Careless Love

Starred review from January 11, 1999
Opening with the 25-year-old Presley's nervous return to the United States in March 1960, this second volume of Guralnick's definitive and scrupulous biography then circles back to describe the singer's military service in Germany, where he encountered two elements destined to define his post-Army life: prescription drugs and 14-year-old Priscilla Beaulieu. His manager, Colonel Tom Parker, was by now a major factor in Elvis's career, and Guralnick is the first to explain successfully how the Colonel, a one-time carnival huckster, maintained an enduring hold on a man whose genius was beyond his grasp. Presley believed that they were "an unbeatable team," and the Colonel's success in keeping Elvis's popularity alive during the Army stint seemed to prove it. The subsequent results of the Colonel's go-for-the-quick-buck mentality--crummy movies made on the cheap, mediocre soundtracks rather than studio albums--shook Elvis's faith in his manager, but he remained loyal through the inevitable artistic and commercial decline. Guralnick's meticulously documented narrative (which draws on interviews with virtually everyone significant) shows the insecure, fatally undisciplined Elvis to be his own worst enemy, closely seconded by the Colonel and the entourage of hangers-on who feared change and disparaged Presley's tentative efforts to grow, especially his spiritual apprenticeships to his hairstylist, Larry, and to Sri Daya Mata. When Elvis roused himself--for his 1968 television comeback, for the legendary Chips Moman-produced sessions of 1969, for the early Las Vegas shows--he was still the most charismatic performer in popular music, with a voice that easily encompassed his rock-and-roll roots and his desire to reach beyond them. But as the '70s wore on, Guralnick shows, he became imprisoned by laziness and passivity, numbing his contempt for himself and those around him with the drugs that finally killed him in 1977. As in volume one, Last Train to Memphis, Guralnick makes his points here through the selection and accretion of detail, arguing in an author's note that "retrospective moral judgments no place in describing a life." While some readers may wish he had occasionally stepped back to tell us what it all means, the integrity of this approach is admirable. Many writers have made Presley the vehicle for their own ideas; Guralnick gives us a fallible human being destroyed by forces within as well as without. It's an epic American tragedy, captured here in all its complexity. Major ad/promo; author tour.

September 15, 1998
The concluding volume of Guralnick's Presley biography, which follows up Last Train to Memphis.

Starred review from November 1, 1998
Watching the humble, well-mannered Elvis of "Last Train to Memphis" (1994) become the bombastic, bloated Elvis of "Careless Love" is indeed heartbreaking. It didn't have to end that way. A tragic figure of epic proportions, Elvis is the poster boy for the sorrows of superstardom. It's an old and now-familiar story: unprepared for the realities of international fame and fortune, Elvis, immensely talented, charming beyond belief, and massively charismatic, found himself adrift in a sea of sycophantic hangers-on, adoring and ecstatic fans, and seemingly endless financial resources--a dream come true or a gilded cage? As his sincere desire to please others was replaced by an obsessive neediness and self-absorption, Elvis' humility gave way to a sense of entitlement. A million adoring fans can't be wrong, can they? Picking up where he left off in volume 1 (after the death of Gladys Presley and Elvis' induction into the army), Guralnick captures it all: Elvis' introduction to 14-year-old Priscilla, the return to the States, the Colonel, the motion pictures, the Memphis Mafia, the studio sessions, Las Vegas, karate, the tours, and, of course, the girls, the guns, and the drugs. Many of the stories told here have been told previously, and Guralnick cites some of the books that came before this one, but, along with "Last Train," this is clearly the definitive account of Elvis Presley, no more lurid than it has to be. The author's thoroughness is matched by his balance. It is obvious Guralnick has a deep admiration for Elvis' contributions as an artist, but he does not overlook or excuse the star's many flaws. An indispensable account. ((Reviewed November 1, 1998))(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 1998, American Library Association.)