All shook up

Mozart would be mortified.

Beethoven would probably spin like an LP in his grave.

But for this week, at least, they ain’t nothing but hound dogs to Austrians obsessed with The King.

Vienna’s Hilton has become the Heartbreak Hotel for “Elvis Week” – seven days of live music, memorabilia and screenings of Elvis Presley films.

The festival coincides with the 28th anniversary of Presley’s death on Aug. 16, 1977. It underscores the singer’s huge popularity in Austria, Germany and other countries where he’s still got fans all shook up.

“For me, he was the only unique entertainer in the world,” says organizer Wolfgang Hahn, who runs Elvis4You, a new shop in downtown Vienna that sells Elvis music, memorabilia and trinkets. “My mission is to tell people in Central Europe how good he really was.”

Presley’s popularity in Europe has grown even though he never performed publicly on the continent.

The only time he spent in Europe was a 1958-60 stint in the U.S. Army in Germany, during which he visited Paris twice while on leave and stopped briefly in Scotland when the military plane carrying him home was refueling.

Harald Molan, a 23-year-old Vienna university student, calls himself “a medium to huge fan.”

“It’s no different than someone who’s crazy about Mozart, who has been dead for even longer,” he says. “At least there’s footage of Elvis on video, which you don’t have if you like Mozart.”

Hahn, who’s 42 – “the same age Presley was when he died” – takes his Elvis seriously.

He calls himself Wolf Memphis, drives a car that bears an “ELVIS9” license plate (one through eight were already taken by other fans), wears an Elvis guitar pick on a cord around his neck and is the lead singer of Little Memphis, a band that does Elvis covers in English and German.

No pompadours, mutton chop sideburns, lip curls or hip swivels for him. Hahn, a friend of Presley’s widow, Priscilla, makes regular pilgrimages to Graceland and sees Elvis impersonators as sacrilegious.

“There was just one Elvis. I think it’s strange to imitate him,” he says.

“It’s a gag for a birthday party, but we take Elvis very seriously. He started a musical revolution.”

Vienna’s Las Vegas-style festival, which is expected to draw hundreds of fans, isn’t the only Elvis event being offered.

French fans plan to gather in Fontainebleu on Aug. 25, and Elvis enthusiasts in England will assemble in Bristol on Sept. 6 for United Elvis Meetup Day.

Elvis rocks on in Britain, where a re-release of his 1959 hit “One Night” soared to No. 1 on the country’s singles charts in January. Over the years, Presley tunes have topped the United Kingdom charts 20 times, beating out The Beatles, which managed only 17.

In Italy, where a fan club based at the Memphis Cafe in Milan boasts 430 members, about 70 people recently headed to Memphis, Tenn., on a trip they organized to mark the anniversary.

Presley is also hot in Germany, where fans over the weekend celebrated the fourthth European Elvis Festival in Bad Nauheim, his base as a soldier.

Hahn says he can’t understand anyone who isn’t crazy about Elvis, an obsession that began when he was 13 and first heard “All Shook Up.”

“I just froze. I said, ‘This is my guy,’ ” he recalls “I get goose bumps just thinking about it.”

Hahn’s most prized possessions include a Gibson guitar signed by the singer, an original Elvis tour jacket, a framed autograph and a photograph of him with Priscilla Presley.

“He was 10 times better than what you hear on a CD or see on a DVD,” Hahn says. “He could do everything – rock, but also gospel and ballads that are so untouchable.

“Even at the end, he had presence and charisma.”