Fifty years ago this month, something unusual happened at Graceland. Instead of hauling Elvis off to a studio, the record company brought the studio to him. They set up their recording gear right inside the house, in a cozy den Elvis loved that fans now call the Jungle Room.
Those sessions ran in late October 1976. They gave us “Way Down,” the last single Elvis released in his lifetime, and the room has a warm, homey sound you can really hear on the tapes.
But there’s one more song from those nights that gives fans chills.
On the last stretch of the sessions, Elvis sang one more tune over a backing track his band had already laid down. And it’s believed to be the last song he ever recorded in a studio session.
So what was it? Here’s the thing that surprises people. It wasn’t one of his own hits at all.
It was a song called “He’ll Have to Go,” and it belonged to another singer named Jim Reeves, who had taken it to the top back in 1960.
Give it a listen.
Elvis Presley, “He’ll Have to Go” (official audio)
Isn’t that a beautiful, aching tune? The lyric tells a quiet little story. A man is on the phone with the woman he loves, and partway through the call he slowly realizes there’s another man right there in the room with her. He keeps asking her to put her sweet lips a little closer to the phone.
When Jim Reeves first recorded it, “He’ll Have to Go” was enormous. It sat at No. 1 on the country chart for 14 weeks and climbed all the way to No. 2 on the pop chart.
You can hear why Elvis wanted to sing it. It’s right in his wheelhouse, a tender country ballad that lets that rich voice of his just glide.
There’s something touching about the choice too. Here was Elvis, one of the most recorded singers alive, and on this night he reached for someone else’s song. A song he must have loved for years, sung soft and slow in his own living room.
That’s a lovely picture to hold onto. Elvis at home, surrounded by his musicians, pouring himself into a quiet old favorite.
Press play above and let his version wash over you. Knowing the story behind it only makes it sweeter.