Crawfish (song)

"Crawfish"
Single by Kitty White and Elvis Presley
from the album King Creole
Released	1958 (1958)
Recorded	January 15, 1958 Radio Recorders, West Hollywood, California
Genre	Jazz, blues
Songwriter(s)	Fred Wise, Ben Weisman
Producer(s)	Walter Scharf

"Crawfish" is a song written by Fred Wise (lyrics) and Ben Weisman (music) and recorded as a duet by the jazz singer Kitty White and Elvis Presley.

It was the opening song for Presley's 1958 film King Creole.^[1][2][3]

British musician and Clash frontman Joe Strummer described "Crawfish" on his radio-show as one of his favourite Elvis Presley songs. The song and his recommendation were included on the soundtrack to the 2007 documentary Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten.

Recording

Bilbrew and Presley recorded the song on January 15, 1958, during the soundtrack recording session for the Paramount movie, King Creole at Radio Recorders, West Hollywood, California. The producer was Walter Scharf, the sound engineer Thone Nogar. At least eight takes have been recorded; the master is take seven.

In 1978, Jean Bilbrew released an alternate master mix (with overdubs recorded in 1978) including the full length intro sung by herself. This version runs 4 minutes and 10 seconds.

Cover versions

The song has been covered a number of times,^[4] arguably the most well-known is by Johnny Thunders and Patti Palladin released in 1985, reaching the top five on the UK Indie Chart across a 12-week stint^[5] and was later included on their Copy Cats covers album in 1988.

References

1. Pitre, Glen (1993). The Crawfish Book: the story of man and mudbugs starting in 25,000 B.C. and ending with the batch just put on to boil. University Press of Mississippi. p. 91. ISBN 978-0-87805-599-9.
2. Caine, Andrew James (2004). Interpreting Rock Movies: The Pop Film and its Critics in Britain. Manchester University Press. p. 67. ISBN 978-0-7190-6538-5.
3. Matthew-Walker, Robert (1995). Heartbreak Hotel: The Life and Music of Elvis Presley. Castle Communications. p. 86. ISBN 978-1-86074-055-8.
4. "Cover versions of Crawfish by Elvis Presley". Secondhandsongs.com. Retrieved 26 April 2021.
5. Lazell, Barry (1997). Indie Hits 1980-1989. Cherry Red Books. Archived from the original on June 8, 2011. Retrieved September 5, 2014.