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When I Stop Talking, You'll Know I'm Dead

By ElvisNews.com/ Lex, July 28, 2010 | Book

A couple of weeks ago I received a copy of Jerry Weintraub’s When I Stop Talking, You'll Know I'm Dead. Was it worth reading?

Design

There’s nothing much to say about the design. The printing is okay, and the few photographs included in the book (among them one with Elvis) are on glossy paper.

Content

To be honest I intended to thumb through the book and read just the passages on Elvis. During the first chapter the book caught me, so the original intention was dropped and I found myself reading the whole thing.
The style is fast, the stories are funny. Sometimes you get the feeling the man has a huge ego, but on the other hand… he made it, several times.

Two of the Elvis-related anecdotes are somehow disappointing, since they make you wonder what’s true of the remaining of the book.

The first is about Kui Lee, Weintraub had the rights of one of his songs, recorded by Elvis and after his success by many other greats… Blue Hawaii. As supposedly nearly every Elvis fan knows, Kui Lee’s song is I’ll Remember You and can hardly be called a hit record. That Weintraub makes this mistake after all those years might be understandable, but his ghostwriter should have checked it… Wikipedia is more than enough!

The other is about Weintraub buying scarves and not selling them at the stands during a concert. According to Weintraub Elvis asked the audience to buy the scarves so he could see them wave. I wonder if Elvis would ever do this, even if he wanted to help a friend, but Weintraub named the show by date… New Year’s Eve 1975. Of course I have the CD of this Pontiac show and nowhere I can hear Elvis ask so, he is talking about his suit, but not scarves.

The third part on Elvis is about the phone call Weintraub received when Elvis died.

Conclusion

It was a fun read, certainly worth the time. Unfortunately I have my doubts on the reliability of the book… Well, there is probably a touch of truth and I might be looking for slugs at low tide, as we say in Holland…

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DekeR wrote on July 29, 2010
I read this book this past weekend. I went to the library and just stumbled on it. I didn't know Elvis' name was in it until I thumbed through it and saw the pics. I too wondereed if the things that Jerry talks about were true. I have the pontiac concert also and I went back and heard nothing about scarves being sold.