)

My first exposure to "Rock Around the Clock" came to me courtesy of Happy Days. Being young and naive, I thought it was an original song written for the TV show. I had no idea who Bill Haley and His Comets were.

I do now, of course.

Playin' Those 'Mind Games'

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"We all been playin' those mind games forever
Some kinda druid dude liftin' the veil
Doin' the mind guerrilla
Some call it magic, the search for the grail."

John Lennon

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John Lennon has always been my favorite Beatle, and his death was (for me, at least, and I am sure for many others around the world) the kind of event of which one says, "I remember where I was and what I was doing when ..."

(That's the kind of statement, incidentally, that I have heard a lot in recent days, being as we are nearly upon the 50th anniversary of John F. Kennedy's assassination. Perhaps that is why it springs so easily to mind in the context of a story about Lennon.)

But on this day in 1973, Lennon was neither a Beatle (anymore) nor the murdered ex–Beatle he became in 1980. He was a solo artist, and he released his single "Mind Games," the title track from the album he released a couple of weeks earlier, in the United Kingdom 40 years ago on this day.

The rest of the album wasn't bad, but the title track was really the only truly memorable song from it.

My fellow Lennon admirers will mention a whole range of songs when asked to name their favorite Lennon composition. Some are familiar to mainstream listeners, like "Imagine" or songs he wrote when he was with the Beatles, but some are rather obscure. If you mention them to Lennon fans, they will smile and nod their heads knowingly, but, more often than not, if you mention them to mainstreamers, their faces will show no recognition.

In many ways, "Mind Games" is like that. I think it is a classic Lennon melody with classic Lennon lyrics, easily comparable to any of the best songs he recorded with the Beatles or as a solo artist after the Beatles broke up.

Lennon's admirers will know of it; casual listeners probably will not.

And that probably plays games with a few minds today, just as it did with some critics 40 years ago.

The Meaning of 'Angie'

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"With no loving in our souls
And no money in our coats
You can't say we're satisfied
But Angie, Angie,
You can't say we never tried."

Mick Jagger and Keith Richards

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My life followed an unusual pattern in 1973 — well, it was an out–of–the–ordinary pattern for me, to say the least.

That summer, my parents decided to take part in a program in which the college where my father taught was a participant.

Under this arrangement, students could enroll in summer college courses being offered at the University of Graz in Graz, Austria. My parents could receive significant discounts on airfare and accommodations if they took classes as well, which they did, but they didn't seem to take their classes seriously. It was mostly a low–cost way for the family to take a trip to Europe.

Faculty members from other schools did the same thing. I remember becoming friends that summer with a couple of boys my age whose fathers were teachers in Nebraska. I even visited them in Nebraska once after we returned to the United States.

Speaking of which, we returned to America in early to mid–August, as I recall, and my family had to pack our things quickly because my father was about to begin a four–month sabbatical in Nashville, and we had little time to get everything ready for our move.

Consequently, August of 1973 is a blur for me now. But all I have to do is hear a song that was on the radio in those days, and I am instantly transported back to that time.

And one of the most prominent songs was released on this day in 1973 — "Angie" by the Rolling Stones.

It was on the Stones' "Goats Head Soup" album. No other song on the album could compete with it as far as public popularity was concerned. "Angie" raced to the top of the Billboard charts; "Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)," its closest competition from the album, made it to #15 the following year.

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I remember at the time there was considerable speculation about the subject of the song. Was it about David Bowie's first wife, whose name was Angela? Was it about actress Angie Dickinson? Or was it about bandmate Keith Richards' newborn daughter (whose name was Dandelion Angela)?

(Personally, whenever I heard "Angie," I thought of a beautiful classmate of mine whose name was Angela — and who inspired my earliest adolescent fantasies. Matter of fact, I still think of her when I hear it — and I have seen a few recent pictures of her on Facebook. She's still capable of inspiring fantasies — or song lyrics.)

Richards wrote nearly all of the song, and he said it was about heroin and his attempts to stop using it.

Kind of a reverse twist on the Beatles' "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" explanation, huh? In case you aren't familiar with it, speculation held that that title was a play on the abbreviation LSD, and it was a drug–inspired song.

John Lennon popped that balloon, though, by explaining that the title came from a piece of artwork done by his young son at school.

That's the way the '60s and early '70s were, though. Everyone was looking for hidden meanings in everything — and the speculation was almost always wrong. (That observation never fails to remind me of a line that George Carlin used when doing his disc jockey act — "In a few minutes, we'll be listening to the new John Lennon single, which, if you play it backwards at slow speed, it screws up your needle ...")

I suppose, though, like most songs, "Angie" means whatever the listener thinks it means.

Personally, I never attached any special meaning to "Angie," other than a little harmless fantasizing about my classmate Angela, but I had a friend in college who always thought of her mother when she heard it (she thought of her father, a truck driver, whenever she heard Elton John's "Rocket Man").

To each his own, I guess.

'Love Me Do' Turns 50

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I'm an acknowledged Beatles fan.

Less charitable people might see it as an addiction. Perhaps they would say I am a "Beatles–a–holic." But I don't feel that way. To confess to being addicted to something is to admit to being powerless over a bad thing, something that is not healthy or desirable but over which you have no control.

I'll admit that I have no control over my affection for Beatles music. But it is not an addiction. True, there are days when I feel that I absolutely must hear a Beatles song — or a song that was released by John Lennon, Paul McCartney or George Harrison in their solo careers.

But I don't think that is a bad thing. It is something that has been a part of me all my life — and it has enriched my life.

Beatles songs have been enriching many lives for half a century.

The very first Beatles single, "Love Me Do," was released on this day in 1962.

Fifty years. Wow. As Tony Sclafani writes for NBC News, the Beatles "probably couldn't have imagined being age 50, much less anyone marking the single hitting the half–century mark."

Nevertheless, we are witnessing the first of many such milestones today. In the years ahead, all the other Beatles songs that you've been humming as you went about your daily business and singing in the shower all these years will be turning 50 as well.

But "Love Me Do" was — and is — the first. If you want to mark the date when the British invasion really began, it was on this day 50 years ago.

With a ditty that McCartney wrote in the late 1950s when he was about 16.

Actually, I guess, the invasion was more than a year away on Oct. 5, 1962. I suppose the invasion part occurred when the Beatles came to America and appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show — and were greeted by wildly screaming Beatlemaniacs who had been watching the explosion of Beatlemania across the ocean.

After that, things would never be the same.

It all began on this day in 1962.

A Satisfying Single

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Five and a half years ago, Rolling Stone named it the #2 greatest rock 'n' roll song of all time.

Considering that nothing has been recorded and released since that time that could even remotely be considered a threat to it, I have to assume that the Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction" is still the second–greatest song in Rolling Stone's opinion, second only to Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone," which was released the following month.

Oh, did I mention that today is the 45th anniversary of the commercial release of "Satisfaction?" It became the first — and perhaps the greatest — #1 hit in the Stones' storied career.

I guess a lot of songs could be said to be Vietnam era songs, but "Satisfaction" seemed to grab the unofficial title when it was prominently used in the 1979 film "Apocalypse Now."

I've wondered which song the individual Stones would pick as representative of the Vietnam era. I'm inclined to doubt that Keith Richards would name "Satisfaction." He didn't seem to think there was anything special about it. The song's famous, distinctive guitar riff wasn't unique in the Stones' repertoire, he insisted, saying that "there is only one song — it's just the variations you come up with."

I have heard — although I've never been able to prove — that Mick Jagger once said he would rather be dead than still singing "Satisfaction" when he was 40. Maybe he did, but he seemed to come to appreciate the role the song played in his success. It was "the song that really made The Rolling Stones," he said, "changed us from just another band into a huge, monster band."

Over the years, it has become such a favorite of Rolling Stones audiences that it practically takes an act of God to prevent the Stones from playing it in their concerts. But I was present once when the Stones didn't play it — even though Jagger was not yet 40.

It was a rainy Halloween weekend in Dallas, and a friend of mine and I had obtained tickets to a Stones show in the Cotton Bowl. It had become routine for the Stones to play "Satisfaction" as their final song at the shows on their North American tour. But, on that occasion, it was raining so much and the speakers were making snap, crackle and pop sounds — and someone, perhaps someone in the band, perhaps someone in the offstage entourage, decided it wasn't safe to continue.

It was the only show on the tour that did not have "Satisfaction" as its finale.

I was disappointed that I never got to hear the Stones play "Satisfaction."

But I was pleased that its absence made the show I saw unique.

So Far Away

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Carole King is one of those musical figures who seems have been around all my life.

And, in one form or another, I guess she has.

She probably reached her peak in popularity as a performer in the 1970s, but she has been writing songs that wound up climbing to #1 on the charts for half a century, starting with "Will You Love Me Tomorrow?" the song she and Gerry Goffin co–wrote for The Shirelles.

As a performer, I suppose King's signature album was "Tapestry," which was released nearly 40 years ago — in January 1971. There are several songs on that album that have achieved a certain stature with the public, like "It's Too Late," "You've Got a Friend," "I Feel The Earth Move" and "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman."

Whew! Just typing those titles gives me a flashback to the 1970s. But not the '70s of disco balls. I'm thinking about the part of the '70s that was the true heyday of popular songwriting.

Thirty–nine years ago this month, King released the single that has always epitomized her in my mind — "So Far Away." That song was on "Tapestry," too, and it was one of the reasons why the album remained on the charts for six years.

I've heard it said that "So Far Away" was symbolic of "Tapestry," but I disagree. It differed sharply from the jazzier, up–tempo songs that surrounded it. "So Far Away" was more wistful, slower, deliberate, the kind of song that seems to appeal to a person more as that person gets older and realizes how easily time slips through your fingers. In spite of its title, it's about time more than distance.

It's funny, isn't it, how your mind links songs to people, places, things? I've always linked "So Far Away" to a lost love. She isn't lost in the sense that no one knows where she is. I mean she is lost in the sense that life took her one way and it took me another.

I'm not sure if we ever listened to that song together. We might have. We dated for nearly a year, and we often listened to music late into the evening when the rest of the household had gone to bed, leaving us to enjoy some private time with the lights down low and music playing, either records I had brought with me or the radio.

I didn't have "Tapestry" in those days, but I wouldn't be surprised if it played on the radio a time or two. And there were certainly times during our relationship when the radio provided the soundtrack. Anyway, if we didn't listen to the song together, somehow the subject must have come up because I remember her making a reference to one of the lines — "doesn't anybody stay in one place anymore?" — although I don't remember the context of the conversation.

Actually, I guess it is that line that makes me think of her more than the song itself, if that makes sense. It seems appropriate, the kind of question you ask when you first realize, for whatever reason, that things change, places change, people change. That you can't go home again.

It's always been a song of loss for me, but it's also a reminder of a time and a place and people that will always be important to me.

And when I hear that song, they're not so far away, no matter how many years have passed.

Harrison's Harbinger of Singular Success

An item at Wikipedia caught my attention this morning.

On Wikipedia’s main page is a "featured article" — which may or may not be relevant to the date or something in the news.

This morning, the "featured article" was about the song "Something" that appeared on the Beatles’ album "Abbey Road."

"Something" was written by George Harrison. Although "Abbey Road" was the 12th studio album released by the Beatles — and in spite of the fact that Harrison had been writing songs that appeared on albums by the Beatles for six years, including "Taxman," "Think for Yourself," "If I Needed Someone" and "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" as well as songs that, for one reason or another, weren't recorded by the group — "Something" was the first Harrison song to appear on the "A" side when it was released as a Beatles single in October of 1969.

This terminology may sound odd to youthful ears that have never listened to a 45-rpm vinyl recording.

But, in the years when the Beatles were making music, the "A" side was the song on the single that was promoted commercially. There might be several singles released from one album, and they were all usually used to promote sales of the long-play album.

The "B" side was the "filler" song, the one that was put on the other side because, well, something (so to speak) needed to be there.

The song on the "A" side was the one that the promoters expected to be a big hit — although there were times when my friends and I bought singles because we liked the "B" side songs.

Buying singles was an economical way to collect music if you didn’t have a lot of money to spend. But the LP ("long play") made it possible to listen to music for extended periods of time between changes.

Anyway, if someone recorded a song that was a hit as an "A" side single, it was like striking gold. The "B" side song was usually forgotten.

And, for half a dozen years, Harrison’s songs had served as the "B" side material for the group.

Small wonder, then, that, after the band broke up, Harrison — who had been feeling more and more confined in his role with the Beatles — became the first Beatle to have a #1 solo album — the ambitious three-record set "All Things Must Pass."

By George, he had to do something with that backlog of material!

(An interesting trivia point. One of the assistant engineers on the "Abbey Road" album was Alan Parsons — who was unknown at the time but went on to engineer Pink Floyd’s "The Dark Side of the Moon" and produced several successful records with his own Alan Parsons Project.)