Last Train to Memphis by Peter Guralnick

Author:Peter Guralnick [GURALNICK, PETER]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780316206778
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Published: 2011-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

Juvenile delinquency, a widespread breakdown of morality and cultural values, race mixing, riots, and irreligion all were being blamed on Elvis Presley and rock ’n’ roll by a national press that was seemingly just awakening to the threat, the popularity of the new music among the young, and, of course, the circulation gains that could always be anticipated from a great hue and cry. In an age which attached little or no value to vernacular culture in any form and had always focused its fiercest scorn upon the South (“Dogpatch” was about as sophisticated a concept as existed for an appreciation of southern culture), the level of vituperation should perhaps have come as no great surprise—but, after the warm reception that Elvis had gotten almost everywhere that he had appeared throughout the South, and the generally indulgent one that he had received elsewhere, it clearly did. Mrs. Presley was beside herself with anger and shame (“She’d get mad and cuss sometimes, say some low-down things,” said Vernon’s brother, Vester), and even Elvis seemed taken aback by the onslaught of the debate. “I don’t do any vulgar movements,” he protested weakly to Aline Mosby, the UP reporter he had stood up in Vegas. “I’m not trying to be sexy,” he told Phyllis Battele of the International News Service. “It’s just my way of expressing how I feel when I move around. My movements, ma’am, are all leg movements. I don’t do nothing with my body.”

Only the Colonel kept his cool. Back in Madison the letters were pouring in by the truckload, most of them accompanied by dollar bills for the picture packets that were offered through the fan clubs. After the Berle appearance, Charlie Lamb, the veteran PR man whom Colonel Parker had left in charge back home, hired twenty girls to take care of the overflow: “I hired a doctor’s wife to handle the money and keep records of what’s coming in with the mail, and I called the bank and told them, ‘I got so much money I can’t bring it in.’ ” What did Colonel Parker think about it all? “I’m going to get a wiggle meter to time the wiggles,” said the Colonel with imperturbable calm. “When Elvis stops singing, we’ll put him on the stage and just let him wiggle!” Only his cigar hid the smirk of the jovial Colonel, “who was the exact opposite,” Miss Mosby reflected, “of the serious singer.”

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