Customer Reviews

Elvis Is Back!

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Having just paid almost $50 for an FTD (Follow That Dream) label 2-CD set of "Elvis Is Back", you can imagine that I was expecting some excellent entertainment value. FTD has delivered again! This INCREDIBLY fine sounding re-master of the 1960 Elvis Is Back LP---plus singles and outtakes from its associated March and April 1960 RCA Nashville sessions---is worth every nickel.

It is fun to hear the excitement build as Elvis and the band work through early versions of classic tracks like "Such A Night", "A Mess Of Blues", "Soldier Boy", "The Girl Of My Best Friend", "Fame And Fortune", "Fever", "Dirty, Dirty Feeling", "It's Now Or Never" and MORE. Elvis experiments with an assortment of interesting vocal phrasings, and the guys fool around with tempo and instrumentation as the session progresses. His operatic range on "It's Now Or Never" is legendary, and the emotion Elvis puts into "Soldier Boy" is stunning-- it is powerfully elegant...especially so on takes 1, 2 and 3. Eventually, take 15 of "Soldier Boy" (with a smoother vocal and what seems like a slightly faster tempo) became the "master"--the track chosen for the album.

Listening to this beautifully re-mastered CD, one feels as if they are there in real-time; not "were there", but ARE THERE-- in the control booth-- as the sessions come to life; the mix, and the instruments, particularly the bass guitar, have never sounded this good on a consumer release. FTD has done a terrific job; this true stereo mix has been opened up spatially (but not overdone), and the light touch of EQ, reverb and general lack of compression (revealing greater dynamic range) are much appreciated.

These were Elvis' first post-army studio sessions. He was in fine voice-- and you can HEAR the maturing of his vocal talent (range, interpretation and emotive achievement) revealing a refined, yet fresh new style. The choice of material also speaks volumes...country, blues, gospel, doo-wop, rock and wonderfully navigated pop. If you've ever wondered what Elvis is all about...this is a good place to learn. I can't imagine any singer alive today who could even come close to the capabilities of this guy.

This also represents (I believe) the first Elvis 3-track recordings...which means that the (then) new technology has joyously preserved what is truly an amazing collection of music production. Remember, Elvis recorded 'live to tape' with the band backing him in real-time as he made these hits...no going back later (like producers today can do with 8, 16, 24, 48 and 64-track machines). In this environment, Elvis feeds off the band, and the band feeds off Elvis' performances. To use the 's' word (synergy) here is appropriate---and not a surrender to the lure of the cliché.

This is a most compelling package of Elvis' early 60s pop, rock and blues tracks. When you hear the original album and single hit MASTERS-- alongside the outtakes and alternate versions-- you gain a great appreciation for the recoding process and the undeniable talent of Presley, his musicians and the Jordanaires (his long-time background singers).

With 53 tracks-- this trip back in time lasts about 2 hours. You will want to listen to this on a quality stereo system...not mini-headphones. (Don't wait too long. FTD only presses a limited number of discs. They may not re-issue because of the high production costs for what could be a potentially small market of second run sales.)

At first, the $50 price tag may seem too high, unless you consider this more of a time trip; in that light, $50 for the price of a ticket to take you back to two special nights, March 20, 1960 and April 3, 1960...and put you on a front-row chair INSIDE RCA's Nashville studios as you listen to Elvis work out on the other side of the glass...well, $50 seems like the deal of a lifetime.

Can you imagine how Elvis fans would feel TODAY--if someone had made arrangements back THEN--to film all, or even part, of his return to music making? In the absence of such a visual recording, close your eyes and open your other senses as you experience what all of America learned in the spring of 1960: "Elvis Is Back".

In the last few years there have been loads of Elvis Presley releases. Very few prove as exciting and essential as this double CD-set covering Elvis' first two post-army studio sessions in March and April 1960. These sessions not only produced a series of sterling cuts which made the original exemplary "Elvis Is Back" album, they also gave us true classics like "It's Now Or Never", "Are You Lonesome Tonight" and "Stuck On You".

This new "Elvis Is Back" set masterminded by the Follow That Dream team gives us the original album, the singles and all the substantial outtakes. Several of these outtakes have been released earlier (7 are released here for the first time, just as 19 false starts and workparts), but to have them all assembled often in augmented sound quality, makes the investment really worthwile.

This set, presented in the now characteristic tri-fold digipack the size of a 45rpm, has no less than 53 tracks, with both discs running well over 78 minutes each. Digitally transferred and mixed at the Sony Studios in New York, the sound quality is outstanding.

...and one of the best CD re-issues, as well. If the original LP pressing of this album had included "Are You Lonseome Tonight?", "A Mess of Blues", and "It's Now Or Never" at the time of its original release, this easily would have qualified as the best rock & roll album ever recorded. In this re-issue format, the argument for it is incredibly strong.
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This is a remarkably well-rounded collection of material, with a stellar collection of pop tunes, romantic croonings, raving rockers ("Such A Night" got a bit of a shot-in-the-arm with "3000 Miles to Graceland", and as out-of-place as it may have sounded on that film's soundtrack CD, it absolutely grooves here), and some of the best blues tunes The King ever belted out this side of "Santa Claus is Back in Town". "It Feels So Right" may be the tamest of the NAS-TEE blues on this album, and that says a lot. "A Mess of Blues" is top-notch, but "Reconsider Baby" sets the standard even higher, and "Like a Baby" is just flat-out RAUNCHY. I don't know if a singer has ever come across as being as inspired as Elvis was on this album (except perhaps for Elvis during the '68 Comeback Special, but it speaks volumes about The King when the only one with whom he can compare is himself).
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The main problem is that this CD is AWFULLY bloody difficult to find; its availability is sketchy at best and pricy at worst. I was able to get ahold of an Argentinian copy (viva albiceleste!) via an online auction, and I don't notice any issues with its quality. I will be happy to provide a contact source for anyone who isn't successful finding a domestic copy or a different imported version; I assure you that you will feel 10 times rewarded when you listen to it, regardless of its pressing origin. TCB, baby!
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Strangely Amazon staff reviews of Elvis albums are littered with mistakes, and this is no exception.

'Girl Of My Best Friend; is not a cover - it's a Presley original, written for Elvis by Beverly Frank, a pseudonym of the writer of 'I Beg Of You, Rose Marie McCoy. Donner recorded his vesion only because RCA refused to issue the Presley original as a single.

Aside from 'Girl Of My Best Friend', which is perfect 60's pop, the album demonstrates the Presley genius on 'Reconsider Baby', 'Like A Baby', 'Fever' and Such A Night - all covers and all superior to the originals. 'I Will Be Home Again' is a little known masterpiece. 'Make Me Know It and 'The Girl Next Door' don't reach the heights of the other cuts, but this is is one of Elvis' top three albums. Want to hear the greatest blues/R'n'B singer of his generation at his vocal peak - buy this album. Between 1960 and 66 especially, Elvis Presley had the greatest voice in the history of popular music - this is the proof.

Too many people refuse to admit that Elvis Presley continued to grow as an artist after the '50's. This album is proof that he matured beyond the level most people are lazy enough to remember him for. Many have cited Elvis' willingness to sing questionable material and his sometimes tacky taste in singers like Dean Martin.But it's precisely Elvis' inclusiveness as a singer that makes him great--the fact that he managed to integrate more strands of American popular music into himself than almost anyone else. It was the wideness of taste that managed to include Dean Martin which also included Lowell Fulsom. Elvis had excellent taste--the problem was that it was too wide. "Elvis Is Back!" is perhaps the greatest example of Elvis' taste and integrative power--it features nearly every pop form Elvis enjoyed. The wideness of his taste meant that he was susceptible to the most sugary pop, like "The Girl of My Best Friend" or the still-sweet "Soldier Boy." There's also the pop rock that made his name in 1956, although here sometimes in diluted form("Stuck On You"), along with the usual ballads--here sung more powerfully than before but still with the usual senitivity of tone that tells you a lot about the beauty of his voice and the genuine grace at the bottom of his personality. There's also something new--the operatic pop numbers he'd always been attracted to but now decided to dabble in. At their most questionable they sound weird and turgid("Are You Lonesome tonight?") and at best sound dramatic and thrilling.("It's Now Or Never.") But the best part of the album is the blues. Every song in the genre is sung here perfectly--you can feel the hair rise on your neck stand up when he assays "Reconsider Baby" with such deadly cool, or when he matches the saxophone on "Like A Baby" with sinful intent. The most revealing part of the album--perhaps any of Elvis' albums--comes midway. Elvis croons "Soldier Boy" with genuine care and grace and ust when you think he is about to fully dive into pure pop he suddenly lunges into the Drifter's "Such A Night"--which concludes with one of the most pleasurably dirty bits of music I've ever heard. Only someone as great as Elvis Presley can get away with following the most treacly love song with a full-fledged orgasm.

The first Elvis' post army album is a wonderful mix of Doo Wop ("Soldier Boy"-only doo-wop song he recorded), blues ("Reconsider Baby", "It Feels So Right"), rock 'n' roll ("Dirty Dirty Feeling", "Such a Night", "Fever", "The Girl Next Door Went A'walking", "Like a Baby") and pop ("The Girl of My Best Friend", "I Will Be Home Again", "Thrill of Your Love"). On this reissue are six bonus tracks "Stuck On You", "Fame And Fortune", "Are You Lonesome Tonight?", "I Gotta Know", "It's Now or Never" and "A Mess Of Blues"). Album is recorded with Scotty Moore, D.J. Fontana, The Jordanaires and Nashville session musicians (Boots Randolph, Floyd Cramer, Hank Garland, Bob Moore)

Elvis Presley is the biggest selling recording artist of all time. Not The Beatles, Stones, Sinatra, Crosby, Jackson (or Garth Brooks for that matter) come close to the number of records sold worldwide by Presley.

One must consider the Sun recordings as perhaps the best music ever put on record. Without the "golden era" of Presley's '54 -'58 recordings, rock and roll may well have become a fad. As John Lennon once said, "Before Elvis there was nothing."

Although misguided and used by Tom Parker, Elvis managed to record several trend setting and classic albums. "How great thou art", "I'm 10,000 years old" and "Elvis Is Back" are perhaps his three greatest efforts.

"Elvis is back" defined a period in Elvis' life when is was "do or die". Either he would regain his place in music history, or he would become a has been. Lucky for us, he became an icon to not only rock and roll, but to music in general.

"Elvis Is Back" had elements of the music that Elvis loved. Gospel, blues, jazz and good old rock and roll. No one can listen to "Reconsider Baby" and not FEEL the blues. His voice was never smoother on a ballad and never more forceful on a blues recording. "Elvis Is Back" had it all.

Hind sight being 20/20, "Elvis Is Back" should have outsold "Blue Hawaii" by 10 to 1. Instead, "Blue Hawaii" became his biggest selling album. Parker could smell a buck a million miles away - if the public wanted weak soundtrack material, he would make sure Elvis recorded as much as he could stand. It is a shame that he was not given the chance to record more albums like this one.

"Elvis Is Back" is Elvis' "Sgt. Pepper" or "Pet Sounds". If Elvis hadn't recorded another album in his career, he would have had a place in rock and roll forever because of a few sides on Sun records and 10 singles in the early '50's.

"Elvis Is Back" is a small look into what may have been.

ELVIS IS BACK was the King's first post-Army album and is one of his finest. Although Elvis recorded some binaural stereo sides in the late '50s, which were released years later, this was his first album in RCA's "Living Stereo" (as opposed to the "Full Dimensional" variety at Capitol, and Columbia's "Stereo-Fidelity," later renamed "Stereo-360 Sound.")

This CD contains all 12 tracks from the original album, the 12 tracks from its "pop" sequel, SOMETHING FOR EVERYBODY, and the hit singles from the period (excluding movie songs). While not as comprehensive as the FTD version, which is really aimed at hard-core collectors, this is a terrific release for most Elvis fans. Along with the Legacy Edition of FROM ELVIS IN MEMPHIS from 1969, these two albums, which bookended the '60s, are definitely must-haves.

After two years of absence Elvis was back at the recording studio to turn a new leaf and provide new and exciting sounds

This is an album that is filled with Elvis vocal mannerisms that no one can master just as well. Throughout the various rock tunes, he provides again an example of a high pitched voice that can be next to a low baritone note. Do notice how he still passes his trademark of muffling or accentuating verses in order to escape from the constraints of a solid rocker. Inescapably, Elvis manages to jazz up the rock tunes based on his vocal acrobatics.

As far as the ballads go, Elvis is at the top of his form and never fails to provide full sound and distinct them all apart from each other. For example, Soldier Boy is a doo-up ballad that up to that point only major black vocalists could validate through their performances. Elvis is giving a new approach to this style. On the other hand, the ballad Fame and Fortune is a distant cry from doo-up melodies. Still Elvis manages to blend an operatic feeling with a doo-up following to it.

Overall, the album is a must for collectors.
The package presentation once again is superb and the outtakes are gold.
Do notice the one-two-three-four whisper preceding the epitome of Elvis Blues sound: Reconsider Baby

Enjoy!!!

Despite what a lot of people think about Colonel Parker he was the first BIG artist manager. He had no prior influences to draw upon. There was never anything as big as Elvis. Nor will there ever be.

Parker was smart enough to keep Elvis in the limelight even though he was thousands a miles away in Germany away from his adoring fans. He put Elvis in the studio before he departed to Germany and recorded enough material to release slowly over a two year period. Elvis was in the army and still topping the charts!

What makes this album so good though is that Elvis had been away from what he loved to do for so long. He couldn't wait to get back into the studio and record not only some solid rock n roll and blues but put on record some of the European music he was influenced by while in Germany.

I have heard a lot of people say Elvis was never same after the army and it wasn't the pure rock n roll we were accustomed to. So what !

He had already proved he was the King of Rock so why not try something new ?

The music on this album speads across the borders of all kinds of music. Rock, rythem & blues, ballads and melodramatic.

His voice was powerful, commanding and he never sounded better.