"Elvis '68 Comeback Special"

The Police filmed a show one time in Florida because of the P.G.A, Y.M.C.A., or somebody. They thought that I was...something. He’s got to be crazy. So they, the police, came out and filmed the show. I couldn’t move. I had to stand still. The only thing I moved was my little finger like that. You ain’t nothing but a hound dog crying all the time through the whole show”……….Elvis Presley Comeback ‘68  

Colonel Tom Parker had originally wanted Elvis’ 1968 special for NBC-TV to be a Christmas program, in which “His Boy” sang an hour’s worth of holiday classics. The producers, however, had something more challenging in mind. And for once, the Colonel did not get his way. Even with the change in format for the program, however, the Colonel still expected Elvis to close the show singing “Silent Night.”

The immediate triumph of Elvis was that it wasn’t  all the things it could so easily have been. It aired just before Christmas 1968, yet there was just one Christmas number, and Elvis sang it dressed neck-to-toe in black leather. The ultimate triumph of Elvis was that it was an act of career regeneration almost without parallel. There’s even a case to be made for saying that the show paved the way for the tide of fifties nostalgia that crested with American Graffiti, Happy days, and the rock ‘n roll revival. Elvis, though, wasn’t looking backward so much as trying to restore forward momentum. The old songs reaffirmed his joy in making music, a joy that had slowly ebbed over the course of twenty post-army movies.

In a sense, Elvis was fortunate that he hadn’t appeared on television since May 12, 1960 when he’d participated in Frank Sinatra’s “Welcome Home” gala.  Sometimes, in doing what came naturally, Elvis looked like a prophet; sometimes like a genius. When he told everything he knew about music into “That’s All right”, they said he invented Rock ‘n  Roll. When he walked onto NBC’s Burbank soundstage on the evening of Thursday, June 27, 1968, he invented “Unplugged”...and reinvented himself.

The Comeback Special featured live segments, pre-filmed concert sequences and casual jamming sessions, and loosely told the story of a young singer finding fame.

 The leather suit that Elvis wore for the Comeback Special had been specially tailored for him by Bill Belew, who went on to design several of the jumpsuits that Elvis wore in later years. After he filmed the concert sequences for the Special, Elvis decided that he wanted to return to touring.

Elvis wore several outfits, during the various sections of the Special. At the end, dressed in a white suit, he sang'If I Can Dream' which had been specially written to close the show. It had reached No 12 in the charts by January 1969, and went on to become yet another millionseller.

 By 1968, there had been tremendous change in music and pop culture, change that Elvis had helped pave the way for over a decade earlier. It had been  more t seven years since Elvis had appeared in front of a live audience. Thought of primarily as a Hollywood star at the time, he had become less and less a part of the current pop cultural scene. He missed the closeness of his public, the energy and excitement of live performing, the satisfaction and challence of music making unencumbered by movie production needs. He was ready for a change. Elvis would be the show’s only headliner, no big name guest stars. Elvis taped in the summer of 1968, first airde on December 3th, and was one of the biggest television hits of the year, receiving rave reviews from the public and the credits alike. The show closed with Elvis sitting on the edge off the stage, singing “Memories” to a prerecorded backing track.

Just two of these performances, “Lawdy Miss Clawdy” and  “Blue Christmas” were used in the original edit that was broadcast in December 1968. “Tiger Man” replaced  “Blue Christmas”, when the show re-aired on August 17, 1969. Another five recordings, “That’s All Right”,  “Are You Lonesome Tonight”, “Blue Suede Shoes”, “Love Me”, and “Trying To Get To You”, appeared in the legendary Performer series, but the complete 8:00pm show from NBC’s  Studio 4 in Burbank is available in its entirety on BMG cd “Tiger Man”                                            

By 1968, the rarity of his television appearances was one of his few remaining trumps. The special was shot between June 20 and June 30. Elvis’ buddy, Joe esposito told once that the shooting schedule was so intense that he and Elvis camped on rollaway beds in a dressing room. Elvis worked feverishly hard, very much aware of how much was at stake. During rehearsals, Steve Binder noticed him sitting in his dressing room with his buddies. They were singing, playing, talking and joking. This, Binder realized, was a side of Elvis that few had seen, and his first instinct was to bring in a camera to document these jam sessions.

That idea gradually broadened to the concept of the Sit Down Shows. Elvis would sit  informally with friends to play and reminisce as he’d done in the dressing room.The original contract stipulated that there would be no live performances, but Binder won Elvis over the idea of shooting this segment in front of a live audience as well. Elvis then agreed to perform the Arena (stand up) segment of the show in front of a live audience as well. The first two days of recording were largely devoted to the travelog segment. There was to be a fantasia on “Guitar Man”. In which several set-pieces showed the perils and pitfalls awaiting a young guitar picker making his way through the world. The script changed constantly, as did the song selection.  

The first Sit Down show was scheduled for 6:00PM on June 27. At the last minute, Elvis told Binder that he had changed his mind and wouldn’t do it. According to Joe Esposito it took some cajoling to get Elvis on stage. When Elvis appeared it was in a black leather outfit tailored by costume designer Bill Belew in the mistaken belief that Elvis had appeared in leather during the fifties. It appealed to Elvis’ sense of drama, although he had no idea how it would become under the lights. Elvis, Scotty Moore, D.J. Fontana, Charlie Hodge, and Alan Fortras were grouped on kitchen chairs in a boxing ring, with Elvis’ movie stand-in, Lance LeGault, off to one side playing tambourine. Elvis had asked for the audience to be moved closer, and the Colonel arranged for him to be circled by women.  

The set largely bypassed the sixties in favor of songs with which Elvis made his name. There were just three numbers he’d never performed before, “Baby What You Want Me To Do”, “Tiger Man”, and a new song, “Memories”, written specially for the show. “Baby What You Want Me To Do” was a loping Jimmy Reed blues hit that Elvis alchemized into a rockabilly romp. “Tiger Man” was another blues, first recorded by Rufus Thomas for Sun almost a year to the day before Elvis cut his first record. Elvis almost certainly considered recording it at Sun records, and later joked that it was “my second record”, but not too many people got to hear it”. He hurls himself into it with a wild-eyed fury that had been absent for a decade.  

Elvis was clearly nervous as he began his first song. He knew that to many members of his audience, his career had become something of a joke over the past few years. He was unsure as to whether he would be able to generate that old excitement in front of a large audience,  yet as the first few chords rang out, his self-confidence returned and he regained his legendary magic touch.  

Elvis was in perfect form. With his slicked-back hair and long sideburns, and attired in a tight, black leather suit, he cut a sleek, handsome figure. He was suntanned and thinner than he had been in years. Most importantly, his voice was stronger than ever.  It was a wiser, more mature, and more cynical Elvis who ripped through a set of old rock and roll classics and powerful ballads. The intimate setting of the pit segment was the perfect venue for Elvis to acquaint himself with a new generation of fans.

Elvis performed the first few songs alone on the stage, either playing guitar and singing or just standing alone with a mike, belting out the tunes to the audience sitting right at his feet. The band, complete with a full orchestra, played offstage behind the audience. There was nothing to divert the audience’s  eyes from  Elvis’s  mesmerizing performance.  

In the later part of the pit segment, Elvis sat on a chair placed a in a circle among the members of his old band, each playing an acoustic guitar while members and the audience in between loose, yet powerful renditions of his old hits and standard rhythm and blues numbers.  Elvis was supposed to reminisce about the old days and talk about his music. Instead,  he just jammed with his old friends and had a good time. Despite the scripted instructions, Elvis refused to open talk about himself. Nevertheless, he did joke around with the band and the fans. Indeed, at one point during the segment, he stopped the band in the middle of a song as his lip curled in a classic Elvis snarl and said, “Wait a minute…wait a minute. My lip’s stuck. “ As the band laughed he continued, “I’ve got news for you. I did twenty-nine pictures like that.”

It has come to be regarded by many as the ultimate showcase of Elvis Presley as an artist and a man. It was another milestone in Elvis’career. Many more were to follow. After this show everything in Elvis’ life and career changed. Elvis and the Colonel seized the moment. Then the “concert area” would begin, with Elvis breaking new musical ground and reaching a whole new level of superstardom.   

“He was very polite which surprised me..and his wanting to change. I felt he wanted to break away from the past. I felt he wanted somethin’ else that his life up until that point hadn’t given him that the ’68 Special had exposed him to. The Special, I think, opened his mind entirely.”-Gene McAvoy, Art Director for the 1968 NBC TV Special  

 I had heard that Elvis won Grammys for his gospel music, and I believe, from the time I spent with him, that’s really more where his heart was at. We were doing a song on the ’68 Special. I think it was called “Saved”. It’s about a guy standing on the corner shouting about God. “I’m saved, I’m saved. People let me tell you I’m saved”. Something just clicked inside of me..that Elvis really ment what he was saying. I never really forgot that moment when he was singing that song. I think it was one of the things that helped me seek out a relationship with God!  

There was a problem with the ending of The “68 Comeback Special”. The show was coming together so well and presenting such a strong, revived Elvis, that the director could not see closing with a pat of Christmas song. While the show was in rehearsals, Robert Kennedy was assassinated. The show’s staff was genuinely struck by Elvis’ compassion for Kennedy, and his concern too about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s  murder in Memphis. They wanted to present that part of his character in the special. “If I Can Dream” was written to capture both the spiritual side of Elvis and the spiritual aspects of Christmas. It is the essence of Elvis. “Presley is one in a lifetime, “ said Bender. “We had Joe Louis in the boxing ring, and we had Manolete in the bull ring. In his arena, Presley is the champ.”

The Claude Thompson Dancers backed Elvis in the special’s production numbers, but there were no other performers on this program.

June 20-23  

Nothingville / , Big Boss Man / Guitar Man (first version) /  Little Egypt, Let Yourself Go, It Hurts Me, Trouble, Guitar Man (2^nd version), Where Could I Go Up to The Lord, Up Above My head, Saved, Trouble (Opening Version), Guitar Man (Complete Opening Version), If I Can Dream, Memories, A Little Less Conversation, Let Yourself Go (Instrumental)  

Rehearsal Recordings

Studio: Held In Elvis Presley’s dressing room at NBC, Burbank, California.