New 'Memphis' box set highlights Elvis' hometown recordings, from Sun to Jungle Room
Despite a long recording career that saw him cut at top studios in New York, Nashville and Hollywood, Elvis Presley’s most uniquely powerful work was captured in his hometown of Memphis. In August, RCA Records and Legacy Recordings will celebrate that body of work with a new Elvis box set titled “Memphis.”
The five-CD set — which will also be released digitally and in a pared down two-LP vinyl package — marks the first “fully comprehensive collection” of the recordings Presley made in the Bluff City. It will be released Aug. 9 and is available for pre-order now.
Coinciding with the 70th anniversary of Presley’s first sessions at Sun Records in 1954, "Memphis" includes 111 tracks spanning his recordings in the city, with 88 of those tracks newly remixed by local Grammy-winning engineer/producer Matt Ross-Spang at his Crosstown studio, Southern Grooves. The deluxe package also features liner notes from fellow Grammy winner and Memphis author/essayist Robert Gordon.
Produced by noted Elvis archivist Ernst J?rgensen, the box set chronicles Presley’s 1954 and 1955 sessions at Sun, his comeback at American Sound studios in 1969, the music he made at Stax Records in 1973, live recordings from a 1974 show at the Mid-South Coliseum, and a final set of songs cut in the Jungle Room of his Graceland home in 1976, a year before his passing.
Aside from the iconic Sun recordings, all the tracks on "Memphis" were newly mixed by Ross-Spang, removing overdubbed strings, horns and additional backing vocals. As J?rgensen notes, this “provides a unique ‘fly-on-the-wall’ glimpse of what it sounded like to Elvis, while he was recording all these songs with the band.” A version of “Polk Salad Annie,” from the 1974 Mid-South Coliseum show, has been released, offering the first preview of the set.
As the announcement of the project notes, these new intimate mixes offer a variety of musical revelations, “from Elvis' intuitive chemistry with “The Memphis Boys” at American (particularly notable on “Long Black Limousine”), to the subtle way he builds his vocal phrasing around his backing singers in the Stax sessions, or the palpable joy he brings to the innuendo-filled lyrics of “Way Down” in the Jungle Room.”
In his new essay for the package, Gordon writes: “With these recordings on Memphis, we are standing next to Elvis inside the recording studio, us and the basic band, hearing what he’s hearing. The strings haven’t been booked, horns are not yet on stand-by, the background vocalists are at home watching TV. What we hear is the foundation onto which the hits were built, the basic tracks that were in the studio with Elvis. And nothing more. We’re hearing a beautifully mixed version of what Elvis was hearing in his headphones when he was singing.”
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The “Memphis” set will be celebrated as part of Elvis Week 2024 later this summer, with a pair of events in and around Graceland. On Aug. 13, the Graceland Soundstage will host an “Elvis: Back in Memphis” concert blending live performances with storytelling from the musicians and vocalists who were part of these legendary recording sessions. Confirmed participants include American Sound drummer Gene Chrisman and vocalist Donna Rhodes, and Larry Strickland from the Jungle Room sessions.
On Aug. 14, Sony will host a special “Memphis" listening party and Q&A at The Guest House at Graceland’s theater. Full details and guest lineup for the event have yet to be announced, but Ross-Spang and Gordon are expected to be a part of the event. Free tickets can be reserved at Graceland.com.
This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: New Elvis box set announced: 'Memphis' tracks, release date and more
