Dewey and Elvis: The Life and Times of a Rock 'n' Roll Deejay

Epilogue

Epilogue Coming to terms with Dewey Phillips is not easy. He was neither monster nor angel, neither devil nor saint, but an unpretentious, kindhearted, self-absorbed, and, ultimately, self-destructive soul who wanted nothing more than to spread the gospel of the new rhythm and blues sound to a captivated audience. That he certainly did. For better or worse the music he helped so much to change has become a key part of the way people now live. A great part of that change is reflected in the huge transformation that took place in popular culture during the last half of the twentieth century. But even accounting for the racial progress that may have been helped as a result of the music, any objective appraisal of this period cries out for an awareness that there are at least some mixed feelings about how much lives changed at the millennium. Even those who proudly participated in protest demonstrations fighting for civil rights must recognize the unintended changes that took place completely apart from the rewards of racial advancement. The most forceful fan of rock ’n’ roll becomes nostalgic when recalling the nonracial aspects of the years immediately preceding the upheaval that the music helped bring about. The music of an era—old or new—does that. While we can hope that the racial transformation is permanent, in the long eye of history rock ’n’ roll may be only one more cycle in shifting musical tastes. During my many hours of interviews with Dorothy Phillips she always remained quietly tranquil, speaking softly, seldom animated, and rarely displaying deep-felt emotion when recalling the early days with Daddy-O-Dewey. The one, misty-eyed exception was a recollection of a quiet Memphis evening in the backyard of Sam Phillips’s home during 17.231-234_Cant.indd฀฀฀231 2/8/05฀฀฀1:59:24฀PM Epilogue 232 the Easter weekend of 1955. Elvis had gained popularity, and the whole gang—Dewey, Sam, Elvis, and everyone’s families—was sitting around Sam’s swimming pool relaxing and enjoying life. The fierce Memphis summer lay ahead, and the cool, early evening breeze by the side of the pool provided a refreshing comfort before the heat arrived. The year 1955—the heady days of Elvis’s early superstardom—was the period when he and Dewey seemed to be almost joined at the hip. Presley had not yet been crowned the king of rock ’n’ roll, but already the evangelical efforts of his court jester had helped spread his fame from the confines of his provincial beginnings to a much larger MidSouth audience. Basking in the crew-cut complacency of the peace and prosperity promised by the Eisenhower years, the country—after several dismal decades of depression and world war—was bubbling over with wide-eyed optimism. It was difficult to find anyone not convinced that the best was yet to come. It would be years before his claim to the title of “the King” was uncontested, but already Elvis was at least a prince, no doubt aware that the most exciting part of his early fame was in the pursuit itself. All was indeed right with the world. On this particular evening in Sam’s backyard, everyone, including Elvis, seemed to be in a particularly pensive mood. Whenever the crowd got together—especially Dewey and Sam—there was always “lots of hollering and carrying on,” but this night seemed different. The evening had started late, and after a while “things just seemed to quiet down and everybody got kind of comfortable in their favorite chairs.” Before anyone realized it, the first light of an Easter sunrise began to break. At that point Elvis, without provocation or request, ambled over to his guitar and started strumming slowly. “Just as the sun was coming up, he began singing ‘Take My Hand, Precious Lord,’” Dot says as she stares outward, apparently seeing the picture now as vividly as then. “And I think it was the most beautiful moment I can remember in my whole life.” As Dot relates the incident, it is difficult to picture that frozen image without thinking of how the story ended. It is hard to conjure up the instant without seeing it from this side of the sadness and sorrow that accompanied the stratospheric rise and fall of both Elvis Presley and Dewey Phillips. It is impossible to isolate that single mental picture without thinking about the awful declines that lay ahead...