Heartbreak Hotel in an attempted robbery in El Paso, Texas. On August 25, 1955, the "El Paso Times" reported Krolik's death under the headline "Story Of Person Who Walked Lonely Street". Axton and Durden give different accounts of how the song was written. Durden's account is that he had already written the song and performed it with his band the Swing Billys before he presented it to Axton. Axton's account is that Durden had written only a few lines of the song and asked her to help him finish it. She says that the report of the suicide "stunned" her, and she
Heartbreak Hotel recalled hearing it for the first time when he was 8 years old: Critic Robert Cantwell wrote in his unpublished memoir "Twigs of Folly": President Bill Clinton performed the song on saxophone during his appearance on "The Arsenio Hall Show" on June 3, 1992. In 2004, it was ranked number 45 on "Rolling Stone"s list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time", the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame included it in its unranked list 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll and in 2005, "Uncut" magazine ranked the first performance of "Heartbreak Hotel" in 1956 by Presley as