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| From | "Jaimie Vernon" <bullseyecanada@hotmail.com> |
| Subject | Re: Elvis : one more thing |
| Date | Tue, 26 Oct 2004 10:43:29 -0400 |
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At Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 09:28:31 Jake wrote:
>Okay. But am I wrong in thinking, as I thought most of the naturalized
>world did, that the point of Elvis was he brought R&B (and yes,
>country and his awful showtune renditions) ALL to the white populace?
>BLUES for chrissakes, which was originally (oh god) a BLACK man's
>music and whites didn't want to hear it from some black guy but they'd
>hear it from a greaser-trucker who had no prior music experience but
>loved his mama? Definitely a performer. But a stupid actor. Even
>though I love those movies.
Well, that's what the press that hated him was saying about him at the
time....that he was corrupting white youth with " Nig...(expletive deleted)
music". That it was un-Christian. That it was eroding the fabric of
Democracy. Blah Blah Jingoistic Blah.
Elvis may very well have been converting the general populace to southern
race music, but that wasn't the intent. The material came to him
honestly...he was a God fearing gospels boy don'tcha know. So it was only
after people went nuts for what he was bringing to the table that the cash
machine was created (to be repeated ad nauseum with the Beatles)...and the
vehement and scrutiny ensued. The biggest irony was Elvis later wanting to
help the American government spy on the Beatles to stamp out THEIR incidious
grasp on the American youth.
Which is NOT like what's going on now where artists are made to order and
created specifically to sell merchandise -- not the other way around.
>Early rock and roll? Perhaps I'm wrong here.
Yep.
>And I just remember reading credits to a lot of his big hits, MANY of
>his big hits, and I just didn't see his name associated with many of
>them at all.
>
>But I'm probably wrong.
No, you are correct. Colonel Parker made sure that the songs that Elvis sang
had a nice little publishing perk so that EP (and the Colonel) made
publishing royalties off of every song. A clever ruse that has now become
the standard for show-tune divas like Celine Dion (who has 100% publishing
on everything she releases....no matter who writes the track...leaving the
songwriter with only 1/2 the total royalties).
>I don't think it's bad that now we have more artists trying to write
>their own stuff. What I think is lame is when music can go downhill
>because of this, it waters down, it loses its appeal because anyone
>can do it (thanks, punk although I love that too) and we still have
>throwaway artists with no merit, flash-in-the-pan crap that people
>seem to love. It's all good. :)
>
>Everything is out there for a reason.
And that reason needs to be addressed and killed....so that it will never
happen again :-)
Jaimie Vernon,
Bullseye
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