CHAPTER 13
MARTY LACKER: I didn’t see any of the drug taking back then. I have more innocent memories of those years. I remember coming back from the movies or the skating rink at daylight and eating watermelon in what is now the Meditation Garden. Every once in a while, we’d have a watermelon fight, where we’d throw hunks of the stuff at each other.
One night, I said, “Hey, I’m going up to Union City [Tennessee] to live for a while.” I’d landed a job at WTUC Radio. Elvis said, “Good luck. I hope you’ll come back when I’m home.”
LAMAR FIKE: Because I lived at Graceland, I saw a lot more than some of the guys. Gladys was drinking, but she was also taking amphetamines. Elvis got his first uppers from his mother, in ’57. Gladys had a tremendous problem with the change of life. It was squirreling her out. Her doctor had given her these things, and Elvis would swipe them out of the bottle and never let her know. She couldn’t figure out how she was taking so many of them, and she would have to go get her prescription refilled. This was Dexedrine. And sometimes Desbutals.
Well, Elvis and I got hold of that damn bottle, and I took two or three of them. I said, “Boy, I want to stay on this elevator for a while!” We used to get so damn ripped, our teeth would chatter. I got to the point where I couldn’t even swallow one because it would stick in my throat.
Elvis just loved the shit out of pills. He loved what they did. Any pills. He would open a box of Bayer aspirin and chew the whole damn bottle. He thought that pills were the answer for everything. If anybody believed that medicine would shape the world, it was Elvis.
BILLY SMITH: I never heard anyone in the family say Gladys had a difficult time with menopause. The only thing I remember about her acting strange was once when she had a nightmare at Graceland. She got up, and went to the kitchen, and sat down in there for the longest time. She talked to the maid, Alberta [Holman], about it.
About the pills, I think Elvis’s biggest introduction to drugs was during the army days. But I’m sure Aunt Gladys, at times, probably said, “If you got a headache, why don’t you take this? This is a pain pill.”
LAMAR FIKE: He slacked off on the Dexedrine for a while. But only for a while. Because Elvis had such an addictive personality that he would just lock onto these things. When this first started, we would be driving home from a movie, and he’d take a different route. I’d say, “Where are we going?” And he’d say, “We’re going to Florida” and just drive straight on out the highway. Finally, he’d stop at a service station and I’d call Gladys and tell her. But you never knew what he’d do when he got hopped up. And, of course, the amphetamines didn’t help his nightmares any.
MARTY LACKER: Some of the guys used to sleep in the bedroom with him because of his nightmares. You just couldn’t leave him alone.
LAMAR FIKE: I had to go in there and sleep with him on a regular basis, and I went through a couple of those nightmares. They scared me to death. He hit me in the jaw one night and never knew it, and I said, “That’s enough of this shit.” So I put a sleeping bag down at the end of the bed and slept down there.
One night, I woke up and found him standing at the end of his bed. God, the bed was enormous. It had to be nine feet square. And he had this cover, and he was slinging it around and yelling, “Get away from me! Everybody, just get away!” So I got on my hands and knees and crawled around and flipped the light on and he woke up. Usually, when this happened and he came out of it, he’d just crack up laughing.
When girls stayed over, I would have to stay up and take them home afterwards. Elvis wouldn’t go to bed ’til I got back. When I got home, I would either get in bed with him or in my sleeping bag. I didn’t think anything about it because, hell, my cousin and I used to sleep together all the time. That’s what you do in the South. Elvis rarely had a good night’s sleep. That’s why it took’so much shit [drugs] to knock him out.
BILLY SMITH: When he was sleepwalking, you couldn’t just full-fledged shake him or run and scream, “Hey, wake up. You’re having a nightmare.” Because he’d punch you out. The best thing to do was to just call his name and barely touch him. Mama told me once that when the Presleys lived in Lauderdale Courts, Elvis got to sleepwalking and went outside in his underwear. This boy and girl that he knew had just come home from a date. The girl saw him and went over and woke him up. He was so embarrassed because he was practically naked, you know. So Gladys started taking the knobs off the doors so he couldn’t get out and roam around at night.
LAMAR FIKE: Somebody said to me the other day, “This must have been a tortured guy.” Well, Elvis was the kind of guy who made mountains out of molehills. He’d kill a fly with a sledgehammer.
One reason, I guess, is by ’57, he was already feeling like his life was not his own. He wanted to be a big star, but he hadn’t counted on a lot of things. One time, back then even, he said to me, “Lamar, I’m a robot. Somebody just tell me what to do and move me around.”
When he went on stage was the only time he could control who he was. But already by ’57, Elvis would lose his temper and blow up. In the time I was with him, he fired me probably 100 times and I quit probably 150 times.
In ’57, ’58, we got into violent arguments. He’d ask me how I liked something he was doing, and I’d say, “Well . . . ” But from the beginning, we had that sort of relationship. And when Elvis would run you off, or you’d quit, you’d get out there in the world and find it was pretty rough. But usually, after he fired you, he’d change his mind. Gladys would always tell me, “Lamar, anything Elvis says is from the mouth out. It’s not from the heart.”
BILLY SMITH: One thing that really hurt Elvis was when Scotty and Bill left. It was right after Jailhouse Rock, in ’57, just before Elvis’s second Tupelo Fair Show. He played a benefit for the Elvis Presley Youth Recreation Center, and he was expecting them to do it with him.
LAMAR FIKE: Bill Black talked Scotty into quitting. But [drummer] D.J. [Fontana], who joined him during the “Hayride” days, wouldn’t do it. He was the only one who stayed. He always called Elvis “Chief.” He said, “Chief, I’m still here.”
I remember this because the scene was really terrific. We were at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Los Angeles. I was sitting in the living room, and Elvis walked in and said, “I think Scotty and Bill are fixin’ to quit.” I said, “Well, you better call Colonel.”
Elvis got on the phone, and he said, “Colonel, Scotty, and Bill are quitting. What am I going to do?” And Colonel said, “You’re going to get another band. That’s what you’re going to do.”
Elvis hung up and said, “What am I going to do without them?” I said, “You’re going to do a show. They’re just musicians.” Elvis thought it was the end of the world.
It came down in an interesting way. Elvis and I got in the car, and we drove over to the old Knickerbocker Hotel. That’s where Scotty and Bill and D.J. were staying. We drove by, and there was Bill in the lobby of the hotel, walking back and forth, just preaching to Scotty and D.J. Elvis turned around and looked at me, and he said, “What do you think?” I said, “It looks to me like Bill’s running the shooting match.”
We were going to Hawaii in November, and we knew they didn’t want to go. Bill didn’t want to fly. So we said we’d go over on [the ship] the Matsonia.
But that wasn’t the real reason. They didn’t think they were getting enough money. Because while Elvis was making this fabulous fortune, they were getting a salary of $100 a week at home and $200 a week on the road, plus a $1,000 Christmas bonus. They wanted recognition, and they wanted a percentage of the profits, same as they got when they first started out. And Colonel said, “Fuck you. You’re not going to get it. That’s the way it is, boys, cut-and-dried.”
MARTY LACKER: They were also tired of sitting around. They’d done this little five-day tour of the Pacific Northwest, but that was the first time they’d worked with Elvis since March or April, and they wanted to be paid while they weren’t on the road.
LAMAR FIKE: I don’t blame Scotty, Bill, and D.J. for trying, but they could be replaced. You could have put them in the Seattle Fair and they wouldn’t have drawn twenty people. Musicians have a tendency to forget that.
It finally came down on September 21. Bill called and said it was over. Elvis sat down with me and he said, “It’s happened.” He was lower than a snake’s belly. The Colonel said, “That’s no problem.” And he put that Nashville group together for the Tupelo Fair—Floyd Cramer on piano, Hank “Sugarfoot” Garland on guitar, and Bob Moore on bass.
They blew everybody away. Elvis turned around to me after the fair with this big grin on his face. He said, “Shit, I didn’t need Scotty and Bill anyway, did I?” But Scotty never completely went away. He was around, off and on, ’til ’69.
BILLY SMITH: When Elvis first started, Gladys and Vernon were—God, I don’t think you could describe the feeling. It was like “Here’s a son that made it.” And they relayed that to most of the family. My daddy was different, but a lot of the relatives were resentful. When Elvis started making those appearances on TV, like on The Milton Berle Show, we realized he was big-time. And there was a lot of envy.
I remember in ’57, a lot of the family came around to Graceland. I was just damn proud to be there. I never asked for anything. I never thought about it. First of all, there wasn’t a lot of need because Elvis bought a lot of stuff for Bobby and me when we first moved there.
When it got close to Christmas, Elvis asked his daddy to get $15,000 in one-thousand-dollar bills. He carried them around with him for days. On Christmas Eve, he laid all fifteen bills across his bed. Then he invited some of the family up one by one. When they got up there, and they saw that money, he’d go to the bathroom, or find some excuse to leave the room, to see if they’d take any. And somebody did. Years later, Elvis told me he knew exactly who it was, his cousin Billy Mann. Elvis never said a word about it. He let Billy think he’d pulled a good one on him, but Elvis never had any use for him after that.
MARTY LACKER: Elvis told everybody, “Don’t even let him come anywhere near the gate.” And Billy Mann was the one who ended up taking that picture of Elvis in the casket for the National Enquirer. So that tells you even more about those people.
BILLY SMITH: When it came time for Elvis to invite me up, I saw those bills and said, “Gosh, Elvis, you shouldn’t leave that laying around. Anybody could come in here and take it.”
I was just a teenager. And I’m not saying I never stole nothing. I did, as a kid. But I got my ass whipped for it, and I knew the difference.
From then on, Elvis always kept me right with him and not just at little stuff like the skating rink. I mean, day in and day out. And there were other little tests. You had to prove yourself to him.
That same Christmas, he had several members of the family on both sides working for him. And he give ’em all a thousand dollars. Back then, that was a hell of a lot of money. Some of ’em up and quit working, and at the time Elvis needed twenty-four-hour security the most. It made it a hardship on those who stayed. My daddy worked around the clock ’til Elvis could get somebody to replace him. And then, after the money was blown, the others come back and begged for their jobs. Elvis took ’em back, but he didn’t feel the same.
One time, Vester kept asking Vernon for a raise, and Vernon wouldn’t give him one. So he came up and asked Elvis. There were two or three of us in the den, and Elvis was ticked off because Vernon had told him Vester had threatened to quit. So Vester came into the den, and he said, “Ever since you’ve been here, Elvis, I’ve been down there buckin’ that gate.” And Elvis said. “I’ll tell you what, Uncle Vester. If you don’t like it, you can buck that fuckin’ gate in another direction.” And Vester shut up and left. He never did quit. He didn’t have any other place to go.
Christmas of ’57 is the most memorable one because it was my first Christmas at Graceland. If I remember right, Elvis give me and my brother $200 for Christmas. Maybe it was $200 in all, a hundred-dollar bill for each of us. I was used to getting a dollar-a-week allowance, so it was like having Santa Claus for a first cousin.
That whole Christmas was like a kid’s dream. Elvis had a white nylon tree with red Christmas balls on the white carpet. And he’d put the red velvet drapes up. And he had holly hanging around, and berries. Aunt Gladys always had all kinds of good things to eat during the holidays. A couple of Christmases before, Bobby and me and some of the other cousins went to the Goodfellows dinner for underprivileged kids. I’d damn near choked to death on turkey, trying to get finished so I could go back for seconds.
I remember that Elvis asked Bobby and me to go with him to get presents for his mama and daddy. We went to Whitehaven Plaza, this new little shopping center. That must have been for some smaller gifts. Because I was thinking he give his mama a mink coat that year, but that might have been Christmas of ’56. And it seems like he give his daddy a diamond ring.
Sometime around there, Elvis got his draft notice. He knew it was coming because Colonel talked him into going to get his physical long before the draft board called him up. Maybe he thought it made Elvis look real patriotic. Anyway, when the draft notice come, Colonel said to ignore it, that he’d get him a deferment until March, when King Creole was finished. Elvis was real happy, you know, although later on, I think he might have thought Colonel tricked him into enlisting.
Elvis gave Colonel an $1,800 Isetta sports car that Christmas. And he was in such a good mood that he let photographers come up and take pictures of him with his draft notice under the Christmas tree.
That night, he set off almost $2,000 worth of fireworks behind Graceland. Me and Bobby helped him. That was probably the best Christmas I ever had.