Elvis Presley: His Hand In Mine

ELVIS PRESLEY: HIS HAND IN MINE (1960)

1) His Hand In Mine; 2) Iʼm Gonna Walk Dem Golden Stairs; 3) In My Fatherʼs House; 4) Milky White Way; 5) Known Only To Him; 6) I Believe In The Man In The Sky; 7) Joshua Fit The Battle; 8) He Knows Just What I Need; 9) Swing Down Sweet Chariot; 10) Mansion Over The Hilltop; 11) If We Never Meet Again; 12) Working On The Building.

General verdict: Gospel Elvis, but not too far removed from Crooner Elvis.

To tell the truth, you do not have to be so much of a gospel fan to dig this album as you have to be an early Sixtiesʼ Elvis fan. Just like the several gospel songs that he already did in the previous decade, or those Christmas tunes, this material is not being treated in some special, distinctive manner by the artist simply because it focuses on God instead of girls. There are no huge church choirs, no grand organs, no feeling of sacred solemnity — most of these songs could feature ʽLove Me Tenderʼ-like lyrics and youʼd never suspect they might have been about anything else. For all his alleged spirituality and fear of the Creator, this guy sure had an intimate relationship with his Maker, sometimes bordering on lewdness.

Many people find this a good thing, and take pleasure in the quiet and solitary nature of these recordings — sometimes going as far as declaring that His Hand In Mine might be one of the greatest gospel albums of all time. Of this latter exaggeration I would say that it is similar to calling the Byrdsʼ Sweetheart Of The Rodeo one of the greatest country albums of all time: both of these efforts are decent and display a solid grasp of the essence of the genre, but still, leave the major country accolades for major country players and the major gospel accolades for major gospel singers, like Sister Rosetta Tharpe or Mahalia Jackson. The real problem, however, is that my tolerance for Elvisʼ ballads is limited, and since Elvisʼ gospel is not stylistically different from his ballads, I just spend most of the time hoping somebody re-write the lyrics to ʽJailhouse Rockʼ. "Everybody on the angelsʼ block, dance to Judgement Day rock" or something.

Seriously now, from the most basic and formal point of view this album is more immaculate than the Conception — perfectly sung, perfectly arranged, perfectly produced. Already on the title track you can hear Elvis doing his very best as a singer, covering nearly his entire vocal range from lowest to highest and conveying that feel like crazy. But when the tempo speeds up and The Jordanaires begin goading the King into a bit of spiritual ecstasy, things start feeling... well, not entirely right: ʽIʼm Gonna Walk Dem Golden Stairsʼ is boppy and fun, yet it feels like Elvis is toeing the line, keeping his voice to an excited, but restrained hush where the music actually demands going all out on the listener. The same pattern will later repeat on the equally fun and equally hush-hush ʽJoshua Fit The Battleʼ, ʽSwing Down Sweet Chariotʼ, and ʽWorking On The Buildingʼ.

Of course, there is nothing openly criminal about this restrained approach, but in 1960, the year when rockʼnʼroll was seemingly subdued and extinguished, it might have seemed that even the flame of the gospel performance was being put out in that manner — itʼs like, weʼd want to raise Hell for the Lord, sure, but itʼs late and we really donʼt want to wake up the kids, so keep the noise level down, please. In retrospect, such context should no longer be hurting the overall effect from the recording, and the very idea of an «intimate» gospel session as opposed to more generic choir action should be appealing by definition, but...

I cannot specifically blame any individual songs — it is more of a general feeling of slightness that prevents me from joining in the general praise. But to be perfectly fair, the slightness and slickness of His Hand In Mine is on a whole other level than the slightness of G.I. Blues, and I would definitely take gospel Elvis over ʽWooden Heartʼ Elvis any day... though, come to think of it, both these songs and ʽWooden Heartʼ sound as if their target audience was not so much the grown-up original fans of the King as their younger brothers and sisters — most of these tracks are so cuddly, theyʼd work better in the context of a middle school Christmas show than in actual church.

Strangely enough, the public was not that impressed: the album only reached #13 on the charts, a far cry from the endless top spots of his Fiftiesʼ LPs (even Christmas Album had hit #1, for Godʼs sake!) — a clear sign that «gospel Elvis» wasnʼt really going to cut it neither for younger followers (whose disappointment would be predictable) nor for the parents. You could argue that the move was a decidedly anti-commercial one in the first place, but at this point in history Elvis was not really allowed to make anti-commercial moves. The albumʼs reputation on the whole seems to have significantly increased in retrospect, as part of the whole movement to re-assess and re-appraise Elvisʼ pop years; but the important thing, perhaps, is not to let us get carried away by insinuating that «gospel-infused pop», which this album really is, somehow contains more depth and spirituality than non-gospel-infused pop. Personally, I get a far stronger spiritual kick from the likes of ʽGood Luck Charmʼ than ʽI Believe In The Man In The Skyʼ.