Studio Session for RCA May 15-21, 1971: RCA's Studio B, Nashville
Elvis kept picking up songs on his own, and that made publishing matters trickier. It wasn't that Elvis would never cut a song his publishing companies couldn't get a deal on, those days were long gone, but naturally his organization would make every effort to get a piece of the action when they could. As the session approached Elvis's pop list included two Kris Kristofferson songs, "Help Me Make It Through The Night" and "Sunday Morning Coming Down."
On the third night of the sessions, Elvis got started on what he really wanted to do: cut a version of Kris Kristofferson's "Help Me Make It Through The Night." The song wasn't supposed to be recorded; Freddy already knew that Felton's friend Bob Beckham of Combine Music had no intention of making a deal. Kristofferson's song catalog was one of the hottest of the early '70's, and Elvis's record sales just weren't big enough anymore to persuade a writer of his stature to give up royalties. But Felton wasn't troubled by the situation; thwarted himself from introducing songs to Elvis sessions, he was only too happy to see Beckham profit at Hill & Range's expense. Ever since he started working with Elvis, Felton had been hoping to break the repertoire monopoly levied through Hill & Range by the mighty Colonel. Now, with a song he really wanted to do, Elvis knocked another hole in the wall himself. He took full command of the recording, working out the arrangement both with the players and with the singers that Felton had brought back: the Imperials and a trio of female singers that included Millie Kirkham. In the end they did sixteen takes of the Kristofferson song, homed in on numbers ten, sixteen as the best, and grafted the ending from sixteen onto take eleven to create a master.
Recorded March 17, 1971, first released LSP Elvis Now, 1972
(The Complete Recording Sessions by Ernst Jorgensen) |
