• A live concert to me is exciting because of all the electricity that is generated in the crowd and on stage. It's my favorite part of the business, live concerts.

• Adversity is sometimes hard upon a man; but for one man who can stand prosperity, there are a hundred that will stand adversity.

• After a hard day of basic training, you could eat a rattlesnake.

• Ambition is a dream with a V8 engine.

• Every time I think that I'm getting old, and gradually going to the grave, something else happens.

• From the time I was a kid, I always knew something was going to happen to me. Didn't know exactly what.

• I did the Ed Sullivan show four times. I did the Steve Allen show. I did the Jackie Gleason show.

• I don't do any vulgar movements.

• I don't know anything about music. In my line you don't have to.

• I don't think I'm bad for people. If I did think I was bad for people, I would go back to driving a truck, and I really mean this.

• I happened to come along in the music business when there was no trend.

• I have no use for bodyguards, but I have very specific use for two highly trained certified public accountants.

• I hope I didn't bore you too much with my life story.

• I knew by heart all the dialogue of James Dean's films; I could watch Rebel Without a Cause a hundred times over.

• I learned how important it is to entertain people and give them a reason to come and watch you play.

• I like entertaining people. I really miss it.

• I like to sing ballads the way Eddie Fisher does and the way Perry Como does. But the way I'm singing now is what makes the money.

• I miss my singing career very much.

• I never expected to be anybody important.

• I sure lost my musical direction in Hollywood. My songs were the same conveyer belt mass production, just like most of my movies were.

• I think I have something tonight that's not quite correct for evening wear. Blue suede shoes.

• I was an only child, and Mother was always right with me all my life. I used to get very angry at her when I was growing up-it's a natural thing.

• I was an overnight sensation.

• I was training to be an electrician. I suppose I got wired the wrong way round somewhere along the line.

• I'd just like to be treated like a regular customer.

• I'll never feel comfortable taking a strong drink, and I'll never feel easy smoking a cigarette. I just don't think those things are right for me.

• I'll never make it, it will never happen, because they're never going to hear me 'cause they're screaming all the time.

• I'll stay in Memphis.

• I'm no hillbilly singer.

• I'm not trying to be sexy. It's just my way of expressing myself when I move around.

• I'm so nervous. I've always been nervous, ever since I was a kid.

• I'm strictly for Stevenson. I don't dig the intellectual bit, but I'm telling you, man, he knows the most.

• I'm trying to keep a level head. You have to be careful out in the world. It's so easy to get turned.

• I've been getting some bad publicity - but you got to expect that.

• I've never written a song in my life. It's all a big hoax.

• I've tried to lead a straight, clean life, not set any kind of a bad example.

• It's human nature to gripe, but I'm going ahead and doing the best I can.

• Just because I managed to do a little something, I don't want anyone back home to think I got the big head.

• Later on they send me to Hollywood. To make movies. It was all new to me. I was only 21 years old.

• Man, I really like Vegas.

• Man, that record came out and was real big in Memphis. They started playing it, and it got real big. Don't know why-the lyrics had no meaning.

• More than anything else, I want the folks back at home to think right of me.

• My movements, ma'am, are all leg movements. I don't do nothing with my body.

• People ask me where I got my singing style. I didn't copy my style from anybody.

• Rhythm is something you either have or don't have, but when you have it, you have it all over.

• Rock and roll music, if you like it, if you feel it, you can't help but move to it. That's what happens to me. I can't help it.'

• Since the beginning, it was just the same. The only difference, the crowds are bigger now.

• That's why I hate to get started in these jam sessions. I'm always the last one to leave.

• The army teaches boys to think like men.

• The closest I ever came to getting married was just before I started singing. In fact, my first record saved my neck.

• The colored folks been singing it and playing it just like I'm doin' now, man, for more years than I know. I got it from them.

• The image is one thing and the human being is another. It's very hard to live up to an image, put it that way.

• The Lord can give, and the Lord can take away. I might be herding sheep next year.

• The next thing I knew, I was out of the service and making movies again. My first picture was called, GI Blues. I thought I was still in the army.

• There are too many people that depend on me. I'm too obligated. I'm in too far to get out.

• They put me on television. And the whole thing broke loose. It was wild, I tell ya for sure.

• Those movies sure got me into a rut.

• Those people in New York are not gonna change me none.

• Too much TV hurts movies.

• Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away.

• Until we meet again, may God bless you as he has blessed me.

• Whatever I will become will be what God has chosen for me.

• When I get married, it'll be no secret.

• When I got outta High School I was driving a truck. I was just a poor boy from Memphis, Memphis.

• When I was a boy, I always saw myself as a hero in comic books and in movies. I grew up believing this dream.