Elvis Presley

An almost sufficient list of covers, maybe interesting at the time but hardly interesting in 2025. 2.4/5 - > 2/5

Really enjoyed this, was pleasantly surprised. I didn’t think much of my previous Elvis album but this had some great tracks on it.

Top Track - Trying To Get To You

I'm not the biggest Elvis fan, but I think this album shows all the different sides of his music in a way that is the essential Elvis. It's very good.

From a personal enjoyment perspective, I quite liked this album.

From a music history perspective, this is super fraught. The majority of these songs were written and better performed by black artists. It simultaneously makes me glad things have changed somewhat, but it also reminds me that SO MUCH racism still exists

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Short, intense barrage of tracks short and varied tracks. I'm not the biggest Elvis fan, but it's hard not to be somewhat entertained.

None of these songs were in lilo & stitch 🤔

The blueprint for rock and roll. Raw and energetic, before Elvis got sanitised.

I felt my arteries clogging with peanut butter, jelly and bacon sandwiches.

I know I look like a barbarian giving this review. I'm sure to the 1950s ear this was incredible, but I suppose in the 20s it no longer dazzles. No songs stood out to me. Still good, of course.

(Addendum: I looked at some of the other reviews after writing mine and apparently about 80% of people have the same sort of opinion as mine. Not a barbarian after all!)

Good. Classic. Mellower than I expected.

Great album, signs of things to come. I loved the production values. An album definitely made for airplay.
The King in every sense.

acho essa capa mto foda.
e aprecio que o album seja curtinho.

só isso mesmo.

Better than Coldplay.

Elvis is, obviously, absolutely huge. Everyone has heard of him. He is one of a very small number of globally dominating artists. Before The Beatles for a large chunk of the planet, he was music.

I find it strange then that only 70 years later I know absolutely no one who listens to him. And I don't mean in a kind of RYM sense of someone checking an album out and rating it, I mean genuinely sitting at home on a weekend and listening to a couple of Elvis records for the sheer pleasure of it. All of The Beatles' albums pass this test after 60 years, but growing up I've only seen Elvis as an iconic image rather than a musician.

If I was to guess why, it would be because of the value we place post-1963 on musicians writing their own songs. We struggle to look at someone who is an amazing performer and give them the same kind of plaudits as a singer songwriter. Back in 1956 that would be like expecting your favourite actor to have written all their lines but now, to me at least, it seems reasonable.

This debut does a great job of showcasing Elvis "the performer." The sheer force of personality that made him a wild sensation in a mostly grey world. He can get quite weird and freaky on the mic, which I like. He can also be sentimental and soulful. A legend.

Talentless chancer with a penchant for hamburgers and 14 year old girls releases collection of other people's songs and covers and inadvertently helps kick off rock and roll as well as a stream of fat Elvis impersonators and wedding chapels.

The king? Fuck off. Alvin Stardust, Stray Cats and Mrs Mills did a better job.

As legendary as Elvis is, and while I do have to give props to the man, it's remarkably lukewarm due to it being dated to hell.

I know many of these are cover songs by superior black artists, but this is the first rock n roll album to hit number one on the charts and paved the way for many of the other albums on this list. That by itself is worthy of five stars. Iconic cover art, too.

Amazingly, less white than London Calling.

This is Elvis Presley as we know him. There are many important and good songs on the album. And although it's quite short, it still felt long to me. 3/5

Ehhhhh