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At the end there was a nuts with a zombie mask, dressed in white perfect Elvis-style, posing for pictures between the few dozen person of the audience, holding the hands of everyone.

Shortly before, that psychiatric case who goes under the name of Dead Elvis and His One Man Grave delighted the few people attending at the Traffic club of Rome with a show at the same time unsettling, coarse and very funny. The audience, very young but qualified, liked it so much, including us: sure, it has been difficult to follow the delirious monologues which interspersed with every scanty and skeletal rockabilly song he played during the three quarter of an hour of the gig time, but maybe to be understood wasn't that important for Elvis. In fact, he's a poet, his jabbered delirium is on the metaphysical side of life, the same as the fellatio he gave to the microphone, the loose mask that always seem to slip from his face and the King's costume, almost perfect but with a pair of shoes which didn't shine enough compared to the rest… the monologues and monster's cries, the little screams and special effects as a z-movie Jon Spencer version, altogether they compose an imaginary world that's absolutely trashy Las Vegas (not by chance, where our hero he's from), although his Myspace talks about an imaginary "Disgraceland".

His mix between lo-fi, r'n'r, garage, blues and country, with posters that also would be perfect for a Cramps show, talk loud about the "cultural" and musical references of the guy: here you got the real rubbish America, the one of white trash and gore, the sick side of stars and stripes, which comes out from the movies of Russ Meyer, Roger Corman, and why not Samuel Fuller, just as from the records of Screamin' Jay Hawkins.

Mr. Dead Elvis shake, in fact, is pure made in Usa, and it's easy to think that if Presley could sing from the grave he would play this kind of music. The same way, if the truck driver from Tupelo would have been in a porn movie, also producing the soundtrack, we're pretty sure that while he would have been enjoying with a big-boob bare assed blonde he would have sang songs like "Monster Under your Bed", "Get Outta My Grave" and "Shake". Dead Elvis is writing alternative and imaginary histories of rock. He's a messiah and a man that you have to follow on at any price. Listen to him and buy his 7"; by doing so, maybe next time his shoes will also have the right brightness.

by filpaz '08