Covers of Elvis Presley tunes

How often is this done? I just came across one example I would like to discuss and can think of a few more, but feel like it is usually avoided.

I just came across an interview with Rob Stoner on Wayne Robins’ substack which mentions a cover of “Viva Las Vegas” that was easy for me to find.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3X4oUmuXjw

John Cale to thread.

Ha, yes!

(xp)It’s competent maybe but he changes a few words, which is annoying, and it seems to bump up against the uncanny valley of missing some of the spark of the original so why bother unless you are doing an Elvis tribute or karaoke.

Bruce Springsteen did a lackluster version of VLV for a a tribute UK-only EP called The Last Temptation of Elvis and performed live a few times as well. Much better are the ZZ Top and Dead Kennedys versions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOoKzw3JSCM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Q_FNzQb1G0

Still love the Concert for Kampuchea version of “Little Sister” as played by Rockpile with Robert Plant singing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKJVBuPAcXA

'Suspicious Minds' has had a fair few attempts made on it

Are we including songs that Elvis didn't sing or record first, but where his is the best known version? Because if so, Fine Young Cannibals, "Suspicious Minds" and Pet Shop Boys, "Always On My Mind".

Yes, think we should include those although of course it should be noted as such. Did anyone ever actually hear the original Mark James version of “Suspicious Minds,” before or after? I went and listened recently. I had been under the impression that it was going to be almost the same track just a lesser vocal but the whole thing was just not quite there yet.

'Suspicious Minds' is an Elvis song for all functional purposes imo, unless you're specifically talking about pre-Elvis versions xp

Yes, 100% agreed.

Maybe you had to be there- I was there with my ear pressed to the radio, perhaps TSF was there at this performance recorded by his beloved WLIR- but I really enjoyed the Rockpile cover of “Jailhouse Rock” at minute 39 of this performance at the Palladium.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pfxEdKL0mM

I take it back. The track on the Mark James version of “Suspicious Minds” IS pretty close, thereby making it function here as kind of a highly evolved demo that was actually released.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFP0EP-Oi2I

Dwight Yoakam version of SM strikes an okay balance of being pretty close to the original but having a little bit of its own spin.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPMaTf0KU0M

(Thereby avoiding the uncanny valley alarm system)

Elvis didn't write anything and he seems to heavily mimic the demo versions vocals that I've heard. Not sure if those demoes were done to allign with his singing style though.
His big thing initially appeared to be an ability to combine influences in teh way he performed songs he hadn't written. Making r'n'b songs whiter and white songs a bit more r'n'b. But that may be more pronounced on the Sun recordings where he isn't being produced and arranged by a larger label's staff. I think he maintains quality for a while after he's discovered but do think it's the material closer to taht early stuff that is the most valid.

One later track with a decent cover is Nick Cave doing In The Ghetto as his debut solo single.

Here’s a good example: “Suspicion” (that word again!), written by Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman (those songwriters again!) for the Pot Luck album but not released as a single until a few years later, after a gentleman named Terry Stafford had a hit on it. You may be familiar with the interpretation by Viv Stanshall, produced by Keith Moon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tthGX07elSc

Here’s the chart-topping Terry Stafford version.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUe7dMi2uLA

And the original here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HGthprYz9E

Pomus and Shuman had earlier written both sides of the single “(Marie’s the Name) His Latest Flame” b/w “Little Sister.” The A-side had originally been recorded by Del Shannon for his album Runaway with Del Shannon, which I only just learned so I am still considering this an Elvis song. It was interpolated by The Smiths into
“Rusholme Ruffians” for the live album Rank.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owwvjPKwdK4

The lead singer of which band later notably borrowed some Elvis imagery during his solo career.

love this gospel version of "In The Ghetto" by James Cleveland & The Southern California Community Choir (from 1974):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T90Ac53G3ZM

The Dee Dee Warwick version of SM is a really good slowed-down R&B approach. I don’t care for the Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter version. Too on the nose, at least subject matter-wise.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5e0upsw4IE

Lots of covers of “Love Me Tender” out there, including one by that other notable baritone, Frank Sinatra. Don’t know if I even want to listen to any. Okay, the Linda Ronstadt version is fine, another piece in the puzzle to confirm my theory, which is mine, that she is kind of a Female Elvis, in that she got a lot of static for being just a copycat with pipes plus pretty face and but was in fact a very good singer and interpreter who always had a great band.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFAy6ufpDug

James Cleveland version of “In the Ghetto” is sweet, thanks!

XP
I heard him do a version of a Willie Nelson song soon after I started listening to Nelson, probably after i got the Essential set of Nelson's work and thought wow he's channeling Nelson's style. Presumably You Were Always On My Mind but I think I heard him do similar in a few other places.
But he was one of the biggest commercial artists like ever so presumably has had the effect of eclipsing the influences on him for a lot of the world. Do wonder what he would have done with different management though. If there wasn't a carnival huckster making decisions for him how the career ark would have changed.

Also thinking Frank Sinatra wrote about one song ever but had a great influence on other artists. Are the songs he is famous for thought of as Sinatra songs in a similar way, though he was so large that he was probably given first choice of new songs before everybody else got to them and had songs written to match his style too.

“Burning Love” was originally done by James Redd favorite Arthur Alexander but went unheard so is for our purposes an EP song. Wynonna Judd did a credible version, which was used the film LILO & STITCH apparently.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVPS0ETuUYE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33bQ_BONoyg

Lots of versions of “In the Ghetto” out there. Can’t plow through them all but the one by Candi Staton is grebt!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tt8GDAL7Av8

And she did an ace disco version of “Suspicious Minds” as well!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FueOJBsl8Dk

Some mastermind even made a Candi & Elvis duet mix of ItG which isn’t half bad.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-Co5u88Muk

am i right in thinking that Heaven 17 did a version of 'Suspicious Minds' with G*ry Gl*tter on vocals? or is that just a terrible fever dream?

And now the moment you’ve all been waiting for: John Cale reassembles “Heartbreak Hotel,” with the help of Andy Summers and Ollie Halsall.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHF7b326ydg

Hoyt Axton’s mother would like a word with Mr. Cale.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXWvIgX_Ojk

am i right in thinking that Heaven 17 did a version of 'Suspicious Minds' with G*ry Gl*tter on vocals? or is that just a terrible fever dream?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qx6FYq2oUVU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FN18OcFNbXQ

Jeff Beck Group (with Rod): "Jailhouse Rock" & "All Shook Up":

Annette Peacock's version (rewrite, actually) of "Don't Be Cruel" is great, I don't think too much of her version of "Love Me Tender".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8-YtXCs3qg

am i right in thinking that Heaven 17 did a version of 'Suspicious Minds' with G*ry Gl*tter on vocals? or is that just a terrible fever dream?

That “Don’t Be Cruel” is great! Certainly a lot better than this piss-poor run-through by The Monkees during the Headquarters sessions, which serves mainly to reinforce an admonishment against foot tapping whilst making music that I came across more than once recently.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAOnDGb3dyk

Does the Band's "Mystery Train" count?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQFE113iDx4

Of course! As long as you duly note the original artist and composer Junior Parker.

love this one

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8H_VfuVN3S8

Soft Boys also did "Mystery Train"

“Love Me Tender” always seems to me not much of a song anyway, the melody is not even original, comes from a tune from the previous century called “Aura Lee,” although I don’t mind his performance.

I just remembered one I really really like that I was thinking about last week, will post later after lunch.

ElvisJames Redd is BlecchBack!

Good work everyone so far. The song I forgot to remember to forget that I was thinking about last week was “I Was the One,” the B-side of “Heartbreak Hotel,” as sung by the ex-husband of the late Jo Carol Pierce (RIP) Jimmie Dale Gilmore, here seen doing a masterful version on Late Night with Conan O’Brien:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VY1etiYCDuE

I first saw JDG perform this at The Bottom Line, the same venue at which I once sat next to Doc Pomus during a Lonnie Mack show. He gave an elaborate explanation of how he came to perform and record it, all of which I have long since forgotten. Mostly I remember two things from this show: really liking this song, and worrying about whether opening act Townes Van Zandt, who seems to have his head in his hands between every other song and maybe even during some songs, was about to have a nervous, Cat Power-level breakdown on stage. Jimmie’s first words upon taking the stage were “Oh, I think Townes is one of our finest songwriters, don’t you?”

I also read somewhere (Wikipedia) that Conan O’Brien used to often do “Burning Love” as a warm-up with the band, but can find no further evidence of this.

The Replacements were known to cover “Do the Clam,” as can be heard here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xc8a5IXR91Q

With their roadie Bill Sullivan on lead vocals. I did not attend this show, although I did see them perform that song around the same time at The Grotto in New Haven, when opening at Alex Chilton was a no-show.

Okay, my work here is done.

Back to say that it should be noted that “That’s When Your Heartaches Begin” was originally a hit for The Ink Spots and had been recorded before that, although The Soft Boys and Andy Kaufman obviously were doing the Elvis version.

Nobody mentioned The Residents yet? I was unfamiliar with their project The King & Eye but figured it must exist.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLASyRkrHek

Hmm. Never noticed until now that Nick Lowe missed his cue and kept singing after everyone else finished playing “Little Sister.”

Bruce Springsteen did a lackluster version of VLV for a a tribute UK-only EP called The Last Temptation of Elvis

Oh, look at that, thanks. Don’t think I’ve heard any of it except for the one I mentioned.

Guess I should have hit More Songs when I googled.

Pogues cover of “Got a Lot o’ Livin’ to Do!” seems apropos, although I barely know that song, it having been overshadowed by the similarly named “A Lot of Livin’ to Do” in Bye Bye Birdie. It’s also kind of weird that Ann-Marget was in that as well as Viva Las Vegas. Also new to me just now that Michael J. Pollard played Hugo in the original Broadway cast.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRuCGMYR50c

The Bye Bye Birdie song generated lots of covers, including by Sammy Davis Jr., Nancy Wilson and Louis Armstrong.

Dion’s “Mean Woman Blues” seems a good match of artist and material, although this one I know more through the Roy Orbison version and in the past have considered it to be his song.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-xct_SjpYY

Also done by the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis, The Spencer Davis Group and Cliff Richard & The Shadows.

Okay now I see the little NME in the corner. Was it a magazine giveaway, I wonder.

Macca DIY “It’s Now or Never” is good!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95AEmfr3aCQ

Aaron Neville cover of “Young and Beautiful” exactly the kind of thing I was wondering about the existence of when I started this thread.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dk-31LjoRZA

What Xmas season would be complete without Lemmy covering Elvis covering Carl Perkins singing “Blue Suede Shoes”?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8rWAaaMmC8

Also has The Cramps doing “Jailhouse Rock.” Went looking for any covers by Cramps associate and Memphian Alex Chilton but all I could find was this Dylanesque rarity that doesn’t fit this thread but I will post it anyway for posterity.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJDsqz8XimQ

Nobody mentioned The Residents yet?

I saw their "Cube-E" tour; it was a full-on stage production where they did half-hour medleys of cowboy songs and old-timey gospel and blues, then the second act was a full set of Elvis songs. An amazing show. The album of Elvis songs they did, The King and Eye, was pretty good but not as good as the stage show.

Okay now I see the little NME in the corner. Was it a magazine giveaway, I wonder.

Definitely not a giveaway... it was a charity fundraiser which, I think, was mail-order only.

(Actually, maybe it did have distribution to record stores?)

prev. mention now hear this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7f189Z0v0Y

Elvis had the first hit, although it had a prehistory, and it was co-written by Suspicious, um, Minds originator Mark James, but don’t people think of it as more of a Willie song at this point? I know I do.

So the overall conclusion so far is what, that aside from a few American Studios classics that get covered a lot and some novelty/tribute versions that sometimes hit the target there’s not that much out there?

For better or for worse, when he did it first he did it last, like Calvin Tomkins said about Marcel Duchamp.

Wait, I am speaking too soon! Just remembered a key omission thus far.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-PQxDjl17Q
Bryan Ferry’s version of “(You’re So Square) Baby I Don’t Care.”

Redd had left the thread.

Ferry also covered "Girl of My Best Friend".

Good catch! Hadn’t recalled hearing that song in any form - maybe it was a UK-only hit?- but seems like there are quite a few versions out there, including one by Johnny Burnette. Oh yeah, it’s on an album we discussed before that I complete forgot about. TomorrowTwo years ago is a long time.

Despite him being mentioned upthread, I completely forgot about Rod Stewart doing “That’s All Right,” originally written and recorded by Arthur “Big Boy” Crudup.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=breTsPNGGxQ

Believe I was blindsided by “Cut Across Shorty.”

Here’s The Beatles on the BBC doing it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AW0OXl3dxVw

And here’s Macca doing it with Scotty and DJ! Sometimes I get overloaded on Elvis, Beatles and Rolling Stones but mix and match a bit and maybe something can get through my air defense.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDWfOSKccLM

Slade issued a medley of "That 's All Right..." & "My Baby Left Me" as a tribute shortly after the King left the building in '77.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k50lq2-Tvd4

Interesting.

In addition to Macca, many of the earliest generation of rock and roll artists covered Elvis covering Roy Brown’s “Good Rocking Tonight,” including Buddy Holly, Ricky Nelson, Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis. Then there also seems to be a pre-Elvis version by Wynonie Harris.

The Nudes had their first hit with "Had A Dram", which Elvis had recorded as "For The Heart" on one of his last albums.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCpmwAh7Cnc

JUDDS. lol..Damn phone

“Had a Dream”?

Sorry. Good one! Originally recorded in a non-hit version by Teresa Brewer.

Who was married to Bob Thiele, head of Impulse! Records from 1961 to 1969, but who also played a part in the Buddy Holly story when he was at Coral/Decca.

Keef weighs in:

“People haven’t covered our songs too much, but I take that as a compliment. You don’t really hear versions of Heartbreak Hotel either. What it means is that your version is pretty much seen as the ultimate.”

Interesting.

Perhaps that will put some perspective on things.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAruBWa7LGk

Elvis probably number three on the list of artists associated with Little Willie John’s “Fever” but placing this here for comic relief and romantic interest.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoIZQh1IjI8

When Andrew Hickey started that podcast four years ago Jerry Lee Lewis, Don Everly and Little Richard were the last three standing from the first generation :(

El Vez to thread

Heh. He came up on the regular Elvis thread recently because of “Never Been to Spain.”

This morning finally remembered the Robert Johnson, sorry Robert A. Johnson version of “Burning Love,” which also interpolated the beginning of “A Big Hunk o’ Love.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eeqH4hAzEc

Heaven 17 came up again just now when I got fooled by their non-cover of “Who’ll Stop the Rain.”

Fun fact: in 1975 Robert A. Johnson was the guitarist in John Entwistle’s Ox, but Entwistle fired him because he kept imitating Pete Townshend’s stage moves.

Right. Think we talked about that recently, but always worth a revisit.

Does the Band's "Mystery Train" count?

“Mystery Train” was almost completely retooled by Robertson; he kept the first verse, added two of his own, and made up the chords from scratch. After a haint-ridden false start, the Band climbed onto the train like bindle stiffs, the music dark and funny; when Robbie’s new lyrics emerged, they sounded as if they’d been in the song since it was first sung, seventy years or twice as long before.