“Audie Murphy read the Dirty Harry script and told his eldest son Terry that he couldn’t do it as the role of Scorpio would have blown his image wide open.” …

Since the advent of the twenty-tens I’ve chronicled the King of Rock ’n’ Roll’s often untold relationships with musicians, costars, confidants, and artists subsequently influenced by his groundbreaking oeuvre. “Jeremy’s Elvis Presley Notes” functioned as my column on Examiner for seven years before that Denver-based news website ceased activity. At…

Headaches ensued when Moe Howard, Larry Fine, and Curly Joe DeRita revived their comical Hollywood stunt double sketch from the Depression-era ‘George White’s Scandals’ revue on a live 1961 episode of ‘The Ed Sullivan Show’ — The Three Stooges were on top of the world in the summer of 1939. Moe Howard, younger brother Curly Howard, and pal Larry Fine had been cranking out Columbia two-reelers for five years, and their madcap comedies lifted spirits struggling to make ends meet during the Great Depression. …

Over a decade before Nashville tunesmith Dallas Frazier’s career-defining “Elvira” was granted a glossy country pop makeover courtesy of the Oak Ridge Boys, a victorious post-’68 Comeback Special Elvis Presley sank his teeth into “Wearin’ That Loved on Look,” “True Love Travels on a Gravel Road,” “There Goes My Everything,”…

The ‘I Just Can’t Help Believing’ singer intended a studio reunion with Aretha’s ‘Do Right Woman, Do Right Man’ lyricist Dan Penn if COVID-19 and lung cancer had not intruded — “I’m not necessarily looking for a genre, but I like something with an R&B feeling.” For two and a half years B.J. Thomas had set his sights on the legendary soul-brewing hub of Muscle Shoals in northwestern Alabama. Thomas’ previous album, 2013's The Living Room Sessions, was a distant memory…

It’s doubtful anyone ever daydreamed about Black Keys guitarist Dan Auerbach approaching the late B.J. Thomas to collaborate on a project. But it wasn’t so far-fetched. The above candid verifies the stubbly singer-songwriter gave the “Hooked on a Feeling” blue-eyed soul stylist an exclusive listening party inside the former’s Easy…

‘Was I worthy of being in the TCB Band? After being around Elvis’ house in Palm Springs, I realized it wasn’t necessarily about being as good as Glen D. Hardin. It was about being real. The way I played reminded Elvis of his gospel roots.’ — Tony Brown waited — and waited — for a clinically depressed Elvis Presley at his final, ultimately scrapped recording session. He supplied acoustic piano for Presley’s last sold-out tour. Having ascended to the producer’s seat, Curb Records refused to reimburse him for Wynonna Judd’s quintuple platinum debut. George Strait’s manager…

The 26th edition of the Alapaha Easter Passion Play that perpetually packs the rafters of the Hwy. 82 gym in Alapaha, Ga., debuted in glorious Technicolor one week prior to Easter. The magnum opus of the late Marian Dixon was sidelined by COVID-19 in 2020 and 2021. Entitled “Behold the…

Carnival sensation Johnny Eck’s severely truncated stature did not deter him from being crowned “The Most Remarkable Man Alive” in the 1930s by Ripley’s Believe It or Not! …