‘The King’ Elvis Presley, 40 years after his death, remains an icon and a cautionary tale
He turned music on its head and has been a major influence on everyone from The Beatles to Bruno Mars, but Elvis also played a big part in his own downfall – even if it was just by being a ‘naive country boy’
There is only one Elvis Presley, but there are also many Elvis Presleys.
That’s not an existential riddle about the hip-swivelling, lip-curling singer who irrevocably changed the sound and look of contemporary music and, with it, popular culture in the 1950s and beyond. Nor is it a reference to the estimated 35,000 Elvis impersonators still active around the world today, 40 years after the intensely charismatic singer hailed as “The King” permanently left the building on August 16, 1977.
Jet owned by Elvis Presley to be sold at auction
Elvis died from a drug-fuelled heart attack in Memphis in his famed Graceland mansion, which still draws 600,000 visitors a year (second only to the White House in the US). Only 42, Elvis reportedly weighed almost 160 kilograms at the time of his death – 85 kilograms more than when he was 32. He tested positive in his autopsy for 10 different prescription medications, including 10 times his prescribed amount of codeine.
Yet, while he died far too young, Elvis had seemingly lived several lifetimes in just over four decades.
He was a sometimes scorned high school student, an impoverished Memphis truck driver, an aspiring singer, a wealthy pop music superstar, a sergeant in the US Army, a smouldering sex symbol, a movie idol, a middle-of-the-road Las Vegas showroom staple, a bloated, drug-addled victim of fame, and more.