1962 Elvis Presley: She's Not You

A superior song from what by now feels like the Presley Production Line, 'She's Not You' is no radical departure from the dum dum bounce of 'Good Luck Charm' but it benefits from being co-written by Lieber, Stoller and Doc Pomus. It's a pedigree that ensures that Presley actually has a song he can get to grip with and interpret rather than coast through and, evidently grateful, he delivers the tart and spiteful lyric of settling for second best ("Her hair is soft and her eyes are oh so blue. She's all the things a girl should be, but she's not you") with a sensitivity that it probably doesn't deserve and nary an 'uh-huh' in sight. It's a more than passable offering, but with the knowledge of what Presley once was it can't help but disappoint in its safe dullness. A wild piano solo kicks in midway that sounds like a grafted on leftover from a different session entirely. Maybe it was meant to show that Elvis still had a raucous edge. Maybe. But if that was the case then it's not fooling anyone.