Elvis Presley: Kissin' Cousins

ELVIS PRESLEY: KISSINʼ COUSINS (1964)

1) Kissinʼ Cousins; 2) Smokey Mountain Boy; 3) Thereʼs Gold In The Mountains; 4) One Boy, Two Little Girls; 5) Catchinʼ On Fast; 6) Tender Feeling; 7) Anyone; 8) Barefoot Ballad; 9) Once Is Enough; 10) Kissinʼ Cousins; 11) Echoes Of Love; 12) Long Lonely Highway.

General verdict: The main problem about making a «hillbilly Elvis» album for Elvis is that Elvis was never really a hillbilly in the first place. Or maybe the main problem is just that the songs suck.

The Elvis camp response to the Beatles and British Invasion in general was this oh so thrilling movie about the US government leasing mountaintop land for use as a missile base, with Elvis facing a not-so-incestuous choice between Batgirl and Dodge Rebellion Girl. I have not seen the movie, but seems like he did choose Batgirl in the end, which is probably the best thing about the whole experience (the worst thing is that Elvis actually gets to play two roles — both himself and his cousin, for which the Colonel allegedly demanded two full salaries for his boy). Both the movie and the soundtrack are often regarded as one of the lowest points in Elvisʼ Sixties period, and while there is definitely quite a bit of strong competition for that, it is indeed hard to find any signs of redemption here.

Essentially, Elvisʼ role in this experience is to play the stereotypical nonchalant hillbilly with the stereotypical hillbilly attraction to oneʼs close relatives. The only way that you can really succeed at this is if you play the whole thing as much tongue-in-cheek as possible, but Elvis never had that great a sense of humor or irony, and there lies the rub — even if many, if not most, of these songs were probably written as corny joke tunes, Elvis delivers them with his deadpan face on, as if we were really supposed to emote over the fact that "this one boy loves two little girls", or that he is "just a Smokey mountain boy come back to the hills I love", or, most importantly, that "weʼre all cousins, thatʼs what I believe, because weʼre children of Adam and Eve" (!!).

Worse still, the soundtrack once again lacks even a single unquestionably great tune, an anchor such as ʽReturn To Senderʼ or ʽBossa Nova Babyʼ that could at least superficially steady and redeem the surrounding wreck. The title track, coming from Fred Wiseʼs workshop, was chosen as the lead single, but it is a rather poorly masked variation on Little Richardʼs ʽThe Girl Canʼt Help Itʼ, with a bunch of other rockabilly clichés thrown in for good measure, and although the band is notably tight and professional, there is not an ounce of genuine rockʼnʼroll energy either in the playing or in Elvisʼ singing — the man is very clearly bored out of his skull.

All the tracks are more or less evenly divided into generic ballads, generic rewrites of older pop-rock classic (ʽOnce Is Enoughʼ = an inferior ʽStuck On Youʼ), and hicky hillbilly stuff like ʽSmokey Mountain Boyʼ and ʽBarefoot Balladʼ; youʼd think Elvisʼ Nashville team would feel right at home with this material, but Elvis himself clearly does not, and there is no believing him when he pleads to "give me a honk-tonk fiddle with a guitar in the middle", because why should anybody give anybody something that he absolutely does not need?

In the end, the only song here that may be worth remembering is the final track, ʽLong Lonely Highwayʼ, which actually had nothing to do with the movie but was tacked on to fill up the LP, selected from the May 1963 sessions for an aborted LP. A Pomus-Shuman creation, it is nothing special melodically, just a fast ʽGot My Mojo Workinʼ-style blues-rocker, but at least it gives Elvis an excuse to flash his mumbled-bass-to-uplifting-baritone dynamics, providing this totally uninspiring record with a mildly inspiring conclusion. Other than that, well... the only thing you really have to keep in mind is that this album was released twelve days after ʽCanʼt Buy Me Loveʼ. Really, that is the only thing you have to keep in mind.