OFF THE ROCKER

Part 1

As if the stars were not preoccupied enough with their own mortality, most received regular notes from the reaper in the form of death threats. 

Generally, the number was proportionate to the star’s fame. Elvis got the most, with Lennon a close second, followed by Garcia, Morrison and Hendrix. Janis and Kurt were largely ignored maybe because potential assassins felt that they were doing a good enough job killing themselves.

Elvis didn’t get too concerned about his early death threats because they were mostly from boyfriends and husbands who couldn’t take a little competition. The JFK assassination changed the King’s tune. He now started collecting guns and bodyguards. Then, when the Manson murders went down, it was “as serious as a six-car pile-up,” recalled Lamar Fike. Hearing that he was on Manson’s hit list, Elvis, playing Vegas at the time, packed everybody up and took cover at Graceland. Now his gun collection turned into an armory worthy of Ford Dix, and his employees became the Secret Service. 

“Goddammit, if anybody ever assassinates me, I want you guys to get to him before the police do,” he ordered them. “I want you to pull his eyes out, rip his throat apart, and kill that son of a bitch!” 

Since childhood, Elvis had been plagued with nightmares about manglers and murderers. He later became nocturnal due to his paranoia. “I stay up all night, and I have my friends with me, and I feel comfortable,” he would later reveal. “In the morning when everybody else is up, I feel safe because it’s daytime – and then I can go to sleep.” Even then, he would sometimes crawl into bed with one of the Guys.