Music Video: “In the Ghetto” (Elvis Presley)

“In the Ghetto” is a song written by American singer-songwriter Mac Davis and made popular by rock and roll singer Elvis Presley. The song was released in 1969 as a 45 rpm single with "Any Day Now" as the flip side. It is a narrative story of a young boy who grows up in the ghetto, steals and fights, and eventually is shot and killed. The song was Presley's first Top 10 hit in the US in four years, and his first UK Top 10 hit in three years.

 In the Ghetto” was recorded during Presley's session in the American Sound Studio in Memphis, Tennessee. It was Presley's first creative recording session since the '68 Comeback, and the songs recorded here probably owed some of their financial success to that. Other hits recorded at this session were “Suspicious Minds”, “Kentucky Rain”, and “Don't Cry Daddy”. There were initial fears that the song would damage Presley's reputation for being politically unbiased, but he loved the song and recorded it anyway.

After Elvis Presley, the song has been performed by many other artists. Among them were, most notably, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, The Cranberries, Merle Haggard, Dolly Parton, and Natalie Merchant. In August 2007, Elvis's daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, released a special version of the song creating a duet between her and her father. The video released simultaneously with the song reached number 1 on iTunes video sales chart the first week of its release in the U.S, Canada, Ireland, Great Britain, Germany and Japan.