RCA 2256
Musical directors: Joseph Lilley and Hal Wallis
Track listing: Tonight Is So Right for Love / What’s She Really Like / Frankfort Special / Wooden Heart / G.I. Blues / Pocket Full of Rainbows / Shoppin’ Around / Big Boots / Didja Ever / Blue Suede Shoes / Doin’ the Best I Can
December 5, 1960
10 weeks (nonconsecutive): 2 weeks stereo, 8 weeks mono
Nine months after Elvis Presley was discharged from the army, the King scored his fifth Number One album with G.I. Blues, the soundtrack to fifth film. Yet G.I. Blues wasn’t Elvis’s official comeback album. That release, recorded shortly after his return to civilian life and appropriately titled Elvis Is Back!, spent three weeks at number two, but was unable to unseat the Kingston Trio’s Sold Out.
G.I. Blues was recorded on April 27 and 28, 1960, at RCA Studios and at a subsequent session May 6 at Radio Recorders in Hollywood, the studio that Elvis frequently used for recording soundtrack material. As Jimmie Haskell, who played accordion at the sessions, notes, there were guards in front of the studio to keep away any fans who might have discovered Elvis’s whereabouts. Presley’s crack sidemen — guitarist Scotty Moore and drummer D.J. Fontana — were present at the sessions, but they were augmented by several ace session players, including guitarists Tiny Timbrell and Neal Matthews, bassist Ray Siegel, drummer Bernie Mattinson, and pianist Dudley Brooks.
The movie, co-starring Juliet Prowse, was filmed in April of 1960. It featured Elvis as a young American soldier in the entertainment unit stationed in Germany. In real life, the Army had refused to allow Elvis into the unit, fearing complaints of having given the star preferential treatment.
With both the film and album, Elvis’s career continued to take a new turn, as his manager Colonel Tom Parker attempted to mold him into an entertainer who could be appreciated by fans of all ages. This transformation initially didn’t sit too well with Elvis and his band. “That kind of material wasn’t our normal thing,” says Scotty Moore. “A lot of those songs were kind of the same. Those songs like ‘Pocket Full of Rainbows’ weren’t the type of songs Elvis could sink his teeth into.”
As Moore recalls, Presley’s lack of interest in the material was apparent. “He would fool around and stall and do everything he could not to do the songs, although he knew he was going to them, because each one had already been picked for a certain scene and understood the mechanics. But once he started working on them, he would put his heart and soul into them no matter how goofy they were.”
Elvis also kept his sense of humor. Haskell, known for his work with Ricky Nelson, recalls that at the of one session, Elvis and the Colonel decided to play a prank on an eager song-plugger who was hoping to have Elvis record one of his songs. “Since was the end of the day, Elvis and the Colonel agreed that no matter who played for them, they would say it was terrible and walk out of the room and they did, but it was all just a joke.”
G.I. Blues became Elvis’s fifth Number One album in its sixth week on the chart, and enjoyed the longest chart run of any of his chart-toppers since 1957s Loving You, silencing any suspicions that his popularity may have waned during his time in the service.
THE TOP FIVE
Week of December 5, 1960
1. G.I. Blues, Elvis Presley
2. The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart,
Bob Newhart
3. Nice and Easy, Frank Sinatra
4. The Button-Down Mind Strikes Back!,
Bob Newhart
5. String Along, The Kingston Trio