Elvis Presley

[Tony Trout]

i am going next week! Woooooooooo hooooooooo. I am soooooooooooo excited.

take me with you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[findadeathaddict]

take me with you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hahaha!!!!!!!!

[Tony Trout]

Hahaha!!!!!!!!

Doest thou think I teaseth? I no teaseth about seeing Graceland again. It's been fourteen years since I've been.....

[findadeathaddict]

Doest thou think I teaseth? I no teaseth about seeing Graceland again. It's been fourteen years since I've been.....

Wow! That's a long time. I've never been before.

[gradpig]

I've been twice. Loved it! Would go again.

[findadeathaddict]

I can't wait. I am so excited I can't breathe.

[Introvert]

The O2 Arena are holding an eight-month Elvis exhibition, apparently the biggest outside Graceland, ever. In fact I hear they've taken a LOT of Graceland's treasures to London for it (unfortunate if you're going there any time soon!)

Anyone here going to get tickets? I can't wait!

[neilmpenny]

From his gold phone to his golf buggy, Elvis's private world is laid bare in a new London exhibition.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz3LjSiODB3

[Cynful]

From his gold phone to his golf buggy, Elvis's private world is laid bare in a new London exhibition.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz3LjSiODB3

LOVE IT ALL Neil! I've been to Graceland, but WOW! These rare items are incredible! Thanks!

[Dangitbawb]

Really dumb. I agree. LMP and EAP look like twins. Period. If she isn't his child then I'll kiss your ass.

No denying Lisa Marie is Elvis's girl. She really inherited his looks, but she absolutely did NOT inherit his talent! I was at a NARM convention in Orlando, where she sung for the 1st time in front of an audience, thought it was just horrible. And they played the music so loud, I'm sure just to hide her lack of talent. She also has the personality of a stop sign...

[cleanskull]

http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/31/showbi...jets-for-sale/

[Spooky_Stone]

I am hoping to go to the o2 Elvis exhibition in August for my 35th birthday. I know I might never get to Graceland so this will be worth the 3 hour trip to London

[PiggyTx]

Graceland is awesome. You don't think a house would be all that but, you go there, and if you are a Elvis fan...you are in awe because it's like, wow
Elvis was here. and don't even mention the grave sites. I cried like a baby. I agree about lisa marie, she really does have the personality of a stop sign as
Dangit said..you'd think she'd be more personable. it's like she's pissed she's the daughter of the King

[choff]

Graceland is awesome. You don't think a house would be all that but, you go there, and if you are a Elvis fan...you are in awe because it's like, wow
Elvis was here. and don't even mention the grave sites. I cried like a baby. I agree about lisa marie, she really does have the personality of a stop sign as
Dangit said..you'd think she'd be more personable. it's like she's pissed she's the daughter of the King

About Lisa Marie I have to wonder if this is a case of "...yes my dad is an icon...yes I know my dad still has millions of fans...yes I know people still spend money to buy my dad's stuff and to see his home...but I don't understand why." It wouldn't surprise me at all if some of the Beatles offspring feels the same way when it comes to their famous fathers.

[StewartGilliganGriffin]

I read the auction house is only expecting 10-15 million for BOTH jets. Is it just me or does that seem like a small sum for 2 Elvis jets?

[Dangitbawb]

I read the auction house is only expecting 10-15 million for BOTH jets. Is it just me or does that seem like a small sum for 2 Elvis jets?

I hate that they are selling the jets... I drove by Graceland on a business trip and saw both the house and the jets across the street, but didn't stop to look or anything. Now I'll probably never get the chance

[Poo Bah MCGee]

But he's still dead, right?

[StewartGilliganGriffin]

I hate that they are selling the jets... I drove by Graceland on a business trip and saw both the house and the jets across the street, but didn't stop to look or anything. Now I'll probably never get the chance

I did read in an article that Graceland Enterprises are willing to sell a few acres to any buyer of the planes in case they want to showcase the planes there. So there's still hope. They won't say who the owner is. Could be that person just wants a big payout before he/she checks out.

[jerryvr]

Happy 80th Elvis!

[Elvis]

Everyday Is Like Sunday

[RiotBoots]

Good GOD !!! Can you imagine the amount of plastic that would be in his face if her were alive today??? You know it would.. Ugggggh.. People don't agree, but, he got SOOO lucky.

[McCourt]

Happy Birthday E.

[choff]

Good GOD !!! Can you imagine the amount of plastic that would be in his face if her were alive today??? You know it would.. Ugggggh.. People don't agree, but, he got SOOO lucky.

Oh I so agree !! If Elvis were still alive today with face lifts and all for quick cash he would playing small county fairs. I can see it now.." Welcome to the Berkeley County Fair..TONIGHT...an apple pie baking contest, demolition derby AND a show from Elvis Presley". Graceland ?? Probably foreclosed by now. Radio ?? When was the last time anyone heard Elvis on the radio ?? Even big stations like WCBS-FM 101 who has been called over the years America's oldies station no longer plays Elvis. Today "oldies" means Hall & Oates and Michael Jackson's Thriller LP..and they were from the 80's. Maybe Elvis Presley was lucky when he had cashed his chips when he did.

[PiggyTx]

Elvis was being run into the ground by "The Colonel". yeah, if he lived, he probably would have ended up at county fairs.
but as i say that, if you watch "Elvis: That's the way it is" you would have seen what made him great.. imo.
I watched it again tonite on TCM. I loved Elvis, but he lived a wild life, and sometimes you pay for that.

[stephenmiller]

I don't know if anyone has ever mentioned this before but has anyone noticed that after signing up Elvis, RCA Records did not or were unable to sign up more rock singers after Elvis? Not even Buddy Holly or Rick Nelson or anyone else. Why? It is the fault of that no-good Colonel! He told RCA that if they signed up Buddy Holly or anyone else, he and Elvis would quit RCA. Of course, Elvis was by then the company's biggest moneymaker and was considered irreplaceable. Colonel Tom had a lot of clout and leverage at RCA as they once had his previous two clients, Eddy Arnold and Hank Snow. He was able to intimidate RCA management of the time not to sign any other rock singers after Elvis. However, by 1966, there were newer and more younger executives running RCA and they did not know Parker or were intimidated him so they signed up the Monkees and the Jefferson Airplane. RCA could have been the biggest and greatest record company ever had they signed more rock singers. Maybe the Beatles could have been on RCA alongside Elvis! Comments?

[neilmpenny]

Huge Elvis festival here in Australia in Parkes last weekend. Btw, see the movie 'The Right Stuff'? Gordo Cooper, played by Dennis Quaid went to a tracking station in Australia. That is in Parkes.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-01-0...-elvis/6000484

[NYSDeathhag]

No denying Lisa Marie is Elvis's girl. She really inherited his looks, but she absolutely did NOT inherit his talent! I was at a NARM convention in Orlando, where she sung for the 1st time in front of an audience, thought it was just horrible. And they played the music so loud, I'm sure just to hide her lack of talent. She also has the personality of a stop sign...

Man...have to agree about her personality.....she gets that from her mom. I think her first album was "ok" but ya...nothing like the old man.

[StewartGilliganGriffin]

I dunno if this is already posted but it's Autopsy: Elvis Presley. It's really good. Pretty shocking ending honestly.

[Cynful]

Stewart... that was SO interesting! Thank you... :-) The medical conclusions make perfect sense... fascinating stuff.

[StewartGilliganGriffin]

Stewart... that was SO interesting! Thank you... :-) The medical conclusions make perfect sense... fascinating stuff.

You're welcome. I learned some stuff I didn't know about Elvis and his death. ****Spoiler Alert**** If you are going to watch the Autopsy show posted above stop reading this post.
I didn't know he had glaucoma or that he was that constipated. Like literally no way to clear the blockage without intervention. And that he basically died from pushing too hard on the toilet.

[cindyt]

I've got it bookmarked, and thanks for sharing.

[StewartGilliganGriffin]

It's REALLY good. The guy playing Elvis is a dead ringer. No pun intended. It's eerie how much the guy actually looks like Elvis.

[cindyt]

It's REALLY good. The guy playing Elvis is a dead ringer. No pun intended. It's eerie how much the guy actually looks like Elvis.

Isn't it? I've seen several movies where the actors were dead ringers. One was about Bruce Lee--I thing it was Bruce Lee, the Man, the Myth, the legend, and all the actors playing Bruce, Linda, Brandon, and Shannon could have been them. Spooky.

[Cynful]

You're welcome. I learned some stuff I didn't know about Elvis and his death. ****Spoiler Alert**** If you are going to watch the Autopsy show posted above stop reading this post.
I didn't know he had glaucoma or that he was that constipated. Like literally no way to clear the blockage without intervention. And that he basically died from pushing too hard on the toilet.

Thanks again Stewart... although I was aware that Elvis had numerous medical problems, and was in rather poor health overall, I was particularly shocked about the disclosure that he had glaucoma. Wow... I never heard or read even a whisper about that. Considering his well known penchant for fatty foods, his obvious weight gain in the years prior to his death, and addiction to enormous quantities of opiates (not to mention so many other drugs), I was not at all surprised to hear that he was severely constipated. Again, wow... "severely" is the understatement of the century, especially when it comes to light that surgical intervention would have been necessary to resolve it. IMHO, it was even more sad to hear that no doctors wanted to attempt such a thing, due to Elvis' celebrity status, and intense worry that they would be blamed if "something happened to him" during such surgery.

Well, something did happen to him all right. It was the perfect storm of health problems brought on by disease and physical deterioration, all related to years of stress, obesity, drug addiction, etc. What an ending (sorry)... a "cardiac event" while straining on the toilet... unfortunately, not a rare occurrence at all:

http://www.toilet-related-ailments.c...-maneuver.html

As many of y'all may recall, James Gandolfini (age 51), also suffered a similar fatal "cardiac event", collapsed, and was found in his hotel bathroom. Although he did not have the drug addiction issues that Elvis did, there are a lot of similarities having to do with heart disease, brought on and/or made worse by obesity, poor diet, and an overall unhealthy lifestyle. Excellent and informative article:

http://consumer.healthday.com/fitnes...es-677577.html

[StewartGilliganGriffin]

Yeah. I'm not sure I believe the guy that said the doctors were scared to perform a surgery on Elvis. Wasn't he the friend that they were interviewing? Have to take that with a grain of salt. It's more likely Elvis being an alpha male... or anybody actually, probably didn't want to make a big deal out of such a personal problem in such a personal part of the body. He had a tour begin literally the next day. Cancelling to have your anus worked on would not have been good. He was probably just putting it off and hoping for the best.

[Cynful]

Yeah. I'm not sure I believe the guy that said the doctors were scared to perform a surgery on Elvis. Wasn't he the friend that they were interviewing? Have to take that with a grain of salt. It's more likely Elvis being an alpha male... or anybody actually, probably didn't want to make a big deal out of such a personal problem in such a personal part of the body. He had a tour begin literally the next day. Cancelling to have your anus worked on would not have been good. He was probably just putting it off and hoping for the best.

Yes, very good chance you're right about all those things Stewart. Elvis was definitely surrounded by a LOT of "yes men". He must have been in agony though... just kind of surprising he wouldn't have wanted to remedy that discomfort. I wonder if he knew how bad it actually was? He must have felt like real shit. LOL.

[jerryvr]

38 years today...

[cleanskull]

Good GOD !!! Can you imagine the amount of plastic that would be in his face if her were alive today??? You know it would.. Ugggggh.. People don't agree, but, he got SOOO lucky.

Just imagine Wayne Newton x 2!!!! When we lived in Millington, TN. back in the mid 60's, we would go to Memphis my Dad would point out Elvis and his crew driving somewhere. No pics 'cause those little brownie cameras did not take good pics of action. At that time I did not know the significance of what I saw. We lived half way between Memphis and Millington on Navy road.

[cindyt]

Remember the day he died as if it were yesterday. Sissy and I were on the way to see Smokey and the Bandit when she told me (I didn't have a radio or TV then).

[human]

long live The King

[Tony Trout]

It's REALLY good. The guy playing Elvis is a dead ringer. No pun intended. It's eerie how much the guy actually looks like Elvis.

I've seen this episode and it's nothing that I already didn't know. Elvis died from a massive heart attack while on the toilet relieving himself. End of story, even though there were fourteen different drugs found in his system when he passed.

BTW, the guy playing Elvis in this short documentary is ETA, Ben Portsmouth of England.

To me, he does not, at all, look like what Elvis would have looked like on that day. Have you not seen the pictures of Elvis driving into Graceland on morning he died on August 16, 1977? Elvis's sideburns were way longer than Mr. Portsmouth's. And why Ben even agreed to do this is beyond me. Usually, the ETAs stay as far away as they can from anything to do with Elvis's death. Let's just say that I lost a little respect for Mr. Portsmouth after seeing this documentary.

Also, FWIW, Lisa Marie tweeted to the fans earlier this year that "The Lisa Marie" and "Hound Dog II" airplanes will be staying permanently at Graceland where they have been since they were brought back to Graceland in 1984 because any movement of the planes could damage them. They are not fly-worthy anymore and the engines for The Lisa Marie have been removed. One engine is there at Graceland and I believe that another engine is somewhere in Texas.

BTW, here is an interesting picture that I found on a Facebook page about the Memphis Mafia: It's from the late Robert Kendall, funeral director during Elvis's funeral on August 18, 1977 and Robert was also present when they brought Elvis's body back to the funeral home on August 16, 1977. Scott, of course, has a great article on the main FAD site about Elvis's last days and about what actually happened to the #25 hearse from the Memphis Funeral Home that they used before, and during Elvis's funeral.

I also ran across a piece of paper on that same page detailing how much the bronze marker and the vaults wound up weighing and costing the family. The vault and casket both are protected by a lining of Strentex - which is part of the petroleum products and is very, very reliable. They used this when they sealed Elvis's casket for the final time. The warranty on the vaults, themselves, however only last for fifty years. So, here's a question for all of the folks here that work funerals and burials:

When the warranty is up in 2027 on the vaults for both Elvis and Gladys, will they have to be replaced? If so, could the workers possibly then open Elvis's casket (even though it was sealed with Strentex) and see if anyone or anything is actually in there relating to Elvis?

Here's the picture of Elvis driving into Graceland on the morning of 8/16/77 and the paper from the late Robert H. Kendall detailing the costs of the vaults and other assorted things.

Mr. Kendall died in 1994. However, he kept his many notes about the funeral of Elvis and author, Robert Holton, wrote a book (although it has errors) detailing getting a call before Elvis was pronounced dead (one of the Aldens, possibly?) and going all the way through to the very last moment when Elvis is placed inside the crypt at Forest Hill (even though he was moved later to Graceland because of the body snatching incident.

Another really good account of the days before/during & after Elvis's death is the book, "The Elvis Conspiracy?", by Elvis's chief of security (after Sonny and Red & Dave were fired), Dick Grob. It also gives details as to how the NE's photo of Elvis in his casket came to be taken by the late Billy Mann, Sr. & how much he was paid for that despicable deed and horrible invasion of privacy.

FWIW, Sonny West, Elvis's former bodyguard and security personnel, and his wife, Judy, are sadly both fighting battles with throat cancer (Sonny) and breast cancer (Judy). Their son, Bryan, whom I befriended on Facebook recently has set up a GoFundMe account to help defray their medical costs because MediCare isn't paying for everything that it should - which is a damn shame, IMO.



Only nine hours (approximately) after this photo was taken, Elvis was gone forever.

[Spooky_Stone]

I went to the O2 Elvis Exhibition and LOVED IT! I had a wonderful time, took 182 photos and got all tearful. The Pink Cadillac is amazing and it was the closest I will get to Graceland, I want to go back to the 02 again soon. I will add some photos on here soon of the exhibition

[Upset]

Elvis was a hero to most, but he never meant shit to me...

[Tony Trout]

It really confuses me to see people post answers like the one above......

If he doesn't mean anything to you, why post in a thread about him??

I'm ONLY curious! I'm not asking that question to start any kind of argument or get banned.

[Spooky_Stone]

Photos from the Exhibition and more to follow too

[Spooky_Stone]

[Spooky_Stone]

Will add more photos tomorrow or in the coming week

[atomicbettie]

Nice photos Spooky!

I wasn't a huge E fan but I do like some of his songs and I can appreciate the impact he had on music and culture at the time. It's sad that he made a mess of himself and died due to his overindulgent lifestyle. But he did some great things for music and movies, and he went into the service in the middle of it all because it was the right thing to do. You've got to respect that.

[McCourt]

He was a lot better than the Beatles.

[Mansfield67]

That's because Elvis had talent. I never cared for The Beatles ,they were mediocre at best. El could knock walls down, The Beatles just stood there like puppets.