Mexican Elvis Puts New Twist on The King
Elvis was The King, El Vez is El Rey.
The self-proclaimed “Mexican Elvis,” appearing Friday night at the Casbah in Middletown, shows us what might have happened had the former truck driver from Tupelo, Miss., taken a wrong turn and ended up in Ciudad Juarez rather than Memphis.
He’s got the look: the jet-black pompadour of the pre-Army Elvis and the pencil-thin mascara mustache of a pre-Technicolor Mexican screen idol; a white jumpsuit with a sequined image of Our Lady of Guadalupe--in the green, red, and white of the Mexican flag--on the back.
He’s got the moves: the bumps and the grinds of a young Elvis, the jumps and grins of a young ranchero musician.
He’s got the songs: upwards of 30 Presley classics with a Latino twist, from “You Ain’t Nothing But a Chihuahua” and “In the Barrio” to a mariachi-style arrangement of “Love Me Tender.”
And he’s been getting plenty of attention--from rave write-ups in Rolling Stone and Details to national television appearances on “Hunter” and “2 Hip 4 TV”--since his inaugural performance in August, 1988, outside Graceland, Presley’s former home in Memphis, on the eve of the 11th anniversary of the King’s death.
Three months earlier, El Vez was still going by his real name, Robert Lopez. He had just put together a monthlong Elvis show at the hip (read: Melrose Avenue) La Luz de Jesus pop-art gallery in Los Angeles.
“We featured works by more than 30 artists from all over the United States,” recalled Lopez, who is the gallery’s curator. “We had paintings, furniture, clothing, photos, assemblages, all on Elvis--even merchandising like Elvis towels and Elvis shampoo.
“I had always been an Elvis fan, but it was the show that pushed me over. For the grand opening, I had hired an Elvis impersonator, and, during the sound check, I remember thinking, ‘Anyone can do this.’ ”
Still, it wasn’t until the following August that thoughts turned to action.
“A week before the start of the annual ‘Elvis Presley Tribute Week’ in Memphis, I decided I would go to Graceland and do it,” Lopez said. “But I wanted to be more than just another Elvis impersonator, so I came up with the whole El Vez thing--mixing American and Mexican culture, either singing his songs directly in Spanish or changing them to a Mexican situation.
“I modified three songs on the plane, practiced them in my hotel room, and then made my first appearance as El Vez at the candlelight vigil outside Graceland on the (anniversary) of Elvis’ death.” Presley died Aug. 16, 1977.
“The next night, I entered an Elvis impersonator contest at Bad Bob’s Vapors Club, and, while I didn’t win, a lot of people had come just to hear me, since I had passed out flyers the night before at Graceland.
“Before I came out, the crowd kept yelling, ‘El Vez, El Vez,’ and during each song, at least four women ran up on stage and mobbed me.”
Since his August, 1988, debut in Memphis, El Vez has played more than 50 dates throughout the country, including New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
He’s also gotten extensive media coverage, due in large part to his own promotional savvy: “Everything I’ve learned, promotionally, through the gallery, I’ve turned on myself--calling people up and letting them know something’s out there,” Lopez said.
Initially, Lopez said, he relied solely on tapes for accompaniment. But, before long, he had hired a trio of beehived female backup singers, the El Vettes. Last December, he brought in a backup band as well.
“My full-on goal is to get the band together with a mariachi band plus a salsa combo,” Lopez said. “Then I’d really be able to do all the different arrangements I have in my head.”
El Vez’s Friday night show at the Casbah comes four days after what would have been Presley’s 55th birthday.
It’s also a homecoming of sorts for the “Mexican Elvis.” Now 29, Lopez was born and raised in Chula Vista. San Diego music-scene veterans might remember him as the rhythm guitarist with the Zeros, the pioneering local punk-rock quartet that surfaced in 1976--and in no time at all went from playing South Bay parties and underground nightclubs to headlining at the Whiskey-A-Go-Go in Los Angeles.
“It was a great life style--to be 16 and play the Whiskey, and then drive home so I could make it to school the next morning,” Lopez recalled.
In 1978, Lopez left the Zeros and moved to Los Angeles. For the next three years, he kept active on the L.A. punk scene, playing with a succession of bands--including Catholic Discipline, featured in the 1981 cult film, “Decline of Western Civilization”--before dropping out of music and signing on with the art world.
He spent two years with the Soap Plant, importing Mexican masks; in 1983, he became curator of the La Luz de Jesus gallery.
Since unleashing his El Vez alter ego, Lopez said, he’s turned the bedroom of his modest Echo Park home into something of a shrine for the late King.
He’s got Elvis photos and posters on the walls; a sculpture of Elvis sitting on the throne in rock ‘n’ roll heaven; stacks of magazines and books about Elvis; Elvis decanters, pillows and place mats; a complete collection of Elvis jukebox records; and the obligatory black-velvet painting of Elvis with a tear, purchased some years ago in (where else but) Tijuana.
“Elvis is the epitome of American culture, and El Vez is a combination of American culture and Mexican culture--which has so many different facets, from low-rider to mariachi to folklorico,” Lopez said.
“The world is becoming increasingly cross-cultural, one big melting pot in which cultural ideas are constantly exchanging and mixing and matching. You’ve got world-beat music, Chino-Latino food--and El Vez is just one more example of that.”