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When Elvis Presley played the Mid-South Coliseum in 1997, it was the venue’s largest grossing event ever. It didn’t matter that Elvis had been dead for 20 years.

It didn’t matter Saturday night either - on what would have been Elvis’s 65th birthday - when the King returned to lead a 2 1/2-hour concert that was part live, part film and all surreally rocking.

Some 1,500 who came from overseas helped compose a crowd of 6,546 that paid up to $65 a ticket to witness Presley’s towering video image. Yet thrills were hardly vicarious in what could have been billed “Elvis: Aloha from the Grave.”

“I saw him live once, but dead for the fifth time,” said Mary Pelgus, 45, of Michigan, who was waving letters that spelled E-L-V-I-S and sat next to a lifesize cardboard image of Presley.

Eric and Holly Bonner came from Atlanta for the show.

“The closest we ever got to seeing Elvis (live),” said Eric Bonner, 27, “both of our moms were pregnant with us when they saw him - my mom in ‘72 and her mom in ‘73.”

Projected on a 20-foot screen (two side screens showed the live, interacting band), the late Memphis legend sang more than 30 songs in footage from several televised and theatrical films including 1970’s Elvis, That’s the Way It Is and 1973’s Elvis: Aloha from Hawaii Via Satellite.

It didn’t matter to Brian Evans, 58 - who traveled from Wales - that he was witnessing Presley in a virtual performance.

“It doesn’t change anything,” he said. “He’s still alive!”

This was not the first time to see the spectacle for Judith Werner. The German fan was also at the ‘97 premiere and had seen the show several times in Europe. Get this - she’s 22.

“There are younger fans than me,” she said. Werner explained she loves Presley for his vocal power and believability when singing a song. “And he looks fantastic!”

What lent credibility to the show - which has played sold-out dates around the world since its Memphis debut - are the musicians: Presley’s TCB (Taking Care of Business) band from the ’70s, to be exact. Led by Elvis’s onetime music director Joe Guercio, the veteran ensemble still has the right stuff.

Guitarist James Burton played like the six-string master he is, tossing tasty harmonic fills in Polk Salad Annie and taking a swamp-perfect solo on Johnny B. Goode. The latter song showcased the entire group, who traded hot improvs - from pianist Glen D. Hardin to bassist Jerry Scheff to drummer Ronnie Tutt - in a cutting contest that betrayed everyone’s considerable age. The only way to tell the difference (since none could be heard) between then and now was to compare the fuller, video heads of hair to the thinner, grayer ones on stage.

And even that couldn’t burst the illusion. Elvis and his band were one.

Taking the show on the road for several years has refined the players’ cues, tempos and, yes, musical freedom. From the rhythmically tight turnarounds to the “yeah, yeah, yeah” interjections of the Sweet Inspirations, See See Rider was more convincing than David Copperfield making the Statue of Liberty disappear, while You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’ rendered drama and vocal chills that were far from Memorex.

The concept was weird, sure. But weirdly wonderful as well. It turns out that 50 million Elvis fans weren’t wrong after all.

You see, he made the leap that no other musical artist was ever able to make, not Frank Sinatra, not the Beatles, not Garth Brooks. For the loyal (and that loyalty continues being passed from one generation to the next), Elvis was - and remains - a part of the family.