On a road trip to the West Coast, recent college grad and Austin resident Caroline Sallee was inspired to write a batch of songs about the trip, her life and growing up. Returning home to her childhood bedroom at her parents' Alabama home and taking the performing name
Caroline Says, she recorded the songs and released them on a limited-edition cassette in 2014 with the cheeky title
50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong. The songs range from hushed, introspective ballads ("Winter Is Cold") to introspective, midtempo jangle pop ("I Think I'm Alone Now"), quiet piano songs ("Funeral Potatoes"), and slowly swinging jazz ballads ("My Fiancé's Pets"), to rollicking dream pop ("Gravy Dayz"); all done in classic lo-fi fashion where emotion is prized more than technical prowess and the singer makes no effort to conceal herself behind glossy production. Sallee proves adept at both the quiet songs and those that have a little pep in their step. The way she switches between the two so easily gives the record a nice three-dimensional feel, as does the way she multitracks her vocals to the point where her humming, doo wopping, and soaring harmonies become the most important instrument on the album. The very pretty "God Knows" and the haunting "Streetlights" are prime examples of just how powerful her use of voice as an instrument can be. Despite its short running time,
50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong is a fully realized and impressive debut that shows Sallee is both a songwriting and recording prodigy of sorts, but also a very inventive vocalist. It's the kind of record that deserved to be discovered by more than the hundred people who could buy the tape. Luckily, Western Vinyl thought so too, and in 2017 reissued the album to a wider audience. [
50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong was also released on LP.] ~ Tim Sendra