Ben Preiss
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 Published: Aug 13, 07 Views: 3,085 As the 30th anniversary of his death approaches, Elvis is a presence still strongly felt. He is the second biggest-earning dead celebrity after Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain, according to Forbes magazine, with an estimated $42 million from licensing deals in 2005-2006 That’s a 40-fold rise since 1979, when Priscilla Presley stepped in as executor of the estate after the death of Elvis’ father Vernon. In the last five years, remixes of lesser-known songs “Rubberneckin”’ and “A Little Less Conversation” have become No. 1 hits. Anyway you cut it Elvis is alive and rockin,’ as big as ever. Colonel Tom Parker, Elvis’ manager said it best 30 years ago “Elvis didn’t die. The body did, this changes nothing.”
 Thirty years ago, on the eve of his sudden death at 42 at his Graceland mansion, a bloated and drug-addled Elvis Presley was also unintentionally on the threshold of the ultimate career make-over.Since the mid-1950s, Elvis had recorded dozens of seminal songs, starred in more than 30 Hollywood movies and reinvented himself in Las Vegas as a kind of all-American superhero in a gilded jumpsuit.
As legions of fans prepare to gather next week in Memphis, Tennessee, to mark the 30th anniversary of Presley's death on August 16, 1977, it is clear that Elvis is still taking care of business.
"We're gearing up for the best Elvis Week we've ever had," said Todd Morgan, spokesman for Elvis Presley Enterprises, the Memphis-based firm that manages his lucrative estate and has organized a packed calendar of events.
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