Elvis' Gold Records Volume 4

Infobox Album |
Name = Elvis' Gold Records Volume 4
Type = Greatest hits
Artist = Elvis Presley


Released = January 2, 1968
Recorded = March 1961 to June 1966
Genre = Rock and roll
Length = 43:03 (1997 compact disc reissue)
Label = RCA
Producer = Steve Sholes, Felton Jarvis
Reviews =
*Allmusic Rating|4.5|5 [http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:h9fuxqr5ldse link]
Last album = "Clambake"
(1967)
This album = "Elvis' Gold Records Volume 4"
(1968)
Next album = "Speedway"
(1968)

"Elvis' Golden Records Volume 4" is the thirty-first album by Elvis Presley, issued on RCA Records in mono and stereo, LPM/LSP 3921, in January 1968, recorded at RCA Studio B in Nashville, Tennessee, and at Radio Recorders in Hollywood. It is a compilation of hit singles released between 1961 and 1967. It peaked at #33 on the Billboard Top Pop Albums chart.

Content

Golden Records 4 comprises five Top 40 A-sides along with seven b-sides, five of which also made the Top 40. "Love Letters" had been written for the 1945 movie of the same name, and Presley's cover of the Ray Charles classic "What'd I Say," although performed in the film, does not appear on the "Viva Las Vegas" EP. Three b-sides, "Lonely Man," "A Mess of Blues," and "Just Tell Her Jim Said Hello" were old enough to have been included on "Golden Records Volume 3", when Presley's sales were stronger. Another b-side, "Ain't That Loving You Baby," had been recorded at the furlough session of June 10, 1958, set up by RCA to augment their stock of Presley product while their star was in the army.

When the album was released in early 1968, Presley's sales had cooled off since his heyday. The first three volumes of the Golden Records series covered two to three years of singles releases, but there was a five-year gap between this and the previous volume. There would be no fifth volume during Elvis's lifetime; it was released posthumously in 1984 surveying singles released from 1969 to 1977.

The July 15, 1997 reissue added six tracks and altered the running order. His soundtrack LPs continued to go Top Ten through 1965, performing better than stand-alone singles, hence the abundance of songs associated with Presley's movies added to the reissue. "Rock-A-Hula Baby" dated from the 1961 soundtrack to "Blue Hawaii", pulled off that album as the flip to accompany "Can't Help Falling In Love" as a single. Three tracks were the advance singles for their respective soundtracks: "Bossa Nova Baby" for "Fun in Acapulco"; "Kissin' Cousins" for its album; and the famous "Return to Sender," released a month before "Girls! Girls! Girls!". The flipside to "What'd I Say," "Viva Las Vegas" by the team of Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman, would prove a more durable Elvis recording, receiving myriad cover versions including those by the Dead Kennedys, Bruce Springsteen, and Nine Inch Nails. The gospel song "Crying in the Chapel" had been recorded during the sessions for "His Hand in Mine", this five year-old track going to #3 and added to the "How Great Thou Art" album two years later in 1967.

By 1968, the practice of releasing LPs in mono was being discontinued; as a result, very few mono copies of "Volume 4" were pressed. As a result, according to Jerry Osborne's "Presleyana: The Elvis Presley Record, CD, and Memorabilia Price Guide," mono pressings of this record are considered collector's items. [http://www.jerryosborne.com/elvis.htm]

Recordings were made at RCA Studio B in Nashville, Tennessee, and at RCA Studios and Radio Recorders in Hollywood; original recordings produced by Steve Sholes, Joseph Lilley, Chet Atkins, Urban Thielmann, George Stoll, and Felton Jarvis.

Collective Personnel

* Elvis Presley – vocal, guitar
* Scotty Moore – guitar
* Hank Garland - guitar, bass
* Barney Kessell - guitar
* Chet Atkins - guitar
* Billy Strange - guitar
* Glen Campbell - guitar
* Tiny Timbrell - guitar
* Chip Young - guitar
* Harold Bradley - guitar
* Grady Martin - guitar
* Pete Drake - steel guitar
* Floyd Cramer - piano, organ
* Dudley Brooks - piano
* David Briggs - piano
* Artie Cane - piano
* Calvin Jackson - organ
* Henry Slaughter - organ
* Bob Moore - bass
* Ray Siegel - bass
* Meyer Rubin - bass
* D.J. Fontana - drums
* Buddy Harman – drums, tympani
* Hal Blaine - drums
* Frank Carlson - drums
* Boots Randolph - saxophone
* Rufus Long - saxophone
* Steve Douglas - saxophone
* The Jordanaires - backing vocals
* Millie Kirkham - backing vocals
* Dolores Edgin - backing vocals
* June Page - backing vocals

Track listing

"Chart positions taken from the Billboard singles chart

ide One