I remember shooting pool one night at Dunhan's pool hall on E. Main over the river in Downtown Rochester and arguing with my friends whether Elvis had a good voice or not.
At issue was whether they were altering his recorded sound with echo and filters much the way Pat Boone's or Ricky Nelson's voices were often produced.
My position was that guys like Ray Charles, Roy Orbison or Buddy Holley had truer rock tone and that Elvis was just a more cleverly managed pop artist.
I probably should have stayed home to study Latin that night because when Elvis returned from the Army and showed up on TV in his Comeback Night, I forever changed my mind about his vocal abilities.
Elvis Presley - Trying To Get To You - 68 Comeback Special ( HQ ) - if they would have only left him alone
And there were others who should have been left alone.
Ricky Nelson - Hello Mary-Lou - oh the echo; ya reverb the guitars, not the voices
Ricky Nelson - Garden Party - "you can't please everybody, so you have to please yourself"
I'm not quite sure about this but the Brit rock stars didn't seem to have as much problem worrying about pleasing everyone.
Joe Cocker - With A Little Help From My Friends "What would you do if I sang out of tune?"
Brown Sugar-Rolling Stones - some Brits just didn't care
Rolling Stones - Honky Tonk Woman (Hyde Park '69) - in '69 there must have been more of a sense of humor in accepting political in-correctness
Eric Clapton - Have you ever loved a woman - started caring later in life
Life is unfair - how does he play the guitar so effortlessly?
Janis Joplin - Get it while you can - a few in the U.S.A. didn't care either - "...you may not be here tomorrow"
Lost Backstage | This Is Spinal Tap | Classic Clips - but then again, you shouldn't take it all that seriously, anyway
Source:
http://upstatedigitalpost.blogspot.com/2012/08/an-upstate-new-yorkers-music-favs-part.html