From rocking celebrations to hard-earned reflections, this week’s episode of Deeper Roots turns its attention to the man they called “The King.” We’ve got two hours with songs about Elvis Presley — musical tributes, name-drops, eulogies, and love letters from artists across the past century. Some are playful, some reverent, and some wrestle with the contradictions that made Elvis both larger than life and painfully human. Together, they form a kind of American scrapbook around a figure who never really left the cultural conversation. From the wide-eyed devotion of artists like George Jones, Janis Martin, and Bobby Bare, to later songs reflecting on the strange and tragic arc that carried Elvis from hip-shaking revolutionary to Vegas spectacle, from the Nixon White House photo-op to a lonely and frightening decline, these recordings trace the many ways America mythologized him. Whether delivered as tribute, cautionary tale, obituary, or heartfelt fan letter, the songs on this morning’s show reveal just how deeply Elvis worked his way into the DNA of rock ’n’ roll mythology — and into the imagination of generations that followed.
| No. | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Artist | Title | Album | Year | Start At |
| 2 | Elvis Presley | Elvis [Excerpt From Interview Held Sept.22 1958] | Elvis: A Legendary Performer Vol. 1 | 1958 | 00:00 |
| 3 | Pat Smith | Elvis Elvis | Gals of the Big D Jamboree | 1958 | 00:25 |
| 4 | Billy Boyle | My Baby's Crazy 'Bout Elvis | The Greatest Novelty Songs | 1962 | 05:31 |
| 5 | Nervous Norvus | Elvis You're A G.I. Now | Stone Age Woo | 1958 | 08:03 |
| 6 | Bobby Bare | All American Boy | All American Boy – CD 1 | 1963 | 10:14 |
| 7 | The Hunt Sisters | Elvis Is Rocking Again | Dirty Boogie:The Fortune Records Story | 1960 | 13:09 |
| 8 | Janis Martin | My Boy Elvis | Loud Fast & Out of Control: The Wild Sounds of the '50s [Box] Disc 1 | 1999 | 14:40 |
| 9 | George Jones | The King Is Gone (So Are You) | One Woman Man | 1989 | 23:33 |
| 10 | Steve Goodman | Elvis Imitators | Artistic Hair | 1983 | 26:47 |
| 11 | Syd Straw & The Del Lords | Listening To Elvis | 200 Cadillacs | 2003 | 29:36 |
| 12 | Horace Logan | Announcements (& Elvis Has Left the Building) | At the Louisiana Hayride Tonight (Disc 7) | 2017 | 33:19 |
| 13 | Gillian Welch | Elvis Presley Blues | Artist's Choice: Emmylou Harris | 0 | 33:52 |
| 14 | Dan Reeder | Clean Elvis | Oh Boy! A Sampler | 0 | 43:56 |
| 15 | Cris Cuddy | Dear Elvis | Dear Elvis | 2015 | 46:31 |
| 16 | Greg Brown | Jesus and Elvis | Poet Game | 1994 | 49:49 |
| 17 | John Stewart | I Want To Be Elvis | Havana | 2003 | 53:17 |
| 18 | Loudon Wainwright III | Happy Birthday Elvis | Career Moves | 1993 | 56:39 |
| 19 | Leon Russell | Elvis and Marilyn | Americana | 1978 | 1:00:37 |
| 20 | Sonny Burgess | Bigger Than Elvis | Sonny Burgess | 1996 | 1:09:05 |
| 21 | Stray Cats | Elvis on Velvet | Runaway Boys: A Retrospective '81-'92 | 1997 | 1:11:43 |
| 22 | Mojo Nixon | Elvis Is Everywhere | Bo-Day-Shus!!! | 1986 | 1:15:59 |
| 23 | Derailers | I Love Me Some Elvis | Genuine | 2003 | 1:20:50 |
| 24 | Hayes Carll | Jesus and Elvis | What It Is | 2019 | 1:27:07 |
| 25 | The Tractors | The Elvis Thing | Farmers in a Changing World | 1998 | 1:30:25 |
| 26 | Alannah Myles | Black Velvet | The Atlantic Story [UK] Disc 2 | 0 | 1:35:42 |
| 27 | Kacey Musgraves | Velvet Elvis | Golden Hour | 2018 | 1:39:38 |
| 28 | Marc Cohn | Walking in Memphis | VH1 Classic: The Cuts | 2003 | 1:42:07 |
| 29 | Paul Simon | Graceland | Graceland | 1986 | 1:46:11 |
| 30 | Cowboy Junkies | Blue Moon Revisited (Song for Elvis) | The Trinity Session | 1988 | 1:54:27 |