Elvis 1971 - Don't Think Twice, It's All Right
1970 had been a great year for Elvis. Once again he had enjoyed rave
reviews for his performances in Las Vegas, and his second Vegas season of the
year in August 1970 had been filmed for the MGM documentary feature “Elvis –
That’s The Way It Is”. The resulting album, (a mixture of live recordings,
and songs recorded in Nashville during June 1970) was released in the US in
November 1970, and reached No. 21 on the charts. Elvis had also scored three top
twenty single hits on the US chart during the year, with his February 1970
recording of “The Wonder Of You” reaching the highest position of No. 9, and
a further three singles released during the same year made the US top 40.
1971 started on an equally high note when on January 16, at the Municipal Auditorium in Memphis, the Jaycees Awards named Elvis one of the Ten Outstanding Young Men Of The Nation. His acceptance speech included the lines, “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”. With yet another year of playing Vegas, recording and touring in front of him, his words couldn’t have been more appropriate.
RCA still had enough strong material in their vaults from Elvis’ 1970
sessions for the first album release of 1971 – “I’m 10,000 Years Old –
Elvis Country”. The album was released in January 1971 and was hailed by Peter
Guralnick in his review
of the album for Rolling Stone magazine as, “ a record
that gives us some of the very finest music since he first recorded for Sun
almost seventeen years ago”. Most critics agreed and the album reached the No.
12 position on the US charts.
RCA and the Colonel were keen for Elvis to record more new material, so
that they could continue to release new Presley recordings throughout the year,
and capitalise on his continued success. It
was hoped that following the productive sessions at both American Studios in
Memphis during January & February 1969, and RCA’s Studio B in Nashville
during June 1970, they could record enough material during the spring/summer of
1971 to release three albums, and a number of single releases. The Colonel was
keen for Elvis to record new Christmas and gospel material, as a it had been
five years since his last gospel release “How Great Thou Art”, and a budget
priced re-issue of his 1957 Christmas album had sold very well at the end of
1970.
The first session took place on March 15, with Elvis focusing on the folk songs of Ewan Macoll and Gordon Lightfoot, and only one gospel selection “Amazing Grace” was recorded. As “Amazing Grace” had been a recent hit for folk singer Judy Collins, it’s also likely that the folk influence was another factor in Elvis choosing this song for the session, even though the completed master was by no means out of place when released on the 1972 gospel album “He Touched Me”. Elvis had been introduced to the songs of both Bob Dylan and Gordon Lightfoot, on recordings by Peter, Paul, and Mary, and Odetta, and had made home recordings of this material during the mid sixties. He had also recorded a fine version of Bob Dylan’s “Tomorrow Is A Long Time” during the May 1966 Nashville sessions that produced the “How Great Thou Art” album.
