Emerson Dameron

Irv Cass, decked out in a sequined suit, fake sideburns and a pair of what my friend Todd calls "dick shades," gets his picture snapped with a saucy blonde, also in dick shades. As the flash bursts, the girl licks her upper lip. "Hope my wife doesn't see that on the 10 o'clock news," says Cass in a drawling baritone, "or I'm dead... I'm 71 years old. Nothin' works anymore."

As the vice president of the Elvis Entertainers Network, Cass is the sort of Elvis impersonator who prefers to be termed an "Elvis tribute artist," so as to distinguish himself from those who play Elvis Presley unprofessionally. Cass is one hell of a karaoke singer, a showman who can goof on his late idol and play to his audience without embarrassing either. Along with a cast of fellow ETAs, he's hamming it up at The Original Mother's on the Gold Coast strip, celebrating what might have been Presley's birthday.

Coors is on a $2.75 special. (A barkeep claims, with a fatalistic grin, that the quarter tips will be "laundry money.") Two young women roam the floor with shots of a new Stoli drink, which tastes like hummingbird food. Their names, according to the MC, are Lisa-Marie and Priscilla. Ticket-holders stand to win a vacation in Graceland, official headquarters of the massive kitsch industry that is our shy Tupelo boy's most obvious legacy.

Over pre-recorded accompaniment (heavy on the midrange), Cass bellows "My Way." Near the bar, a man with a clipboard coaches the MC. He's supposed to "plug the hell out of" something or other. Abby, a tipsy gal in a pageboy hat, steps into the light. "We learned a little lesson today," she says. "In sign-language... Elvis... is this." She wiggles her hips. "(You're The) Devil In Disguise" wafts through the PA.

Men in Elvis garb are wall-to-wall at Mother's. A few of them hop up for the Elvis look-alike contest, with results determined by the classic, corruptible applause-o-meter. "Mitch," an older guy with big sideburns and a black jacket, wins the Bulls tickets. He doesn't look much like Elvis--whether the young Sun Sessions Elvis, the iconic Sullivan Show Elvis or the absurd, pill-gulping Vegas Elvis--at all. If anything, he looks like what Presley, after a dye-job and many rounds of Outward Bound, might have looked like today. He's not wearing dick shades.

"I hate to be obnoxious," says a reveler to yet another Elvis offstage, "but what's your favorite Roy Orbison song?"

In the adjacent room, the Elvis karaoke contest was supposed to commence at 9pm, but hasn't yet. All the action is still next door; it's dead here. "Scott," a Gold Coast everydude, sings along with a tinny version of Counting Crows' 1994 hit "Round Here." "She says she'd like to meet a boy who looks like Elvis," he warbles. No one claps.

(2006-01-10)

Also by Emerson Dameron

Pour Showing
Steve Walker traveled from Manassas, Virginia to pour mixers at T.G.I. Friday's on Erie
(2005-11-15)

Arts Attack
"Jazz is a good metaphor for democracy," says Tom Tresser, lead organizer for the Creative America Project
(2005-05-17)

The Last Howl
"When your lover is still inside you," says a curly-haired woman with an air of placid self-importance, "after he has ejaculated. That's when you do it."
(2005-05-03)

Getting Personal
"First off, I want to thank you for having me," says University of Berkeley professor and rhetorician Marianne Constable, her British accent finely tempered by decades on campus. "Were it not for the second person, all of you here today, there would be no first person, me."
(2005-04-19)

Soul Vegetarian
(2005-03-15)

Moto
(2005-03-01)

Chick unlit
(2003-12-16)

Subterranean sport
(2003-04-15)

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