To Elvis Presley’s greatest fan, the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll was immortal. ‘Elvis didn’t die,’ his manager Colonel Tom Parker insisted to a reporter in the days after Presley passed. ‘The body did. I talked with him this morning, and he told me to carry on.’
‘Colonel’, as Elvis called him (and as Parker always referred to himself), refused to accept that music’s biggest star was extinguished.
‘It’s just like when he was in Germany – nothing has changed,’ Colonel claimed, weeks after Presley died from a drug-induced heart attack in the bathroom of his mansion, Graceland, in Memphis, Tennessee, in August 1977.
But a new book, drawing on Colonel’s numerous letters to Elvis and exclusive interviews with his widow, Loanne Parker, reveals just how close the manager came to parting ways with his superstar client in the final years of their partnership.
Author Peter Guralnick, one of the most respected rock historians, earned the trust of Colonel before he died in 1995, and has spent decades piecing together the hidden story for The Colonel and the King.
To many Elvis fans, Parker was a greedy and manipulative man who took half of everything the star earned. Everything that went wrong for the King was his manager’s fault – from the US Army service that cut short his early career in 1958, to the catalog of sub-standard movies during the 1960s.
‘Elvis didn’t die,’ Colonel Tom Parker insisted. ‘The body did. I talked with him this morning, and he told me to carry on’
The manager came close to parting ways with his superstar client in the final years of their partnership
Colonel compared Elvis’s death to his period serving in the Army in Germany (photographed together on his discharge in March 1960)
But as this book proves, Colonel steered Elvis away from self-destruction on numerous occasions.
He understood the singer like no one else, and knew exactly how much to let him indulge his wild whims, before pulling him back from the brink.
Tom Parker knew all about going to the brink himself. An addiction to gambling, every bit as crippling as the singer’s addiction to prescription drugs, drove Colonel to sell the rights to Presley’s back catalog of music for a fraction of its true value in 1973.
At his lowest point, he even considered selling the contract that bound them together.
At the same time, Elvis was putting out feelers for a new manager. And during the early morning hours of Wednesday September 5, 1973, just after Elvis’s closing show in Las Vegas, they both fired each other.
The bust-up was triggered by an onstage rant two days earlier, with Elvis issuing a foul-mouthed broadside against the Hilton chain, its chief executive Barron Hilton, and the whole Hilton family – furious that his favorite waiter had been dismissed.
In an X-rated version of Love Me Tender, he sang: ‘Adios, you motherf***er, bye bye, Papa, too / To hell with the whole Hilton Hotel, and screw the showroom, too.’
Colonel and Loanne were sitting in their usual booth. ‘He turned to me,’ Loanne recalled, ‘and he said, “I’ve never been so embarrassed in my life. I wish I could just crawl under this table right now.”‘
In the same breath, he added: ‘Who does he think he is? How am I ever going to face the Hilton people? He can’t get away with this.’
Elvis and Colonel on the set of Loving You – Parker was blamed for the catalog of sub-standard movies Elvis made during the 1960s
As the show ended, Colonel marched backstage to confront Elvis.
Their shouting match, unprecedented in the 17 years since Parker became the singer’s manager, could be heard through the closed door.
Storming back to his suite, Colonel dictated a letter steaming with barely contained anger – aware that Elvis had gone straight on to a party that was likely to last well past dawn.
‘This letter is only intended in the event you aren’t up when I come up to see you this evening,’ it began.
‘You took it on yourself, on the stage, in front of 2,000 people, to embarrass the executives of the Hilton Corporation with your remarks. Your outburst was a shocking revelation to some of the people…
‘Your speech regarding the hotel firing this fellow as he was a good man, etc was completely out of your class – as the hotel does not ask us to hire or fire someone.
‘You stated you “thought Hilton people were bigger than that.” In the past, [they have] knocked thousands of dollars off your bills for the food, beverages and suite over the years, and as much as $20,000 extra on this trip.
‘I can’t find anything small-time about them.’
Colonel and Elvis had a huge bust-up, triggered by an onstage rant two days earlier by Elvis in Las Vegas
Back in his hotel suite, Colonel fired off a letter to Elvis steaming with barely contained anger
The letter ended with a savage swipe against the paid hangers-on and yes-men who surrounded Elvis.
‘Perhaps you feel I am sticking my nose in something that is not my business,’ Colonel wrote.
‘You should know I am only being honest with you, and fulfilling my responsibility as a friend and manager, to keep you informed of the reaction – but most of the friends around you are reluctant to pass it on, as they are employees and I am not.’
It is probable that Elvis never read the letter. He rarely replied to the long missives, often packed with financial detail, that were brought to him by aides and messengers.
Since Parker went to the trouble of keeping carbon copies of them all, it’s clear these letters were chiefly for his own benefit, a written record should a dispute arise in the future.
But whether or not he knew how angry Colonel was about his behavior, Elvis was still nursing his own grievance.
Just before 1.00am on the Wednesday, Colonel was woken by a summons from the King. He could either get up and come to the Imperial Suite of the Las Vegas Hilton for a showdown, or Elvis would come up to his room in person.
When Parker arrived at the suite, Elvis’s father Vernon Presley was also there. By the time the meeting was over, the Presleys had demanded his resignation – and he had given it.
Returning to his room, Colonel sat up till 7.30am with Loanne, putting the terms of his severance in writing.
He demanded a flat fee of five million dollars, with half payable within 30 days, and offered to ‘extend their advice and information, whatever needed, for one week in the event whoever takes over the new management wishes to take advantage of this offer, at no charge, to make this turnover of management as convenient as possible to the artist’.
In a second, personal letter to Elvis, he seethed at being summoned at such an hour: ‘I had waited up until about 9:30pm for word whether you were up. This, of course, is okay with me as it is your privilege to sleep as long as you wish.
‘I could see no reason for a pressure meeting at 1.00am. You knew I was in bed.
‘I have no ill feelings – but I am also not a puppet on a string.’
The bust-up was inevitable. The letters show tensions had been increasing since Elvis’s Las Vegas comeback in July 1969 – the beginning of his infamous ‘Fat Elvis’ period.
In 1970, Colonel wrote to urge the singer to remember the ‘TCB – Take Care of Business’ motto that epitomized their shared attitude to working hard and making money.
‘Remember your slogan TCB,’ the manager warned. ‘It only works if you use it.’
He worried that Elvis, raddled by booze and drugs, was more emotionally volatile than ever. Public displays of friendship and affection were unwelcome.
‘You and I,’ Colonel wrote, ‘always tell each other by seeing each other on the stage and from the floor by the stage how we feel, so there is no need for hugging each other.’
But by the beginning of that series of shows at the Hilton in 1973, Elvis was in the worst shape of his life.
In a bid to lose 25lb, or nearly two stone, he went on a crash diet that included a daily injection of urine from a pregnant woman.
He lost the weight – but within six weeks put it all back on again.
The decline continued. On July 28, 1976, after a feeble performance in Hartford, Connecticut, Colonel went backstage to chide to Elvis. Later, in his hotel room, he told Loanne that the star had been too groggy to respond.
‘What can I do?’ he pleaded. ‘The real Elvis is sharp and clever, but the person I saw tonight didn’t even recognize me.
‘No one knows how much I miss the real Elvis. If only I knew how to bring him back. I miss my friend so much.’
Pictured: Elvis Presley in concert in 1977, the same year he died
He began to sob uncontrollably, and nothing Loanne could do would comfort him.
Just over a year later, Elvis was dead. Colonel was in Portland, Maine, when he got the news in a 4.00am call from Joe Esposito, one of Elvis’s ‘Memphis Mafia’ of confidantes and hangers-on.
The manager immediately set about cancelling concerts and organizing ticket refunds. ‘He was calm, too calm,’ Loanne told Guralnick.
‘He was talking and moving automatically, as though he had thrown up a wall between his inner self and the outer world.’
For the funeral, Colonel insisted he and Loanne must dress as they always did. ‘Elvis wouldn’t recognize me without my cap,’ he said.
And he delivered a stinging pep-talk to his staff, as they flew down to Memphis: ‘I don’t want to see anyone crying or making a scene when we get there.
‘There will be no emotional outbursts of any kind. We will honor Elvis by controlling our emotions and remaining dignified.
‘We are still working for Elvis, and we want him to be proud of us. That means being strong and taking care of business even under these difficult circumstances.
‘I mean it – NO TEARS.’
He held himself to this rule rigidly. For the rest of his life, he would tell Loanne: ‘It’s still Elvis and the Colonel.
‘It will always be Elvis and the Colonel. I’ll never stop trying to keep his name alive.’
The Colonel And The King, by Peter Guralnick, is published by Little, Brown
