Long live the King

IT seems incredible that it is now almost 30 years to the day that Elvis Presley died. The man we called the King has become a legend and for the past 30 years his memory has been turned into an industry. That s a shame. No-one, really, should be consider

IT seems incredible that it is now almost 30 years to the day that Elvis Presley died.

The man we called the King has become a legend and for the past 30 years his memory has been turned into an industry.

That's a shame.

No-one, really, should be considered an industry, but those controlling the purse-strings in the pop business are well aware of the value of Elvis Aaron Presley.

But, really, the legend of Presley is not just about the commerial explotation of his career.

We have to remember that here was a talent that changed the course of the pop business.

In those early rock-and-roll days of the mid-1950s, Presley arrived on the scene with All Shook Up - and then had hit after hit with the likes of Party, Paralysed and Teddy Bear.

We may have had rock-and-roll earlier when Bill Haley appeared on the scene with Rock Around the Clock, but he didn't last longer than 18 months.

Presley endured and gave us of a certain age a hero for our generation.

It was a change in direction of the pop business: it was the young taking over.

Although there was still a public buying such records as Johnnie Ray's Yes Tonight Josephine and Guy Mitchell's Singing the Blues, and Frankie Vaughan's Garden of Eden and Harry Belafonte's Mary's Boy Child.

But the revolution had started. There had been a culture change and we were suddenly buying outrageous and garish pink and lime green socks. It didn't last long because we were told that they had disappeared in the weekly wash.

I didn't believe it, but at that age you don't argue with your mother.

To return to Presley. He did change the pop industry as much as The Beatles did in the 1960s.

And that's the reason we remember him.

Long live the King.