"Heartbreak Hotel" is a rock and roll song recorded and performed by Elvis Presley. Recorded in January 1956 in Nashville, the song was Presley's first single for RCA Records and introduced him to the American national music consciousness. It was released with the B-side "I Was the One" on January 27, 1956, becoming the first #1 pop record by Presley and the best selling single of 1956.

Song's history

Inspired by the suicide of a young man who left a note with the line, "I walk a lonely street", songwriters Tommy Durden, then a steel-guitarist in Smiling Jack Herring and his Swing Billies, and Mae Boren Axton, a teacher in Jacksonville, Florida, wrote "Heartbreak Hotel" in thirty minutes in 1955.She was Hoyt Axton's mother, and also a publicist for Hank Snow whose manager, Colonel Tom Parker, would later also manage Presley.

So sure that the song would be a hit, Axton presented it to Presley's then manager, Bob Neal, and insisted it would be his first million-seller. On November 10, 1955, upon hearing the demo for the first time, Presley agreed and promised to record the song. Axton offered Presley a third of the royalties if he made the song his first single release from his new label, RCA. Presley first performed the song in Swifton, Arkansas on December 9, 1955 and declared it his "first hit".