Today’s DOTD - Drink Of The Day - is a Velvet Elvis Cocktail inspired by Elvis Presley’s birthday!
His full name may have been Elvis Aaron Presley, but really he needs only one name: Elvis. That’s enough for everyone to know exactly who you’re talking about. Born in Tupelo, Mississippi on January 8, 1935, Elvis and his family moved to Memphis when he was 13 years old.
Elvis began his music career on October 3, 1945, when he was 10, with his first public performance - a singing contest at the Mississippi–Alabama Fair & Dairy Show. Presley kept singing & learned to play guitar throughout his school years, preferring to play hillbilly & rockabilly music, like the tunes he’d hear on the radio.
While Elvis couldn’t read a lick of music, he played by ear - and his ears were hearing all the music that would later make up his legendary sound. From country & western, to Southern gospel, to African American spiritual hymns, and most importantly, rhythm & blues. By the time Presley graduated high school in 1953, he’d learn to combine all of those styles into his own sound.
The professional part of his career began in 1954 at Sun Records with producer Sam Phillips, who was looking to bring the sound of African-American music to a wider - meaning white - audience, but because of the racism of the times, he needed the perfect young white man to do it. Elvis was definitely the man for that job.
The next two years would be a whirlwind, as Phillips at first, and then disc jockey/promoter Bob Neal helped Elvis’ audience grow, through recordings on 45s, and radio appearances on shows like Louisiana Hayride, the primary competition to the Grand Ol’ Opry. Elvis also began touring regionally, through Texas, Arkansas, and through the South.
By 1955, Elvis music & style had caught the attention of Colonel Tom Parker, a former carnival worker who’d become one of the best promotors in music. That year, Parker became his manager, and soon after, scored Elvis a recording contract with RCA Victor records. By 1956, Elvis had released his first single on his new label, Heartbreak Hotel. That first single quickly became the number one hit in the U.S. and RCA sold 10 million copies within the first year.
With chart topping records and record-busting television appearances, Presley rapidly became the new face & sound of a new kind of music they called “rock and roll.” Of course, there were hurdles. Ed Sullivan didn’t consider Elvis suitable until his own show got outranked by Elvis’ appearance on the Steve Allen Show. Sullivan ended up booking Elvis for three appearances for the then-unprecedented sum of $50,000 - what would be roughly $600,000 in 2026 dollars. Elvis first appearance on Sullivan’s’ show on Sept. 9, 1956 became legendary, even though Sullivan himself was not there, because he’d been in a car accident.
While audiences loved Elvis, critics liked to insult him. Gen Gross of the New York Daily News wrote that popular music “has reached its lowest depths in the ‘grunt and groin’ antics of one Elvis Presley.” He called the show “…suggestive and vulgar, tinged with the kind of animalism that should be confined to dives and bordellos.”
Still, the crowds loved him, so Elvis kept knocking out hit singles and albums. Billboard declared that Elvis Presley placed more songs in the top 100 than any other artist since records began being charted. By the end of 1956, Elvis first full year at RCA Victor, he accounted for more than 50% of the record label’s music sales.
Presley’s film career also began in 1956, with first motion picture, Love Me Tender. Released on November 21, Elvis wasn’t supposed to get top billing. The film wasn’t even supposed to be called that, but the studio changed the name of the picture to capitalize on Elvis’ latest number one hit.
The world was Elvis’ oyster – 1957 was a banner year for him. From hits like “Jailhouse Rock,” “All Shook Up”, and “(Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear”, to his second and third films, to his third and fourth straight number-one albums - oh, and he bought a little 18-room house in Memphis that year too - Graceland.
Then he got a draft notice. Elvis entered the US Army in late 1958 and after training, was stationed in Germany, where he’d pick up karate, one of his favorite passions, along with being introduced to amphetamines.
As one would expect, Elvis’ commercial success had its rewards. Between film shoots and recording sessions, Elvis purchased the Graceland mansion a few miles from downtown Memphis for the then-princely sum of $102,500. The house originally had an open patio at the rear, just behind the kitchen. But following his return from Army duty in 1960 he set out on some improvement projects.
By 1965 he had created a 14 x 40 foot fully enclosed room where the patio had been. We’d call it a man cave now. Elvis called it “the den.” It hardly matters – anyone would call it a breathtakingly kitschy ode to tropical environs and poor taste. It eventually earned the moniker Jungle Room after his death.
The room was hard to beat. Green shag carpet. Thick drapes making it eternally dark. With furniture from Sears, he had a waterfall built inside and furnished it with plastic plants, rainbow lights and multiple TVs. It was a place where Elvis could, well, be Elvis. It was his hangout where he ate breakfast and recorded some of his last works.
It’s also where he hung out with a group of friends, known as the “Memphis Mafia,” and was able to behave as he chose. Elvis had a dislike for the singing idol Robert Goulet, but one day Goulet appeared on the TV. Remote controls were not so well developed at the time, so Elvis simply picked up his pistol and shot the screen.
This wasn’t the only TV Elvis shot, but it’s the only one now on display at Graceland. And it was hardly a problem for him, as the money he made for RCA made them happy to provide a nearly endless stream of new TVs.
As Elvis aged, his weight and his drug use became a problem, ending with his death from polypharmacy, the use of too many types of drugs at the same time, on August 16, 1977.
While his ending may not have been as grand as his beginning, without Elvis, we may not have had rock n’ roll. So today, on what would have been his 91st birthday, we salute Elvis with today’s Drink Of The Day, the Velvet Elvis Cocktail.
Ingredients
Here’s what you’re going to need for this drink:
