Remembering Elvis

"I ain't no saint, but I've tried never to do anything that would hurt my family or offend God...I figure all any kid needs is hope and the feeling he or she belongs. If I could do or say anything that would give some kid that feeling, I would believe I had contributed something to the world."
~Elvis commenting to a reporter, 1950's.

“Don’t criticize what you don’t understand, son. You never walked in that man’s shoes.”
~Elvis often used this adaptation of a well-known quotation.

“When I was a child, ladies and gentlemen, I was a dreamer. I read comic books, and I was the hero of the comic book. I saw movies, and I was the hero in the movie. So every dream I ever dreamed has come true a hundred times...I learned very early in life that: ‘Without a song, the day would never end; without a song, a man ain’t got a friend; without a song, the road would never bend - without a song.' So I keep singing a song. Goodnight. Thank you.”
~From his acceptance speech for the 1970 Ten Outstanding Young Men of the Nation Award.

“...the image is one thing and the human being is another...it’s very hard to live up to an image.”
-From the press conference prior to his record-breaking Madison Square Garden shows in New York City, 1972.

“A live concert to me is exciting because of all the electricity that is generated in the crowd and on stage. It’s my favorite part of the business - live concerts.”
-Elvis at a press conference prior to his 1973 television special, Elvis - Aloha from Hawaii, via Satellite.

• “Music should be something that makes you gotta move, inside or outside”
• “I believe in the Bible. I believe that all good things come from God. I don't believe I'd sing the way I do if God hadn't wanted me to.' ”
• “Ambition is a dream with a V8 engine.”
• "Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away."
• "Whatever I will become will be what God has chosen for me."

"There have been a lotta tough guys. There have been pretenders. And there have been contenders. But there is only one king."
~Bruce Springsteen

"...it was like he came along and whispered some dream in everybody’s ear, and somehow we all dreamed it."
~Bruce Springsteen

"When I first heard Elvis' voice I just knew that I wasn’t going to work for anybody; and nobody was going to be my boss...Hearing him for the first time was like busting out of jail."
~Bob Dylan

"Elvis was the king. No doubt about it. People like myself, Mick Jagger and all the others only followed in his footsteps."
~Rod Stewart

"Before Elvis, there was nothing."
~John Lennon

"...if any individual of our time can be said to have changed the world, Elvis Presley is the one. In his wake more than music is different. Nothing and no one looks or sounds the same. His music was the most liberating event of our era because it taught us new possibilities of feeling and perception, new modes of action and appearance, and because it reminded us not only of his greatness, but of our own potential."
~Greil Marcus - From his book, Mystery Train.

"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.

"Ask anyone. If it hadn't been for Elvis, I don't know where popular music would be. He was the one that started it all off, and he was definitely the start of it for me."
~Elton John

"He was a unique artist - an original in an area of imitators."
~Mick Jagger