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.

Toward the end, "The King" was a shadow of the performer who electrified audiences and revolutionized popular music.