Sunset Boulevard - Latest Sony/RCA release Aug 2025

[Joemin]

I have received my copy in the post. The album contains 5 cds, all recorded in 70s.

I copied the following from elvisinfonet.com:

"Sunset Boulevard' Review: A pertinent review of Elvis' new release posted on AllMusic by Mark Deming.
In part he notes...
..In March 1972 Parker struck a deal with MGM to make a documentary about Elvis Presley on tour and the filmmakers wanted to include footage of Presley working in the studio and rehearsing. This led Presley to RCA Records' Studio C in LA where he cut seven new songs and rehearsed for his road trip.
2025's Sunset Boulevard offers a detailed look at the 1972 Los Angeles sessions, as well as ten tracks he recorded in L.A. in March 1975. One thing that sets these recordings apart is that Presley chose to record with his road band who had been working with him since 1968. His TCB Band boasted top-notch musicians who knew Presley's work habits well, including James Burton on guitar, Glen D. Hardin on piano and Ronnie Tutt on drums -- and they give these tracks excellent chops and a warmth and connection with the songs most studio crews couldn't have matched.
While the L.A. recordings were heavily overdubbed for their initial release, for Sunset Boulevard, producer Matt Ross-Spang has given them new mixes that strip away the excess for a clearer picture of what Presley and his band sounded like in the moment.
The results find Elvis in excellent voice and giving the songs genuine emotional commitment. While the set opens with "Burning Love," one of Presley's most potent rockers of the 1970s, the majority of these songs deal with sadness and broken hearts, and the timing was significant. In 1972, his marriage to Priscilla Presley was on the verge of collapse, and on "Separate Ways," "Fool," and "Where Do I Go from Here," you can hear his regret and sense of loss as he wonders how he went so far wrong. Many have said Presley never fully rebounded from his divorce, and the 1975 tracks still reflect a downbeat mood, though "Shake a Hand" and "I Can Help" find him searching for a bright side.
Presley and his team were chronically unimaginative when it came to finding material and thought in terms of singles rather than albums, and listening to this material, it's easy to imagine that with a bit more care and imagination, Presley could have turned these recordings into one of the greatest breakup albums of all time -- a mature but wounded portrait of a broken heart.
The set also includes recordings of two rehearsal sessions held at Studio C in July 1970 and August 1974. Frankly, these are of dubious value; it's instructive to hear the give and take of Elvis and his band, and he has fun getting silly on some tunes, but the quality of the audio is substandard: hollow and boomy in 1970, harsh and crackly in 1974.
The studio masters and their accompanying outtakes make Sunset Boulevard a superior collection of late-period Presley, but think of the rehearsal recordings as a bonus that you needn't examine very often.
-- Go HERE for his full review
(News, Source;AM/EIN)"


I have been listening to this album non stop since it arrived friday morning last (1st Aug 2025). I am hearing songs I am very familiar with that sound significantly different from the original releases. I am totally delighted with this album, in fact I have bought a second copy which I am keeping in its original wrapping. I hope this album is a big seller, so I am encouraging fans to get out and buy it.


























9

[Joemin]

The album is at #13 on the UK midweek chart..well done to the fans in UK, always give great support to the King's releases...

[TCB-FAN]

Ed Hess does his formal review of the vinyl version of "Sunset"......

[TCB-FAN]

Scotty & Craig from the UK do a thorough 40 minute review of "Sunset Blvd."

[FanFrom'61]

The album is at #13 on the UK midweek chart..well done to the fans in UK, always give great support to the King's releases...

It entered the main UK album chart at #67 selling 2,260 equivalent units from CD, double dipping with vinyl, downloads and streaming. It has since dropped out of the mid week chart meaning it will not go any higher than #67 and is extremely likely to drop out of the main chart this Friday. That is not really what Sony would want being a mainstream release - they undoubtedly would like some of the public to buy into it selling enough extra copies to remain on the chart for at least one more week instead of the regular fans buying it on autopilot pre-orders in day one.

[Joemin]

Performance across Europe is much better, with #9 in Switzerland and top 20 in a number of countries.

[Joemin]

Sales should improve this week in the US with Elvis Week

[Joemin]

According to Forbes:

"Elvis Presley’s New Top 10 Album
Presley’s newly-released Sunset Boulevard box set launches on five rankings in the U.K., and it becomes a top 10 bestseller on two of them. The superstar posthumously starts his new release at No. 5 on both the Official Album Sales and Official Physical Albums charts this frame."

I assume this is a physical sales chart and excludes downloads and streaming???

[Joemin]

Just checked the UK official chart site, the album is at #5
BITE ME cover art
NewBITE ME
RENEE RAPP

LW: NewPeak: 1,Weeks: 1
Read more icon

Number2
COLES CORNER cover art
NewCOLES CORNER
RICHARD HAWLEY

LW: NewPeak: 2,Weeks: 1
Read more icon
Number3
THIS IS NOT A DRILL - LIVE FROM PRAGUE cover art
NewTHIS IS NOT A DRILL - LIVE FROM PRAGUE
ROGER WATERS

LW: NewPeak: 3,Weeks: 1
Read more icon
Number4
LITTLE DREAMING cover art
RELITTLE DREAMING
CIAN DUCROT

LW: REPeak: 4,Weeks: 2
Read more icon
Number5
SUNSET BOULEVARD cover art
NewSUNSET BOULEVARD
ELVIS PRESLEY

LW: NewPeak: 5,Weeks: 1
Read more icon

[FanFrom'61]

Performance across Europe is much better, with #9 in Switzerland and top 20 in a number of countries.

Just because it is higher in Switzerland than the UK means nothing. Sales are the important thing and sales against chart positions in Switzerland are relevant to how other albums are selling there. I very much doubt t that sales in `Switzerland exceed those in the UK.

[FanFrom'61]

Just checked the UK official chart site, the album is at #5
BITE ME cover art
NewBITE ME
RENEE RAPP

LW: NewPeak: 1,Weeks: 1
Read more icon

Number2
COLES CORNER cover art
NewCOLES CORNER
RICHARD HAWLEY

LW: NewPeak: 2,Weeks: 1
Read more icon
Number3
THIS IS NOT A DRILL - LIVE FROM PRAGUE cover art
NewTHIS IS NOT A DRILL - LIVE FROM PRAGUE
ROGER WATERS

LW: NewPeak: 3,Weeks: 1
Read more icon
Number4
LITTLE DREAMING cover art
RELITTLE DREAMING
CIAN DUCROT

LW: REPeak: 4,Weeks: 2
Read more icon
Number5
SUNSET BOULEVARD cover art
NewSUNSET BOULEVARD
ELVIS PRESLEY

LW: NewPeak: 5,Weeks: 1
Read more icon

Don’t get confused by Chart Positions in the various sub charts. They are somewhat meaningless in the grand scheme of things. All they show for example is that the Sunset vinyl album sold reasonably well at #11 against other vinyl sales and releases - sales would be just a few hundred copies.

The chart where is appears at #5 covers, CDs, vinyl and Downloads but not streaming.

[FanFrom'61]

According to Forbes:

"Elvis Presley’s New Top 10 Album
Presley’s newly-released Sunset Boulevard box set launches on five rankings in the U.K., and it becomes a top 10 bestseller on two of them. The superstar posthumously starts his new release at No. 5 on both the Official Album Sales and Official Physical Albums charts this frame."

I assume this is a physical sales chart and excludes downloads and streaming???

It includes downloads but not streaming.

[FanFrom'61]

Sales should improve this week in the US with Elvis Week

The release has not entered this week’s Billboard 200 chart which means it has sold less than a few thousand copies if it is just outside the 200.

The guy who writes for Forbes is an Elvis fan who never tells the full story and just concentrates on the small sub charts to make things look impressive, but are insignificant in the bigger picture.

[Joemin]

I am not as well up on the data as you are. Obviously we would want chart success in US, or more importantly sales. I hope sales will pick up this week, people visiting Memphis will surely consider purchasing at Gracelend? Don't dismiss sales across Europe, Germany Belgium, Netherlands etc.

[FanFrom'61]

I am not as well up on the data as you are. Obviously we would want chart success in US, or more importantly sales. I hope sales will pick up this week, people visiting Memphis will surely consider purchasing at Gracelend? Don't dismiss sales across Europe, Germany Belgium, Netherlands etc.

The biggest sales over the last decade has always been the UK, but even that is relatively small for these kind of releases - the average sales during the first week of release during the last five years is around 1900 units. Obviously over time, sales go up on a drip feed basis around the world, but the figures are nothing to get excited over. The first Nashville set released 5 years ago as of around t months ago has global equivalent sales of around 38k units which includes downloads and streaming, with streaming being the main contributor. Elvis on Tour did not sell particularly well which was probably due to price and the repetitive nature of the shows - it did not chart at all in the UK or US album charts. Last years Memphis was another one where sales were low at the outset and have not really improved by much.

Yes I’m sure there will be sales for this Sunset release at Graceland but there is no indication from past releases that the sales will be worth noting because of Elvis week. I’ve read several reviews in music msgs and whilst Disc1 received the best acknowledgements, the general consensus is that this release is more for the deep fan rather than the casual fan or the average record buyer, and that is probably down to the inclusion of the rehearsal material. so is unlikely to gain real interest from those two latter areas.

Streaming numbers reveal that on these kind of releases, well known songs do reasonably well, but there is very little interest in outtakes. So regarding Elvis Week, there is more chance that the 30 #1s album will sell more during the next fortnight because that is what those outside of the fanbase seem to buy too. And for a newbie fan who would like to get into Elvis’ music of the 70’s, a much better way to spend money would be to acquire the 70’s Masters set which is likely to offer better value for money.

[elvis4life]

[A. C. van Kuijk]

Well, Elvis is not as popular as he used to be and I am pretty sure that it will be shown once again when The Beatles released their new/re-made "Anthology" set. However, Presley's "Memphis" also made no impression on the Billboard Chart, but was streamed 1.3 billion times on Spotify alone within a single year. So maybe "Sunset Boulevard" also will become a popular item on the streaming platforms.

[FanFrom'61]

Well, Elvis is not as popular as he used to be and I am pretty sure that it will be shown once again when The Beatles released their new/re-made "Anthology" set. However, Presley's "Memphis" also made no impression on the Billboard Chart, but was streamed 1.3 billion times on Spotify alone within a single year. So maybe "Sunset Boulevard" also will become a popular item on the streaming platforms.

There must be something wrong with that streaming number as that would be the equivalent of nearly 900k units and no Elvis album has achieved that kind of number within a year - not even the extremely popular 30 #1s has done that in a year.
I’ve asked my contact to look into it and hopefully he will get back to me on the next few days. Sometimes this kind of thing happens when song titles from other albums are added into the mix, so a song like Suspicious Minds which has a high number of streams on the Elvis in Memphis album will accidentally get included on another album as it has the same song title.

[NinaFromCanadaEh]

https://www.goldminemag.com/reviews/box ... ed-period/

New Elvis Presley set is a concise look at a less-examined period
The Elvis Presley release ‘Sunset Boulevard,’ which examines L.A. ’70s sessions, comes in a 5-CD box, a 2-LP “highlights” set or a colored vinyl edition.

By Gillian G. Gaar
September 11, 2025



Elvis Presley

Sunset Boulevard

RCA/Legacy (CD, LP, digital)

By Gillian G. Gaar

There have been box sets focusing on Elvis Presley’s recording sessions in Memphis and Nashville. Now comes a box set that takes a look at his 1970s sessions in the City of Angels: Sunset Boulevard.

Presley first recorded in Los Angeles in August 1956, recording songs at 20th Century Fox’s soundstage for his film debut, Love Me Tender. Over the next decade and a half, he often recorded in Nashville, but recorded songs for his movies on the west coast, especially at Radio Recorders. He began using RCA’s studio located at 6363 Sunset Boulevard in 1967; the tracks on this box are drawn from sessions in March 1972 and March 1975.

The first disc in the five CD box set is the standout. The 17 master recordings from both sessions are presented in new mixes by Matt Ross-Spang, removing all the instrumental overdubs. This has been done on other releases, such as Way Down in the Jungle Room, to good effect. What it leaves you with is pure, unadulterated Elvis, without the slatherings of schmaltz that marred his later recordings in particular. Ross-Spang gives a similar treatment to the session outtakes presented on Disc 2 (which don’t sound too different to the final versions).

The sessions featured some of Presley’s best studio work of the 1970s. That included some of the most autobiographical songs he ever recorded. In February 1972 he had separated from his wife, Priscilla. Just one month later, he was in Los Angeles recording songs of heartbreak and disintegrating relationships: “Separate Ways,” “Always on My Mind,” “For the Good Times,” “Fool.” Such songs obviously touched a nerve with Presley. After recording “Separate Ways” (co-written by his Memphis Mafia buddy Red West), he played the track over and over again for members of his entourage. Jerry Schilling, one of those members, observes in the liner notes that the song “was very reflective of his life. He wasn’t getting any hit material, [so] he just sang about his life.”

But that long-awaited hit would also come during those March 1972 sessions, though it wouldn’t have if Presley had his way. Producer Felton Jarvis brought Dennis Linde’s rocker “Burning Love” to the sessions, but Presley didn’t like it. Everyone else did though, and Presley was finally persuaded to record it, and was rewarded with the last Top 10 hit of his lifetime when the song peaked at #2 (kept from the top spot by Chuck Berry’s inane “My Ding-a-Ling,” truly a criminal offense).




By the time Presley returned to RCA Studios in March 1975, he had largely lost interest in recording. He didn’t enter a studio at all in 1974. And in comparison to the work he’d done in 1972, the 1975 sessions were a bit lackluster. He does have a lot of fun with the lively “T-R-O-U-B-L-E.” And he threw himself into the country weeper “Green Green Grass of Home,” a song that Presley had loved since hearing Tom Jones’ version of it back in 1966. A look at the record stats in the liner notes show that Presley’s singles and albums were now doing better on the country charts, suggesting this was a direction he could’ve pursued more seriously, as Jerry Lee Lewis was doing. Presley never entered a proper recording studio again; his 1976 recording sessions were held in one of his rooms at Graceland (later dubbed the “Jungle Room” after his death).

The set’s remaining three discs feature rehearsals at the RCA studios held in 1970 and 1974. There’s no new material; all the songs have previously been released, mostly on albums issued by the collector’s label Follow That Dream, though on this set they’re mixed by Vic Anesini. Presley sounds rather listless during the rehearsals (which were held in preparation for his live engagements), but as he’s primarily performing songs he’s done before, he apparently feels he doesn’t need to put in much effort. It’s more interesting when he works through the numbers he rarely performed live, like “Good Time Charlie’s Got the Blues” and “Promised Land.”

In addition to the five-CD box, Sunset Boulevard is also available in a 2-LP “highlights” edition; a colored vinyl edition is available through Graceland’s website. All tracks are also available digitally.

Overall, the set presents a concise look at a less-examined period of Presley’s career.