Brave New World
ONE of the least successful recordings that Stan Freberg, that ‘acute satirist of "pops" fashions, has made is his
parody of Elvis ("The Pelvis") Presley’s Heartbreak Hotel. For, when the original itself is so outrageously funny, surely any attempt at burlesque must be a work of supererogation. But doubt creeps in. Presley’s recording has been on the Auckland Hit Parade for some time, And certainly only a few of the teen-age record-buyers must have invested in the disc because of its unconscious. humour. The rest must be taking seriously an offering, by this galvanic ex-truck driver, in which a series of incoherent sounds, rather like Zulu speech heard through three thicknesses of woollen blanket, is punctuated with rhythmic groans, out of which I have been able to decipher only the word "lonely." I am sufe it is not. advancing years which make me feel that those who support the Presley style by buying his records are viciously anti-social. The perfect comment on the phenomenon came from Doug. Laurenson on 1YD last week, when, after playing Heartbreak Hotel, he remarked laconically, in a tone of wry resignation, "O brave new world that has such people in it!"
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19560921.2.34.3
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 894, 21 September 1956, Page 18
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199Brave New World New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 894, 21 September 1956, Page 18
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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