Rob Kemp's Elvis Dead live show to be released on VHS

Monday 2nd November 2020, 8:36am by Ian Wolf

Rob Kemp's hit live show The Elvis Dead is to be released on VHS
The multi award-winning 2017 show sees Kemp performing the plot of Evil Dead 2 in the style of Elvis Presley
Distributors Go Faster Stripe are currently taking pre-orders. The cassette will come with extras

Rob Kemp's multi award-winning show The Elvis Dead is to be released... on video cassette.

Comedy label Go Faster Stripe are now taking pre-orders on the new VHS version of the recording of the cult live show.

Go Faster Stripe's Chris Evans explains in the listing: "I am usually against pre-orders, but I've made an exception in this case so I can make sure I've got enough of them ready when the show comes out. It seems there's no way of knowing how popular VHS editions of Elvis singing horror film shows will be."

One of the most successful and acclaimed live comedy shows of recent times, The Elvis Dead made a big splash at the Edinburgh Festival in 2017.

The show's format sees Kemp performing the story of the cult horror film Evil Dead 2 in the style of Elvis Presley.

Appearing at various comedy festivals and on tour, it was nominated for and won a number of awards. The format picked up a Chortle Award (Best Newcomer), an Amused Moose Award (Outstanding Fringe Show), a Comedians' Choice Award (Best Performer), two Leicester Comedy Festival Awards (Best Show, and Best Musical/Improv Show), three Midlands Comedy Awards (Breakthrough Act, Best Alternative Act, and Best Live Show), and an increasingly prestigious Malcolm Hardee Award (Act Most Likely to Make a Million Quid). It was also nominated for Best Newcomer in the Edinburgh Comedy Awards.

A deluxe DVD and a download version will be released at a later date for those who don't have access to a video recorder.

The VHS release will come with a download code of the full show in HD, a lyric book, "a cool postcard (with the download code stuck on it)" and the first 50 people to buy the video will also get a badge.

The release will feature a recording of the show that took place at the fourth Go Faster Stripe Festival. The listing states: "So here it is - the most beautiful object I think we have ever produced - a VHS copy of the fabulous show The Elvis Dead. We've sourced some High Grade professional tapes, commissioned a cardboard slip case, and got some stickers printed up. Rob thought there was no better way to release the show. If you order one of these I'll post it to you a day or two before the download is available."

The listing also states: "Although the VHS medium doesn't lend itself to hidden extra features, we have managed to squeeze one in, but I don't want to say any more about that."

Rob Kemp - The Elvis Dead

Elvis Presley is the quintessential rock star icon. Bruce Campbell is the quintessential B-movie horror icon (and once appeared as Elvis in the soul-stealing mummy movie Bubba Ho-Tep).

Rob Kemp is not an icon as far as he knows, but he does love Elvis and horror, and has been told that he bears a passing resemblance to Bruce Campbell.

The Elvis Dead started as a throwaway comment in a comedy green room, and is the very definition of taking a joke too far.

So don your sequinned jumpsuit, strap a camera to a greased-up two-by-four and sing your way through as much of the plot of Evil Dead 2 as you can in an hour.

The cult hit of Edinburgh Fringe 2017, this multi-award-winning (and even multier-award-nominated) one-man-horror-comedy-mash-up was recorded for posterity as part of the fourth GoFasterStripe Festival and frankly, Rob couldn't be happier about it.

First released: Thursday 3rd December 2020