Massive in the USA but not anywhere else?

[Yanks2014]

Rush lost their mojo in the UK after Moving Pictures! Their electro pop albums werent that big & people lost interest. Dont think they toured much outside of the USA in the 80's & 90's?

Rush never did an "electro pop" album. If they did, maybe that would have been a hit there. Thank goodness they didn't. Rush has had recent tours of Europe, including in 2013, it's not like they never play there or only play in tiny places. Heck, the R30 dvd was recorded in Germany in 2004, looks like a big place to me. And don't forget how huge they are in parts of South America, especially Brazil. Just watch Rush in Rio for proof of that. According to Geddy, they were just too stupid not to tour there sooner. His words, not mine.

[iguana]

^ i saw RUSH in the UK in 1988 and they packed the NEC (birmingham) to the rafters on three consecutive nights. similarly the SECC in glasgow and two nights at wembley arena. it is costly for RUSH to tour overseas because of the sheer production scale that they insist on. tax issues included. besides, even bands that operate well on a financial level will have to look at markets and viability. being able to play as much shows in one US state as in the whole of europe really says something. however, i hear that last year's performance at sweden rock may have altered their thinking about europe; they may have devised a way to play festivals (something that they had refused to do up to then) in order to reach larger audiences. especially in germany there is still a large crowd which has never heard (about) them. dirklerxtpratt: wacken rulez!

apart from that JOURNEY to me is the epitomy of the exclusively-US-band: a huge generations-spanning institution over there, yet has difficulty to sell out medium-sized halls over here. best viewed at festivals, which has increasingly occured in recent years.

[klothos]

Rush lost their mojo in the UK after Moving Pictures! Their electro pop albums werent that big & people lost interest. Dont think they toured much outside of the USA in the 80's & 90's?

Kinda like Queen here in the USA with "Hot Space" and afterward.....unfortunately, it took Freddie passing away for the US to rediscover Queen

[Trane]

Renaissance, too, had a big following in the States (and Germany), but were pretty much ignored in the UK until "Northern Lights."

Rush lost their mojo in the UK after Moving Pictures! Their electro pop albums werent that big & people lost interest. Dont think they toured much outside of the USA in the 80's & 90's?

I think we're losing the thread topic here... we're talking of bands huge in the US and nowhere else....

I'd say that most Country Rock bands (save The Eagles and Dylan(s the Band) and modern country artiste s(89's onwards) haven't made it big outside the US, or north america anyway...

[dgtlman]

Blue Oyster Cult? They did well in Japan, but Europe?

[Trane]

Blue Oyster Cult? They did well in Japan, but Europe?

Very popular as well across the pond...

[revporl]

Grateful Dead is the obvious one. I don't think Europeans can actually imagine how big a band could be... a weeks residence in this football stadium..... a week in that one....

[mozo-pg]

If it's massive in the U.S.A. then there is a 99 percent chance it's massive in Canada.

[Just Eric]

If it's massive in the U.S.A. then there is a 99 percent chance it's massive in Canada.

Canada is just North United States anyway. :-P

[the winter tree]

Slightly off-topic: I once read that Elvis, though hugely popular all over the world, never played shows outside of the USA. It also stated that Colonel Parker, his infamous manager, was an illegal alien and was afraid of being deported.

Any truth to this?

[Jerjo]

I've read that story about Colonel Parker many many times and suspect it is true. Elvis could have made a fortune touring outside the US. The Colonel so mismanaged his client that he was only worth a few million when Elvis died. Priscilla and Vernon eventually threw the Colonel so hard out of the King's estate you could hear him bounce off the sidewalk.

[SteveSly]

I've read that story about Colonel Parker many many times and suspect it is true. Elvis could have made a fortune touring outside the US. The Colonel so mismanaged his client that he was only worth a few million when Elvis died. Priscilla and Vernon eventually threw the Colonel so hard out of the King's estate you could hear him bounce off the sidewalk.

I actually read the book “Elvis What Happened?” last year. It was written by 3 of his “Memphis Mafia” members and came out just before Elvis died. When the book came out the authors were slammed pretty good for painting an unflattering picture of Elvis, but history has shown that the book mostly accurate. Anyway, as you mention, I don’t believe there is any mention in the book of Elvis playing anywhere outside of the U.S. About the furthest away he went was his shows in Hawaii.

[mozo-pg]

Canada is just North United States anyway. :-P

Yeah, but that 1 percent makes me a Canada!!!

[NogbadTheBad]

^ i saw RUSH in the UK in 1988 and they packed the NEC (birmingham) to the rafters on three consecutive nights. similarly the SECC in glasgow and two nights at wembley arena.

I saw Rush on that tour at the SEC and the arena was packed. Great show.

[Guitarplyrjvb]

Grand Funk? I don't remember them being big in Europe!

[Progbear]

I'd say that most Country Rock bands (save The Eagles and Dylan(s the Band) and modern country artiste s(89's onwards) haven't made it big outside the US, or north america anyway...

On the flip side of the coin: Billie Jo Spears. She had a string of hits on the country chart here, but none of them crossed over. For some reason, she was HUGELY popular in the UK.

If it's massive in the U.S.A. then there is a 99 percent chance it's massive in Canada.

And then there's Babe Ruth, who were moderately successful at best in both the US and UK. But they were MASSIVE in Canada (well, as massive as anyone can be in Canada).

Grand Funk? I don't remember them being big in Europe!

They weren't. Possibly the Ur-example of a Heartland band whose music doesn't travel well.

[JJ88]

Grand Funk indeed don't mean a light in the UK.

RE; Elvis. I think Colonel Parker did as good a job as anybody could have in the 50s. But certainly into the 60s, there should have been a change. Elvis in Europe would have been the biggest thing going. Instead it was endless movies and then in the 70s endless US tours and Vegas shows.

[Trane]

Grand Funk? I don't remember them being big in Europe!

They couldn't have toured Continental Europe at the arena level at the peak (I'm prertty sure they had some fans and some airplay in the 70's), but nowadays, they'd still manage to tour the University and small music-hall circuit..

But yeah, not massive for sure...

[PeterG]

Meatloaf? Just a guess, really. Maybe they loved him in Japan.

No way , Meat Loaf was huge in the UK in the late 70s, early 80s - due both to his album and his appearance in RHPS.

[Trane]

No way , Meat Loaf was huge in the UK in the late 70s, early 80s - due both to his album and his appearance in RHPS.

That always blew me away, because his role is hardly the most memorable....and quite tiny, too (5 to 10 minutes, max)

[PeterG]

Indeed, one of the best bits of the film for me.

[Rarebird]

Slightly off-topic: I once read that Elvis, though hugely popular all over the world, never played shows outside of the USA. It also stated that Colonel Parker, his infamous manager, was an illegal alien and was afraid of being deported.

Any truth to this?

I think I have read he was considered to be involved in a crime in the Netherlands, after which he fled to the US.

[GuitarGeek]

Slightly off-topic: I once read that Elvis, though hugely popular all over the world, never played shows outside of the USA. It also stated that Colonel Parker, his infamous manager, was an illegal alien and was afraid of being deported.

Any truth to this?

Corporal Parker (that's the actual military rank he had when he served, he was never a Colonel except in his own mind) was indeed a Dutch immigrant named Andreas Van Kujik (I'm probably spelling that wrong, but I don't feel like checking it right now). But I believe I read he was married to an American girl, and therefore couldn't be deported.

For what it's worth, Elvis did play a couple shows in Canada I think in the 50's, but he never performed outside of North America.

[GuitarGeek]

I've read that story about Colonel Parker many many times and suspect it is true. Elvis could have made a fortune touring outside the US. The Colonel so mismanaged his client that he was only worth a few million when Elvis died. Priscilla and Vernon eventually threw the Colonel so hard out of the King's estate you could hear him bounce off the sidewalk.

Well, it wasn't just only Parker who was to blame for that situation, but also Elvis himself. The guy lived in a giant mansion, kept a private plane on hand, gassed up and ready all times in case he got a snack attack (reportedly, he would fly cross country just to give a particular sandwich or three or four or whatever at a particular restaurant in Colorado or wherever that supposedly made the best), and famously gave up very expensive gifts to near strangers. Ask MC Hammer how that financial plan works.

A bigger issue for me with Parker is how he handled Elvis' career, in particular his acting career. It's been said that when Elvis first did screen tests, it was decided that he was, at the very least, a good actor, someone who was capable of doing a "straight" role, maybe even serious roles, without relying on music. In fact, Elvis did interviews at the time where he said he wasn't too interested in doing musicals or singing on film, he wanted to actually act.

But Parker (or whatever his real name was) knew he could cross promote the films and any type of soundtrack recordings Elvis might do for such a picture, and therefore blocked any and all offers to do get Elvis into doing non-musical films. A few of the pictures are pretty good, but there's a reason why the phrase "Elvis movie" is usually met with snickers. Reportedly, Elvis was offered some good roles, including Midnight Cowboy and a few others in the 60's, but Parker wouldn't let it happen.

(Oh, and as a side note to this, there's the story I once about Parker throwing a shit fit after screening a rough cut of Viva Las Vegas, I think it was, because there were too many closeups of Ann Margaret. I think the line I heard was, "We're making an Elvis movie, not an Ann Margaret movie!", and forced the director to recut the movie. Asshole)

And beyond that, there's the whole treadmill approach that Parker took during Elvis' post-Army career. Elvis probably started doing uppers while he was in the Army, to keep awake during late watch shifts and the like, but having to "look good" on camera at almost all times surely caused him to ramp up his drug use, to include what I once heard described as all manners of "upppers, downers, and in-betweeners". As soon as he'd finish one movie, they'd start on the next one. And remember, he wasn't just "acting" in these pictures, he typically had to recorded several songs for each film, which meant spending time in the recording studio at the same time as he was appearing in nearly every scene of each movie.

And then once Elvis finally decided enough was enough and fled Hollywood, Parker kept him on the road and in the studio pretty steadily right up until he died. They even built a pro grade recording studio at Graceland so that Elvis could record at home, rather than traveling to the studio. And all this while he still had not only an out-of-control drug habit, but also ridiculously gluttonous eating habits.

All of this in the name of capitalism and "free enterprise", I suppose. How far did Parker take it? There was apparently an album released in the early 70's (and named in The 100 Worst Rock N Roll Records Of All Time) called Having Fun Onstage With Elvis. It's an entire LP of Elvis talking between songs. There's no actual music on it, it's basically Elvis as a mostly inept stand up comedian, from what I gather (I've never actually heard it, has it ever been reissued?). Sounds like a dumb idea, but Parker didn't give a frell about what kind of damage he might be doing to his client's career, so long as he got his 10%.

Another Parker story I remember hearing was in the early 80's, some documentarians were making a film about the history of rock n roll. So naturally they want to use some Elvis footage, and Parker (who I gather was still involved with the estate at this stage) quoted some insanely high price for even just a few seconds of footage. The documentarians reportedly said "We're sorry, but this a low budget operation". Parker's response was "I'm sorry, but I'm a high budget guy". What an asshole!


And as another side note, I recall reading that back in the late 90's, a new edit was done of Elvis: That's The Way It Is, which was about 5 minutes shorter but somehow actually contained more songs. They pulled that off by cutting out all of Parker's bullshit hype about Elvis' "return to the concert stage" and replaced it with actual music.

[GuitarGeek]

RE; Elvis. I think Colonel Parker did as good a job as anybody could have in the 50s.

No he didn't. If he had been managing Elvis correctly in the 50's, he'd have let Elvis do some decent movies that revolve around Elvis bursting into song every 10 minutes. He'd also have been smart if he had let Elvis take supporting roles in some pictures, instead of making each film an "Elvis movie". As I said, the frelling frellnik cared about one thing and one thing only, and that was his 10%. He didn't care that he was trading bigger dividends for a lackluster reputation/legacy.