1) Roustabout; 2) Little Egypt; 3) Poison Ivy League;
4) Hard Knocks; 5) Itʼs A Wonderful World; 6) Big Love Big Heartache; 7) One Track
Heart; 8) Itʼs Carnival Time; 9) Carny Town; 10) Thereʼs A Brand New Day On The
Horizon; 11) Wheels On My Heels.
General verdict: Back to being as irrelevant for the times
as a travelinʼ carnival show might be — after all, La Strada this movie is not,
nor are these composers anywhere near to Nino Rota.
Well, unfortunately Joan Freeman is no Ann-Margret,
and Roustabout is a much less
inspiring movie title than Viva Las Vegas
— implying that the spark had gone out as quickly as it was ignited. Predictably,
the soundtrack plunges us back to stale formula, with maybe just one tiny
exception: compared to the pre-Viva Las Vegas
soundtracks, this one is a bit more rockʼnʼrollish, with a larger proportion of
upbeat, fast-tempo numbers, as if the Kingʼs corporate backers had finally woken
up to the idea that rockʼnʼroll was finally back with a vengeance, and that it
made sense to entice young audiences with material that their parents would find
questionable.
Not that it makes any big difference. The
corporate songwriters remain the exact same people, and for Roustabout, you donʼt even have an Otis
Blackwell or a Doc Pomus anywhere in sight. The closest thing to an honorable
classic that you find here is Leiber and Stollerʼs ʽLittle Egyptʼ, a three-year
old joke tune originally recorded by the Coasters and specifically adapted for
the movie (which, being a carnival movie, even had a character named ʽLittle Egyptʼ).
Alas, since it is a humorous number rather than a rambunctious one, Elvisʼ
deadpan delivery is far less efficient than the Coastersʼ original — Boots Randolphʼs
sax is more of a hero on this tune than the King himself. At least they are
still willing to let Leiber and Stoller into the picture.
Other than that, the title track is a speedy
country-western romp with a moderately catchy chorus and a tiny whiff of
genuine melancholy — but after that one and ʽLittle Egyptʼ, the album quickly
becomes yet another bunch of hasty and uninspired re-writes, e.g. ʽHard Knocksʼ
(ʽLetʼs Have A Partyʼ), ʽCarny Townʼ (ʽAll Shook Upʼ), and ʽThereʼs A Brand New
Day On The Horizonʼ (okay, I donʼt remember exactly, but Iʼm pretty sure thereʼs
some old gospel song upon which this one is based). Curiously, there is a
fairly vicious anti-elite university rant (ʽPoison Ivy Leagueʼ) dressed up as
some Appalachian work song, but this, too, is more of a novelty thing than a
serious musical and/or social statement.
Overall, what can you really expect, I guess,
from a set of songs written around the theme of an old-fashioned rustic
carnival (clearly, the hottest thing
in late ʼ64)? Could you imagine that a song called ʽItʼs Carnival Timeʼ could
be a highlight of Elvis Presleyʼs career, no matter who wrote it and under
which circumstances? It is actually quite amazing that the album still hit #1
on the charts, but this was the last straw: by 1965, American attention was
finally whisked away by all sorts of new attractions, and a carnival theme
setting for Elvis was definitely as far removed from the excitement of these
attractions as possible.
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