January 27: Elvis Presley released Heartbreak Hotel in 1956

Heartbreak Hotel is written by Thomas Durden and Mae Axton in 1955. It was written after Durden read about a suicide in the Miami Herald. A man, who had jumped out the window,  had destroyed his identity papers and left a note saying: “I walk a lonely street.”

It was written very quickly, varying sources states that it was done from a few hours down to 22 minutes.

From Wikipedia:

“Axton and Durden give different accounts of how the song was written. Durden’s account is that he had already written the song and performed it with his band the Swing Billys before he presented it to Axton. Axton’s account is that Durden had only penned a few lines of the song, and asked her to help him finish it.  She says that the report of the suicide “stunned” her, and she told Durden, “Everybody in the world has someone who cares. Let’s put a Heartbreak Hotel at the end of this lonely street”. They were interrupted by the arrival of Glen Reeves, a local performer who had previously worked with Axton. The duo asked Reeves to help with the song, but after hearing the title he remarked that it was “the silliest thing I’ve ever heard”, and left them to finish it themselves.The song was written within an hour, and Durden recorded it onto Axton’s tape recorder.”

The song was offered to several artists before Elvis, many of them declined and described the song as strange and morbid . Durden and Axton offered Presley a third of the writers’ credits if he would make it a single, Elvis agreed. Presley recorded the song Jan. 10, 1956. It was his second song recorded on his new label RCA, following “I Got A Woman”. It was released 27th of January 1956.

Heartbreak Hotel, Milton Berle Show:

From the british newspaper The Independent:

“Heartbreak Hotel” started with Elvis, accompanied by a walking bass from Bill Black, reminiscent of Willie Dixon’s work with Muddy Waters. Scotty Moore played assertive and Cramer’s piano pattered like rain. Elvis broke down in each verse, effectively method acting like James Dean. The song was nailed on take seven, but sadly, most of the tapes were wiped. The influence of Johnnie Ray’s “Cry” is self-evident and the song could be a parody. Presley’s dirt-seeking biographer, Albert Goldman, opined, “‘Heartbreak Hotel’, which is an extravagant and highly exaggerated account of the blues, was more a psychodrama than a musical performance. As such, however, it was an extraordinary novelty and it moved rock music into another imaginative space.”

“Heartbreak Hotel” became Elvis’ first gold record, staying the top of the pop charts for seven weeks in the spring of 1956.

Keith Richards on Heartbreak Hotel

In his book “Life” Keith Richard says:

Good records just get better with age. But the one that really turned me on, like an explosion one night, listening to Radio Luxembourg on my little radio when I was supposed to be in bed and asleep, was ‘Heartbreak Hotel’. That was the stunner. I’d never heard it before, or anything like it. I’d never heard of Elvis before. It was almost as if I’d been waiting for it to happen. When I woke up the next day I was a different guy.

He has also said that after hearing Elvis for the first time it was as if the world went from black and white to vivid Technicolor.

Heartbreak Hotel, is it rock’n roll?

“Heartbreak Hotel” is not like the songs Elvis had recorded before, it has a twangy almost jazzy feel. It is a blues record, not a rockabilly song. It’s blues in melody as well as lyrically. It is sung in a special style. Elvis shouts out the verse and whispers the chorus through the whole song. And, it sounds like he means what he’s singing, it’s a truly empathic performance. It is a magnificent tragedy and he never recorded anything else remotely like it: nothing so spooky, moody or weird.

Billboard Magazine described it as “a strong blues item wrapped up in his usual powerful style and a great beat”.