Being Elvis

October 24, 2016
In this sympathetic portrayal of Elvis Presley, English writer and journalist Connolly tells the much-recounted saga of a hillbilly from Tupelo, Miss., who became the first rock-and-roll superstar. Four decades after Elvis’s death, Connolly passes the familiar signposts: born in poverty with a stillborn twin, Sun Studios magic, the sinister “Colonel” Tom Parker, the army stint, romance with 14-year-old Priscilla Bealieu, the Vegas years, drug dependence and unhinged behavior. Gliding over this heavily mined terrain with aplomb, Connolly pays particular attention to Elvis’s psychological makeup, in particular his underlying insecurity, a weakness magnified by the singer’s gluttonous consumption of narcotics, amphetamines, and barbituates, food, and the loss of his beloved mother. Though far from uncritical, Connolly presents his material from what he depicts as Elvis’s perspective, offering excuses and justifications for bad behavior, bad music, and bad films. This speculative leap provides both the strength and weakness of the account: while readers will pity the overwhelmed singer, the world seen through his eyes is quite blurry, and few of even his closest intimates come into focus. Instead, Connolly shoots a close-up of a talented mama’s boy elevated and then broken by the demographic upheaval that transformed pop culture. In his last days, the King complained, “I’m so tired of being Elvis Presley”; as Connolly writes, death was the only escape available to the world’s first rock icon.

October 1, 2016
A veteran London-based journalist rehearses the rise and fall of Elvis Presley (1935-1977).Connolly (The Ray Connolly Beatles Archive, 2016, etc.), who interviewed Presley while working for the London Evening Standard, is a fan as well as a stout critic, and his work is full of praise for his subjects musicianship, voice, and work ethic. But the author is unblinking about the myriads of problems that Elvis faced, and created, throughout his career: his serial sexual infidelities, his wild spending, his failures as a friend, and, of course, his increasing reliance on drugs and his inability to defeat his demons. Near the end, we see an angry, paranoid man, offering himself as a federal drug agent to serve President Richard Nixon, carrying multiple firearms, and winging all over the country in search of peace. Connolly follows a conventional biographical path from Elvis impoverished birth in Tupelo, Mississippi, to his seclusion and death behind the gates of Graceland in Memphis. The author also focuses on his multiple musical talents, his determination to broaden his musical appeal, his influence on many musicians who followed him. There is a sad scene at Graceland when the Beatlesthe latest superstarsarrive to pay homage. We see Elvis social awkwardness and the Beatles playfulness, and we yearn for a recording of the music they played together. Connolly also keeps us in touch with Elvis familyand his devotion to themand to the relationship between Presley and his long-term manager, Col. Tom Parker, whose self-destructive gambling habits are astonishing. Parker would never let Elvis tour abroad, an odd insistence that cost them all millions in lost revenue. The author illuminates, as well, the many forgettable Presley films, his final years in Las Vegas, and the brutal touring schedule that ground him down. Connolly carefully and sympathetically paints the many faces of Presley, faces eventually shrouded in despair.

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July 1, 2016
While working for the "London Evening Standard", longtime British rock journalist Connolly interviewed numerous Sixties and Seventies stars, Elvis Presley among them. Now, on the 40th anniversary of Presley's death, Connolly has crafted a biography that examines what it was like to be Elvis Presley, rich, famous, and profoundly influential yet circumscribed by the circumstances of his upbringing and the total control of his manager, "Colonel" Tom Parker. The result? A remarkable career but also a wasted talent, says Connolly in a big book being published in the UK this August.

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