Review of concert at Eugene, OR, Hult Center/Silva Concert Hall on 1999-05-27
Review of Elvis at the Hult Center -- Eugene OR May 27 1999
Last night I had the pleasure of attending what must have been one of the stranger EC concerts in recent history. The Hult Center, small in itself, didn't seem even half filled -- my guess is that there were perhaps five or six hundred people at most. At any rate, when our man arrived on stage, with one word it was painfully obvious that his voice was absolutely shot to hell -- I mean almost unusably shot to hell -- and he croaked his way through Temptation, Accidents Will Happen, and Talking in the Dark before realizing he was just not going to make it.
At that point, he explained that he had caught some sort of virus, "the type of thing they have in the northwest", and that he was only going to sing the songs he felt able. To punctuate this, he crumpled up the setlist and threw it over his shoulder. We were then treated to a rather odd selectionof songs, heavy on the old punkers and seemingly light on the new ballads. I can't remember the exact setlist, but I do recall a painful attempt at Party Girl (where he didn't even try to sing the "time" refrain at the end) and a rollocking Waiting For the End of the World. I have never in all my career as an EC fan heard his voice sound this rough -- he simply couldn't hit ANY of the notes and as a result jumbled the songs up melodically, trying to keep them within his limited reach. He left the stage after 38 minutes (!) before returning for his mandatory two encores, one of which included an incredibly long God's Comic in which he did a mocking imitation of Elvis Presley and made fun of three women in sequined dresses standing by the front of the stage. Elvis seemed in good spirits as the show degenerated into an informal jam, with the small crowd gathered by the stage at EC's invitation and Steve Nieve doing his best to purposely hit every wrong note while Elvis looks on laughing. After doing Beyond Belief (oddly) and Pump It Up (sloppily) EC left the stage, after an hour and forty minutes -- a bit short by this tour's standards, I think.
It was worth it, though, to catch a glimpse of the unrehearsed and unpolished side of EC -- it was like having him play for you in your living room.
respectfully submitted
by zach maggio