VIVA LAS VEGAS

Today I am going to talk about one of my favorite FTD's ever, Viva Las Vegas. I still remember the day I came across this. I was out in Memphis for EW and spotted it at one of the shops at Graceland. I have always liked the music from this movie so I went to check it out. I was looking over the tracks and spotted track 25, The Climb. I was having a fit. I had been wishing this would be put on a CD for over ten years! I bought it right then and have wore this CD out ever since.

On July 9, 1963 Elvis would start on recording the music for the movie at Radio Recorders. After the movie was released the four track Viva Las Vegas EP was released, and the soundtrack LP would never see the light of day. It was too bad, because I have always thought the movie contained some pretty good songs.

As for the FTD, it starts out of course with the title song, Viva Las Vegas. Good song, it has grown on me over the years. It is for sure a classic. What'd I Say is a rockin song, but I like it much more when hearing it in the movie so I can watch the dance scene. It is one of the coolest ever. If You Think I Don't Need You is a underrated song in my opinion. I think Elvis sounds pretty good in it. I Need Someone To Lean On is a great song in my opinion. It has a very haunting a bluesy sound and Elvis delivers this perfectly. The Lady Loves Me is my favorite song from the movie. I really dig the way him and Ann sound together. Also another key song on this disc is the song You're The Boss. Another duet with Ann-Margret that was recorded but left out of the film. I think it is every bit as good as The Lady Loves Me. It is a freakin crime this was not put in the movie. The disc also has some other songs that were not included in the movie but were recorded for it. Outtakes are included as with most all FTD's which is awesome. By now you should know I love the outtakes. Some have been heard before but some have not ever been released. As I said before the song The Climb is on here. It was a song sung by the lead singer of The Forte' Four with back up vocals from The Jordanairs and Elvis. The Forte' Four is the group who is singing the song on the stage during this movie. This has the whole song on here instead of the chopped up version from the movie.

All in all this is a great CD. FTD did great as usual with it sounding pretty damn good and have great material on it. This group of songs never got the treatment they deserved back in 64 when this movie was released. I think it they had put out a LP and pushed it, it would have been a hit. I think this is probably one of his top three or four efforts as far as movie music in the 60's.