Customer Reviews

The Country Side of Elvis

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Whether you like it or not, Elvis changed country music forever when he became popular in the fifties with his rock'n'roll music. However, there is a saying - you can take the singer out of the country but you can't take the country out of the singer. So it was that Elvis recorded a lot of country songs throughout his career. Some were tucked away on B-sides or album tracks but others were A-side singles. Sometimes his recordings were faithful to the original and sometimes not. This compilation illustrates all aspects of the country songs recorded by Elvis.

I forgot to remember to forget was the first country chart-topper for Elvis. At that stage, nobody could have foreseen how his career would progress. Blue moon of Kentucky, as written by bluegrass inventor Bill Monroe, was a slow ballad. Elvis recorded it as an up-tempo rocker - this was definitely not a faithful cover. Eventually, Bill Monroe paid Elvis the highest compliment by recording an up-tempo version of his own. A fool such as I (originally a Hank Snow song) is another song that Elvis does in a more upbeat rocking style than the original, but the change is nothing like as dramatic as Blue moon of Kentucky. Old Shep, a very sad story about a dog that had to be put to sleep, is very faithful to the Red Foley original. I understand that Red based the song on the sad end to a dog he once owned.

All of the above songs and several others here were recorded in the fifties, but when most people think of Elvis singing country songs, they think of the latter part of his career. Indeed, the majority of the songs here were recorded following his comeback in the late sixties. Although this period of his career was inconsistent, he seemed to enjoy singing country, so the songs included here are among the best he recorded in his final years. It is interesting to note that Moody blue and Way down were both number one country hits, yet both have been omitted from this collection.

Always on my mind, though written with Elvis in mind, was first recorded by Brenda Lee - six months before Elvis cut it. There goes my everything was a Jack Greene country hit that gave both Engelbert Humperdinck and Elvis an international pop hit. Green green grass of home was a Porter Wagoner country hit that gave Tom Jones an international pop hit and which became a minor UK hit for Elvis.

There are several covers of Eddy Arnold songs, including It's a sin, Just call me lonesome, I'll hold you in my heart, I really don't want to know and Make the world go away.

Jim Reeves is also well represented via I love you because, How's the world treating you, There's always me, Welcome to my world and He'll have to go. I know Jim wasn't always the original singer, but I think of those songs as his.

Other covers include Your cheating heart (Hank Williams), I'm moving on (Hank Snow), From a jack to a king (Ned Miller), Release me (a country hit for several singers including Ray Price, which became an American pop hit for Esther Phillips and a major international pop hit for Engelbert Humperdinck), Help me make it through the night, For the good times (both songs written by Kris Kristofferson that became country and pop hits for various singers), You gave me a mountain (an extremely sad Marty Robbins song about the break-up of a marriage), I'm so lonesome I could cry (Hank Williams), There's a honky tonk angel (Conway Twitty), Susan when she tried (Statler brothers) and She thinks I still care (George Jones).

This is a fascinating collection of country songs recorded by Elvis. Many great songs that could have been included have been left out but every track here is worthy of inclusion.

This is Elvis' best country collection. It includes some of his earlist records for Sun Records right on through to his last recordings. It includes his first local number 1 hit "Blue Moon Of Kentucky" which was number 1 one the country charts in Memphis in 1954 and his first national number 1 hit "I Forgot To Remember To Forget" which was number 1 on the Billboard country charts for 5 weeks in 1955. Other favorites include the early country rocker "I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone", the orginal version of "Guitar Man", the classic "Kentucky Rain", a great version of "Fairytale", and one of his latter rockers the underappreciated "T-R-O-U-B-L-E".

Highly recommended if you are a country music fan!

Not to be confused with the 2 CD US release "The Country Side of Elvis ", this is an excellent collection of some of Elvis' best country songs. It includes several songs that made the country charts in the US including It's a Matter of Time, There Goes My Everything, and Fool. You Don't Know Me was a moderate hit on the US pop charts peaking at 44. Highly recommended if you don't already own one of the many Elvis country collections, though the import price is a little high.

This two-CD set contains Elvis' best country songs. My dad liked it so much that I got him one to listen to while driving. It's a must-have for any Elvis fan.

I enjoyed the CD very much. Many of these songs were sung at Memphis during Elvis Week

I love this cd. Elvis lends his soulful voice to some of the classic country songs and made them better in my opinion. This cd is a must for any country fan as well as Elvis fan.

this is a LIVE album, so expect crowd applause interrupting when he starts singing. also he talks through some of these. a real nightclubby vibe to it, at odds with the melancholy of country blues (in particular, "I'm so lonesome I could cry"). this is not a studio version.

I really enjoyed seeing the early clips and songs of Elvis. I became a fan at 11 years old and so lived through all of it. The DVD reviews the loving side of Elvis in a newsy and sweet way.

The Country Side of Elvis collects 51 of his songs that are mostly country music. I bought this cd because I thought that it would be nice to have Elvis' remastered country songs easily accessible on a two cd set, because I already own most of the individual cds on which these songs originally appeared. I am a strong fan of many country singers. I also believe that Elvis Presley is the King of Rock and Roll, rhythm and blues music, and slower romantic ballads, and that he is the most talented singer of popular music during my long lifetime. After all, he was awarded the title of Artist Of The Century. But what we find on The Country Side of Elvis are mostly his country songs, which along with his movie soundtracks are the weakest and least desirable bodies of music that Elvis ever recorded. Elvis' gospel music is far superior to his country music, as are his Rock and Roll, rhythm and blues music, and slower romantic ballads. There are many musicians that are much better singers of country music than is Elvis Presley. So by purchasing The Country Side of Elvis, I managed to acquire an easily accessible collection of some of Elvis' weakest music that is so very far from being the best of country music. It is actually painful and disgusting for me to first highly enjoy Elvis singing his outstanding Rock and Roll and rhythm and blues music, and then hear him sing his ho-hum and nearly completely blah country music. I experience pain because I have empathy for an Elvis who was clearly suffering during this country stage of his recording career. I am disgusted because Elvis was blindly wasting his unsurpassed singing ability by recording much of this collection of country music. Elvis is so far away from being the King of country music. In fact, he sounds like just one more medium quality country singer among the many outstanding country singers who make it in Nashville. Elvis recorded most of these country songs after Priscilla divorced him and when he was very deeply enmeshed in his prescription drug addiction, which probably explains the obvious degree of listlessness that we find in Elvis' voice in much of his country music. Elvis' recording strategy in this last part of his career was to mostly re-record songs that were previously released as hits by different country singers, not caring if his own songs were either new or innovative. Perhaps Elvis thought that his own distinctive voice would make these re-recordings become popular once again. For example, Elvis recorded You Asked Me to, a song that was previously released by Waylon Jennings. Unfortunately, Waylon's version of You Ask Me To is clearly superior to Elvis' version, so Elvis' version never became popular. In all fairness, I must say that there is nothing horrible about the music found on The Country Side of Elvis. The music drifts along in what some people who have less developed musical standards would probably define as a pleasurable listening experience. The music only sounds very inferior if we compare it to Elvis' outstanding gospel music, Rock and Roll, rhythm and blues music, and his outstanding slower romantic ballads. My own evaluation of The Country Side of Elvis is that I don't like it. Thus I award The Country Side of Elvis two stars. Why keep The Country Side of Elvis whan it causes me pain and disgust when I listen to it? Thus I'll dispose of this two cd set. I strongly recommend that you NOT PURCHASE The Country Side of Elvis, unless you want to mostly listen to a highly addicted and grieving man who has misplaced or lost much of his outstanding singing ability. It seems appropriate to mention here that Rock and Roll did not emerge out of country music. Elvis certainly listened to country music as both a child and a teenager, but he also listened to and highly enjoyed other forms of music as well, including the bluegrass music of Bill Monroe and Ralph and Stanley Carter and the blues and rhythm and blues music of African Americans. When Elvis began recording music, first for Sun Studios and then for R.C.A., that music sprung from the traditions of bluegrass, blues, and rhythm and blues music. Remember that on Elvis' first 45 rpm record, he sang Blue Moon of Kentucky, a Bill Monroe bluegrass song. It is true that the young Elvis appeared on the Louisiana Hayride and Grand Old Oprey country venues, which also featured other bluegrass musicians. Because of strict segregation laws that prevented Elvis from appearing with African Americans singing blues and rhythm and blues music, at that time there seemed nowhere else other than these caucasion-only country venues for Elvis to appropriately appear. Country music remained rigidly segregated for about 15 more years until Charley Pride became a country music star. However, it was not until much later in Elvis' life, after Priscilla divorced Elvis and after Elvis' prescription drug addiction had become full-blown and dehabilitating, that Elvis Presley once again returned to his childhood influences and began consistently recording country music.

John