"You know, Bush is always comparing me to Elvis in sort of unflattering ways. I don't think Bush would have liked Elvis very much, and that's just another thing that's wrong with him."
-- Bill Clinton during the 1992 presidential campaign
No wonder George Bush wasn't a very good president. He wasn't the kind of guy who likes Elvis, and Elvis says as much about America as can be said.
Today, it is 33 years since Elvis Presley went to his final reward. He passed the day before Groucho Marx, as major an icon as I can name. But nobody remembers where he was standing when Groucho died.
Several years back, my friend Mike Rocke (he used to play piano in my group) and I were listening to Leonard Bernstein's second symphony. There's a fast pseudo-jazz movement, and it's really a highlight in Bernstein's canon, even if it's not one of his hits. It's over-amped and gaudy. It makes its points broadly, even after its point is made. It's even joyously vulgar.
It coulda been Elvis.
I doubt anyone could ever sum up the American outlook and condition more than Elvis. Or Leonard Bernstein, Willie Nelson, or Louis Armstrong.
Jim Cavender pointed out (last night on the phone) that the truly American cultural giant never distances himself from his cheesiest moments. Instead, he invests them with a character we can't look away from, which can be pretty awful. Seeing Louis Armstrong singing to Barbra Streisand in Hello Dolly is fascinating and kind of terrifying. He's pitching it with the same intent that he did when he pitched the blues of W.C. Handy in the fifties. And -- nobody wants to admit this -- the Elvis that cut "Mystery Train" at Sun is the same Elvis who cut "There's No Room To Rhumba In A Sports Car".
But the Herbie Hancock who cuts "Rockit" etc is not the same Herbie who played on the on Henderson Double Rainbow disc. There's a palpable divide between the two. You don't get that from an Elvis, a Bernstein, a Louis, or a Willie. Or a Stevie. That "I Just Called To Say I Love You" comes from the same genius that gave us "Superstition" speaks worlds.
It's great to be an American.
Nothing teaches you about your country more than going to another country, and no country could be more 'other' than India. And when you talk music with Indians -- educated Indians -- Elvis is their touchstone. Part of it is definitely because India's pop music is the spawn of bad musical movies. But it is also because of his stardom and its ability to transcend the medium itself, so that everything he touches takes on his charm, even if the thing itself isn't very good. India embraces this. India is a culture that embraces everything, discards nothing, and ruminates on it all.
The number and range of books written about Elvis Presley is staggering. Everything from cookbooks to explorations of his involvement with eastern religion. He remains as fascinating a subject to Americans as has ever been. He has been venerated and ridiculed, often in the same breath, and analyzed out to here, but little is really known. He wasn't posessed of an intellectual process, nor did he do interviews, keep journals, write letters. and he never spoke of music in terms of his role in the picture of art -- his art or anyone else's. Instead, he made all kinds of records and movies, good and bad. He punched the clock and went into work like a total pro. On this best days, "Suspicious Minds". On his worst, "Ito Eats". That's an extreme dichotomy but any standard.
Americans, on our best days, are smart, vulgar, gregarious, and a little bit lonesome. We curse and swagger. Our literature -- film, music, books -- takes in low, middle, and high brow tastes almost all at once. That doesn't mean it's always good. It just means we're not snobs by nature.
Thirty-three years after his death, Elvis still embodies this -- for better and for worse -- more accurately than anyone else we have. It's hard to imagine anyone eclipsing him for this.
