Release and Reception
"Heartbreak Hotel" was released as a single on January 27, 1956 with B-side "I Was the One", a song that was also recorded during Presley's RCA debut sessions. Billboard magazine praised it as "a strong blues item wrapped up in his usual powerful style and a great beat". However, "Heartbreak Hotel" was less-than-warmly received by the British music press. The New Musical Express wrote that, "If you appreciate good singing, I don't suppose you'll manage to hear this disc all through".
Presley made his national television debut on January 28, appearing on CBS's Stage Show, starring Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey. As Stage Show's ratings had been slipping, producer Jack Philbin agreed to have Presley on because he was relatively cheap at $1,250; after looking at a photograph of the singer, Philbin exclaimed, "He's a guitar playing Marlon Brando!" Despite the single having been released only a day before to coincide with Presley's national television debut, the Dorsey brothers did not allow Presley to perform it on their show because it didn't work well in rehearsals. For his second appearance, on February 4, Presley was again aware that he could not perform "Heartbreak Hotel". However, at his third appearance on Stage Show a week later, Sholes pressured CBS to give consent. Subsequently, Presley and his band performed "Heartbreak Hotel" with borrowed instruments (their own were being driven to Florida in preparation for a tour) with the backing of The Dorsey Brothers orchestra.
On March 3, 1956, the song entered the Billboard pop chart at number 68, and the Country and Western chart at number nine. Within two months, "Heartbreak Hotel" reached number one on both charts. It also made top five on the R&B chart, the first Presley single to chart there. This resulted in "Heartbreak Hotel" becoming only the second single in history to reach all three Billboard charts, after Carl Perkins' "Blue Suede Shoes". The song spent a total of twenty-seven weeks in the top 100. By April, "Heartbreak Hotel" became a million-seller, earning Presley his first RIAA-certified gold record, and going on to be the biggest selling single of 1956. The single is currently certified double platinum in the US. The song made its debut on the UK Singles Chart in May 1956; it peaked at the second spot the next month and stayed on the charts for 22 weeks.
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Famous quotes containing the words release and, release and/or reception:
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“We read poetry because the poets, like ourselves, have been haunted by the inescapable tyranny of time and death; have suffered the pain of loss, and the more wearing, continuous pain of frustration and failure; and have had moods of unlooked-for release and peace. They have known and watched in themselves and others.”
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