The arrival of autumn is always heralded by the usual signs: stormier more unsettled weather, the colourful turning of the leaves, many-hued autumnal wreaths and the re-emergence of cinnamon-infused treats in the coffee shops. No different to anywhere else but for one key factor which always makes itself first known subtly, almost imperceptibly.
Rachel and I will be out on our weekend walk in Porthcawl, having rounded Newton point and strolled back via Coney beach, or perhaps we’ll be looping back through Lock’s Lane toward the centre of town for a well-deserved coffee when, in mid-conversation, one or both of us will suddenly turn and do a double-take without realising. We’ll scan back over the people we passed until we find what it is that caught our attention until we see it again – a dark quiff, a pair of turned-up jeans perhaps, a bolo tie or even a shirt collar pointed proudly upward. At this point we’ll turn to each other and share a knowing grin as all of these things boil down to one name that will soon sit on every pair of lips in town: Elvis.
Each September, from Memphis to Manchester, Tupelo to Treorchy, they come to celebrate rock n’ roll’s greatest icon. Even now, years on, the whole thing feels as though it should be taking place in America’s southern states, with their sweltering humidity and draped shadows of Spanish moss hanging from the trees, yet the annual festival here, in this little coastal town in Wales, endures. At first a gentle trickle starts to swell the occupancy of nearby Trecco Bay caravan park and to occupy the spaces of the Hi-Tide Inn’s car parking area with camper vans as, from mid-month, this remarkable band of pilgrims arrives in an ever-growing flood bearing the many signs and symbols of their devotion. Confederate flags? Yep. Pink Cadillacs? Yes ma’am. For one glorious weekend everything, and I mean everything, comes in an Elvis-shaped package, all of it devoted to the worship of the one true king.
It continues to stagger me that a man who died nearly half a century ago at the same age I am now while writing this, can inspire such enduring fanatical devotion even here, half a world away from his birthplace. Beatlemania was one thing, but this is on another level entirely. Each tiny aspect of Presley’s life, every forensic detail, has been picked apart, memorised, adopted and even slipped on like a mantle so that a number of the populace can become, if just for a moment, a representation of the man, so it seems that endless pretenders to the throne surround unwitting passer-by on every street corner.
Rather than feeling jaded by the surplus of hair cream and sunglasses though, the town itself actually seems to come alive. The local running clubs on their regular Saturday morning route along the esplanade, are suddenly punctuated by stick-on sideburns, flared polyester jumpsuits and A-line polka dot skirts; the pavements at key points outside the great pavilion and the Hi-Tide inn at the top of Coney Beach are thronged with every conceivable description of humanity through which the casual observer has to press themselves to make a slow advance. Look in at the posters in any pub window as you pass and you will even see how this transformation reverberates through the language used, as any number of given nouns from Elvis’s life, whether it be from his own name or from the places in his life, are adopted as stage monikers by impersonators: Aaron Elvis, Karl Memphis, Danny Graceland, John King – all of them devoted to spending large chunks of their lives walking in someone else’s blue suede shoes.
Of course, such an army of adoring worshippers need their relics, and so these too become a feature of the landscape. In some kind of modern pop culture parody of those Communist posters of Stalin and Mao, the face of the King smiles down benignly from T-shirts, keyrings, even plastic handbags – all the cheap trinkets and memorabilia that visitors snap up as mementoes only to have them break or to lose them months later. However, the sales of such knick-knacks are vital to the local economy, helping to sustain the holiday town’s traders through the long, quiet winter months in the year’s final flourish of bustle and trade before all hunkers down to await the coming of the next holiday season when the beaches fill up once more.
As the weekend progresses, the festival culminates in any number of prestige prizes – best Gospel Elvis, best Vegas Elvis and so on – which, for the highest-level impersonators, represent something of a coup and a potentially significant career boost and, while I imagine the bigger shows to be hugely entertaining events, my preference is to simply amble around and soak it all up because, for all the noise and bustle and fuss, and largely because of my own tongue-in-cheek take on the weekend, I find all of this tremendous fun.
Just wandering the streets at the height of the festival allows the casual observer to dip in and out of proceedings, stopping here and there along the way for a quiet pint of beer or glass of lemonade, every watering hole having its own impersonators swivelling their hips and rattling out the greatest hits while those ranks of devotees, often dressed as GIs or in Hawaiian shirts, croon along with broken voices and excessive gusto, providing almost as much entertainment for the casual observer as the acts themselves.
For all of this, whichever your preferred take on events, what else can anyone say except “Thank you, thank you very much”?
