In 1956, Smiley Lewis scored a minor hit – #11 on the R&B charts – with a song written by Dave Bartholomew and Dave King called “One Night”. By 1957, Elvis Presley was a huge star. He had already had big hits with “Heartbreak Hotel”, “Hound Dog”, “Don’t Be Cruel”, “Love Me Tender”, “All Shook Up”, and 50 million people – over 80% of the viewing audience – had watched him on the Ed Sullivan Show. In January, 1957, he recorded a “One Night”. According Peter Guralnick, writing in the liner notes of The King of Rock and Roll: The Complete 50’s Masters:
‘One Night,’ by way of contrast [with ‘Teddy Bear’, which he recorded at the same session], … clearly stemmed from no other source but Elvis Presley’s passion for the music, and it was delivered with undiminished, and unexpurgated, force. Upon his return to the studio a month later to complete various album and single tracks, he re-cut ‘One Night’ with cleaned-up, more teen-oriented lyrics in a performance which, despite its lyrical compromise, actually matches the intensity of the original.
At the end of 1957, Elvis was drafted, so RCA began releasing previously recorded tracks, and they released “One Night” October, 1958. It hit #4 in the US and #1 in the UK. He played it during his 1968 comeback special, and it was re-released in the UK in 2005 and again hit #1. I believe his original recording (the one with the original lyrics) was first released only on The Complete 50’s Masters boxed set in 1992, under the title “One Night of Sin.” (It’s also included on the remastered version of his third album, Loving You.)
I haven’t been able to find out who – if anyone – suggested the change in lyrics. But it’s obvious that someone – Elvis, his manager “Colonel” Parker, or executives at RCA – thought the original would be too controversial. I assume that this judgment was probably right. But this is crazy – although the new lyrics are arguably more “teen-oriented” it’s hard to see how they are “cleaned-up”. And I can’t shake the feeling that this little episode shows something deep about the ignorance and perversity of censorship.
The key lyric change – and I imagine the first one that someone came up with – was from “One night with you / Is what I’m now paying for” to “One night with you / Is what I’m now praying for.” So, instead of looking back in anguish and regret at the sin he committed, the singer now looks forward to it with hope and expectation. The other changes follow from this. And make no mistake, in the original there is no wink and nudge suggesting it was actually lots of fun. Elvis sings it like the fires of hell are burning his … well, use your imagination. The released version may appeal more to teens, but that’s only because it is a pure fantasy of seduction – with no price to be paid. If your goal was to encourage teens to avoid sex, it seems to me that the released version is infinitely more dangerous. I obviously wouldn’t make a very good censor.
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Original “One Night” aka “One Night of Sin” |
Released version “One Night” |
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One night of sin, Is what I’m now paying for The things I did and I saw Would make the earth stand still Don’t call my name Always lived, very quiet life One night of sin, yeah Always lived, very quiet life One night of sin |
One night with you Is what I’m now praying for The things that we two could plan Would make my dreams come true Just call my name Always lived, very quiet life One night with you Always lived, very quiet life One night with you |
{ 8 comments }
Gene O'Grady 02.21.07 at 5:37 pm
I couldn’t agree more, but I’m all too familiar with the mentality that would consider the second version cleaned-up — rather like when preparing the scripture readings for my father’s funeral I was asked to exclude any of the Pauline passages saying that Jesus had freed us from our sins on the grounds that it would imply that the deceased had sinned (as he himself would only have been too aware!)
However, what I’m really curious about is whether anyone else finds the old “my love’s too strong to hide” blatantly indecent, or if I’m just still suffering from an unredeemed adolescent mentality after all these years.
Russell Arben Fox 02.21.07 at 5:50 pm
This is fascinating, Jon; thanks for writing it up. And, like Gene, I completely agree with what you’re saying. It is an odd but undeniable reality that when most people choose to or are obliged to take on censorious responsibilities, the first instinct is to shy away from a subject entirely, even if the original treatment of said subject actually makes a worthier message than what is come up with in its place. And really, I shouldn’t say “most people”: I can look at how my wife and I sometimes try to manage things in accordance with what we think our oldest daughter (now ten years old) is ready to see or read, and I realize that sometimes we do the exact same thing.
benton 02.21.07 at 5:52 pm
Could it be the idea of actual infidelity that was the problem rather than the idea of sex? In this case I suspect that Elvis singing about cheating on you — which is how I take it — might not have been the message they wanted.
JR 02.21.07 at 6:11 pm
It was always okay to talk about sex if you did it so that the very young wouldn’t quite understand. In 1925 Eddie Cantor sang, “If you knew Susie like I know Susie,” and no one over 18 had to guess how he knew Susie. There’s a whole pop lyrics vocabulary of ways to say things without actually saying them. “One night with you” passed muster because to a 15-year old in 1957 it could have meant a date. But a “night of sin” leaves no room for ambiguity, so it isn’t in the phrase book.
Rasselas 02.21.07 at 9:44 pm
Countdown to apposite Greil Marcus citation starting now…
cs 02.22.07 at 1:01 am
Perhaps, yet I don’t think it is clear what the motivation is for changing the lyrics. “cleaned-up” is Guralnick’s word, not Elvis’, and may be merely descriptive, not implying causation. The obvious (to me, anyway) alternative interpretation is that Elvis loved to sing songs that teased his audience, especially live – just loved it (the list is long, but I’d give the gong to the awesome “Just Pretend”). It is obviously more difficult for the girls to imagine Elvis was singing about having been with them last night, yet they could easily join, for the moment anyhow, in the prospective fantasy. The way Elvis performs the song tends to support this interpretation.
dave heasman 02.22.07 at 9:47 am
I was 12 when it came out. jr is right, in my case anyway, no thought of filth. Lyrics then didn’t mean anything anyway, it was the overall sound that counted. It was and is a magnificent record, one to play to anyone who disparages Elvis. And I didn’t notice the homoerotic lyrics of the b-side either – “I Got Stung by a sweet honey-bee..”
Rob 02.23.07 at 11:11 pm
Perhaps the changes to the lyrics weren’t to make it less dirty but to make it less religious, more secular, at a time when Christianity was perhpas less ecumenical. It’s “cleaned up” also in the sense that anticipation is more marketable than repentance.
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