A 3-CD box set, the 40th anniversary chronicle of time Presley spent at Stax Recording Studios in Memphis in July & December 1973, will be available Aug. 6 via RCA/Legacy.
Released simultaneously will be a single CD of highlights from the box set simply titled Elvis at Stax and a 180-gram, double-vinyl LP.
Elvis at Stax: Deluxe Edition includes six consecutive singles that the Stax sessions produced, all of which skirted the Top 40 from 1973-75. In effect, they rivaled some of the hottest streaks that Presley had charted a decade earlier.
Those Stax singles still resonate today:
· “Raised On Rock” b/w “For Ol’ Time Sake” (Hot 100 #41, country #42);
· “I’ve Got A Thing About You Baby” b/w “Take Good Care Of Her” (Hot 100 #39, country #4);
· “Promised Land” b/w “It’s Midnight” (Hot 100 #14, country #9);
· “If You Talk In Your Sleep” b/w “Help Me” (Hot 100 #17, country #6);
· “My Boy” b/w “Thinking About You” (Hot 100 #20, country #14); and
· “Mr. Songman” (B-side of “T-R-O-U-B-L-E,” Hot 100 #35, country #11).
. "I Got A Feelin' In My Body" (recorded at Stax, catalog RCA PB-11679), was reissued as a posthumous single by RCA Records in 1979.
Elvis at Stax co-producer Ernst Mikael Jørgensen, director of RCA’s Presley catalog for over two decades has long been concerned with doing justice to the Stax sessions, which were never acknowledged by the artist's record label RCA as a unified whole.
Instead, as with most of Presley's studio work in his second decade as a recording artist, the tracks were scattered onto LPs and intermingled with material recorded in Nashville and Hollywood.
The bulk of the Stax cuts showed up on Raised On Rock/For Ol’ Times Sake (1973), Good Times (1974), and Promised Land (1975). For Elvis at Stax, many of the outtakes originated on the CD-era reissues of those three albums on Jørgensen’s and co-director Roger Semon's own label, Follow That Dream (FTD) Records.
Taking up the cause for Elvis at Stax is award-winning resident Memphis journalist Robert Gordon, who has written an in-depth, day-by-day (i.e. night-by-night) liner notes essay for the box set.
Previously, Gordon and his wife Tara McAdams (author of The Elvis Handbook, 2004) co-wrote the liner notes essay for RCA/Legacy's From Elvis In Memphis: Legacy Edition (2009).
Etched in music history, 1973 was a crucial watershed year for Presley, in the wake of his return to extended concert touring in 1972, after 12 years away from the stage and 27 movies in Hollywood.
His New York City concert debut was emblematic of an exciting new chapter in his career. It was chronicled last year on the RCA/Legacy deluxe 2-CD+DVD box set, Prince From Another Planet: Elvis As Recorded Live At Madison Square Garden / 40th Anniversary Edition, which captured an afternoon and an evening concert staged on June 10, 1972.
His manager, Colonel Tom Parker, sought a world-class mega-event to underscore the touring, which led to the one-hour global satellite broadcast from the Honolulu International Center Arena on January 14, 1973, viewed by over one billion people around the world. That, too, was recently chronicled on the RCA/Legacy double-disc set issued this past March, Aloha From Hawaii: Legacy Edition.
The highs of 1972-’73 led Presley and Colonel Parker to accept RCA’s $5.4 million offer for an outright transfer of Presley's complete back catalog. He wanted a new start, new control, and a new publishing company. But the RCA deal also called for his return to the studio and a promise for him to deliver 24 new masters, i.e. two new singles (four songs), a new pop LP (ten songs), and a new gospel LP (ten songs).
Presley spent 12 days at Stax in 1973 (July 21-25 and December 10-16), and the rollercoaster ride of those sessions is meticulously detailed in Gordon’s liner notes. Elvis at Stax neatly compartmentalizes the results:
· Disc 1: The R&B and Country Sessions – The Outtakes: 17 tracks
· Disc 2: Part 1 – The Pop Sessions – The Outtakes: 10 tracks
· Disc 2: Part 2 – The July 1973 Masters: four single sides and six album tracks, and
· Disc 3: The December 1973 Masters: seven single sides and 11 album tracks.
Elvis at Stax: Deluxe Edition track listing
Disc 1: The R&B and Country Sessions – The Outtakes: Selections – 1. I Got A Feelin’ In My Body - take 1 (I) • 2. Find Out What’s Happening - takes 8-7 (B) • 3. Promised Land - take 4 (I) • 4. For Ol’ Times Sake - take 4 (I) • 5. I’ve Got A Thing About You, Babe - take 14 (I) • 6. It’s Midnight - take 7 (F) • 7. If You Talk In Your Sleep - take 5 (J) • 8. Loving Arms - take 2 (I) • 9. You Asked Me To - take 3A (F) • 10. Good Time Charlie’s Got The Blues - take 8 (I) • 11. Talk About The Good Times - take 3 (I) • 12. There’s A Honky Tonk Angel - take 1 (I) • 13. She Wears My Ring - take 8 (I) • 14. Three Corn Patches - take 14 (I) • 15. I Got A Feelin’ In My Body - take 4 (J) • 16. If You Don’t Come Back - take 3 (I) • 17. Promised Land - take 5 (H).
Disc 2: Part 1 – The Pop Sessions – The Outtakes: Selections – 1. Mr. Songman - take 2 (F) • 2. Your Love’s Been A Long time Coming - take 4 (I) • 3. Spanish Eyes - take 2 (I) • 4. Take Good Care Of Her - takes 1,2,3 (D) • 5. It’s Diff’rent Now (unfinished recording) (G) • 6. Thinking About You - take 4 (I) • 7. My Boy - take 1 (D) • 8. Girl Of Mine - take 9 (I) • 9. Love Song Of The Year - take 1 (F) • 10. If That Isn’t Love - take 1 (I) • Part 2 – The July 1973 Masters: • 11. Raised On Rock (Hot 100 #41, country #42) (A) • 12. For Ol’ Time Sake (charts same as track 11) (A) • 13. I’ve Got A Thing About You Baby (Hot 100 #39, country #4) (C) • 14. Take Good Care Of Her (charts same as track 13) (C) • 15. If You Don’t Come Back (A) • 16. Three Corn Patches (A) • 17. Girl Of Mine (A) • 18. Just A Little Bit (A) • 19. Find Out What’s Happening (A) • 20. Sweet Angeline (A) .
Disc 3: The December 1973 Masters: Selections – 1. Promised Land (Hot 100 #14, country #9) (E) • 2. It’s Midnight (charts same as track 1) (E) • 3. If You Talk In Your Sleep (Hot 100 #17, country #6) (E) • 4. Help Me (charts same as track 3) (E) • 5. My Boy (Hot 100 #20, country #14) (C) • 6. Thinking About You (charts same as track 5) (E) • 7. Mr. Songman (Hot 100 #35, country #11) (E) • 8. I Got A Feelin’ In My Body (C) • 9. Loving Arms (C) • 10. Good Time Charlie’s Got The Blues (C) • 11. You Asked Me To (E) • 12. There’s A Honky Tonk Angel (Who Will Take Me Back In) (E) • 13. Talk About The Good Times (C) • 14. She Wears My Ring (C) • 15. Your Love’s Been A Long Time Coming (E) • 16. Love Song Of The Year (E) • 17. Spanish Eyes (C) • 18. If That Isn’t Love (C).
Album source index:
A – from Raised On Rock/For Ol’ Times Sake LP (RCA APL1-0388, released October 1973)
B – from Raised on Rock CD (FTD 86971 28432, released July 2007)
C – from Good Times LP (RCA CPL1-0475, released March 1974)
D – from Good Times CD (FTD 50602 09750 0 3, released December 2012)
E – from Promised Land LP (RCA APL1-0873, released January 1975)
F – from Promised Land CD (FTD 50602 09750 1 9, released December 2011)
G – from Walk a Mile in My Shoes – The Essential ’70s Masters 5-CD box set (RCA 7863-66670-2, released October 1995)
H – from Platinum - A Life In Music 4-CD box set (RCA 67469, released July 1997)
I – from Rhythm and Country CD (RCA 07863-67672-2, released August 1998)
J – from Today, Tomorrow and Forever 4-CD box set (RCA 07863-65115-2, released June 2002)
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