Thread: Glen Campbell dead at 81

Glen Campbell, the indelible voice behind 21 Top 40 hits including "Rhinestone Cowboy," "Wichita Lineman" and "By the Time I Get to Phoenix," died Tuesday. He was 81. A rep for Universal Music Group, Campbell's record label, confirmed the singer's death to Rolling Stone. During a career that spanned six decades, Campbell sold over 45 million records. In 1968, one of his biggest years, he outsold the Beatles.

"It is with the heaviest of hearts that we announce the passing of our beloved husband, father, grandfather, and legendary singer and guitarist, Glen Travis Campbell, at the age of 81, following his long and courageous battle with Alzheimer's disease," the singer's family said in a statement.
Campbell was a rare breed in the music business, with various careers as a top-level studio guitarist, chart-topping singer and hit television host. His late-career battle with Alzheimer's - he allowed a documentary crew to film on his final tour for the 2014 award-winning I'll Be Me - made him a public face for the disease, a role President Bill Clinton suggested would one day be remembered even more than his music.

"He had that beautiful tenor with a crystal-clear guitar sound, playing lines that were so inventive," Tom Petty told Rolling Stone during a 2011 profile of Campbell. "It moved me."

Campbell was born in 1936 in Billstown, Arkansas, the seventh son in a sharecropping family of 12 kids. "We used to watch TV by candlelight," Campbell told Rolling Stone in 2011.

In his youth, Campbell started playing guitar and became obsessed with jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt. He dropped out of school when he was 14 and moved to Wyoming with an uncle who was a musician, playing gigs together at rural bars. He soon moved to Los Angeles and by 1962 had solidified a spot in the Wrecking Crew, a group of session pros. In 1963 alone, he appeared on 586 cuts and countless more throughout the decade, including the Byrds' "Mr. Tambourine Man," Elvis Presley's "Viva Las Vegas," Merle Haggard's "Mama Tried" and the Righteous Brothers' "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling."

"I'd have to pick cotton for a year to make what I'd make in a week in L.A.," he said. "I learned it was crucial to play right on the edge of the beat ... It makes you drive the song more. You're ahead of the beat, but you're not." Fellow Wrecking Crew member Leon Russell called Campbell "the best guitar player I'd heard before or since. Occasionally we'd play with 50- or 60-piece orchestras. His deal was he didn't read [music], so they would play it one time for him, and he had it."

In late 1964, Brian Wilson had a nervous breakdown on tour with the Beach Boys, and the band called on Campbell to replace him on bass and high harmonies. "I took Brian's place and that was just ... I was in heaven then – hog heaven!" Campbell remarked.

"He fit right in," said Wilson. "His main forte is he's a great guitar player, but he's even a better singer than all the rest. He could sing higher than I could!" Wilson even wrote an early song, "I Guess I'm Dumb," for Campbell. His first hit was a cover of Buffy Sainte-Marie's antiwar song "Universal Soldier." But Campbell's own political views tended to be conservative. "The people who are advocating burning draft cards should be hung," he said in 1965.

Campbell had his first major hit in 1967, with "By the Time I Get to Phoenix," written by Jimmy Webb, an L.A. kid with a knack for intricate ballads. "Glen's vocal power and technique was the perfect vehicle for these, in a way, very sentimental and romantic songs. And I think that you know we made some records that were very nearly perfect. 'Wichita Lineman' is a very near perfect pop record," Webb said. "I think in the process that Glen was a prime mover in the whole creation of the country crossover phenomenon that made the careers of Kenny Rogers and some other... many other artists possible."

The tune kicked off a working relationship that included the haunting Vietnam War ballad "Galveston," the tender "Gentle on My Mind" and "Wichita Lineman," Campbell's first Top 10 hit. With swelling orchestral arrangements and slick production, the songs weren't exactly considered hip in the Sixties. "They felt packaged for a middle-of-the-road, older crowd," said Tom Petty. "At first, you go, 'Oh, I don't know about that.' But it was such pure, good stuff that you had to put off your prejudices and learn to love it. It taught me not to have those prejudices." In 1968, Campbell won Grammys in both the country and pop categories, including Best Country & Western Solo Vocal Performance, Male, Best Country & Western Song and Best Vocal Performance, Male...

Rest of the story at the link:

http://www.rollingstone.com/country/...aign=080817_16

A lot of people don't realize what a great guitarist he really was technically speaking. He was a member of the famed 'Wrecking Crew' before he became famous who were studio musicians in the '60 that played on everybody's hit records. One other member that became well known was Leon Russel.

Here is an interesting blurb from Wikipedia about the Wrecking Crew and the songs they played on:

The group's ranks began to materialize in the late 1950s, but in the early 1960s they fully coalesced into what became their most recognizable form when they became the de facto house band for Phil Spector, playing on many of the hits that he produced at the time, and contributing to the development of his Wall of Sound production methods. After the initial success of Spector's records, they became the most requested session musicians in Los Angeles, playing behind many popular recording artists such as Jan & Dean, Sonny & Cher, Barry McGuire, the Mamas & the Papas, Frank Sinatra, and Nancy Sinatra. They were sometimes used as "ghost players" on recordings credited to rock groups, such as the Byrds' debut hit rendition of Bob Dylan's "Mr. Tambourine Man" (1965), as well as the first two albums by the Monkees, and the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds (1966).

If you have Netflix at one time there was a documentary on the Wrecking Crew there that is really good. I started a thread about it one time.

By the way, he had a well known conversion and put out at least one Christian CD. I had one of them that I really liked and listed to for a long time when it was out.

He could really finger that guitar. Outstanding!

I remember him before he hit it big. He had one minor hit, "Turn Around, Look at Me" and I didn't think he'd ever go very far. But then he met up with songwriter Jimmy Webb, as I recall, and with "By the Time I Get to Phoenix," he had a major hit, followed by several more. I think my favorite is "Southern Nights."

Someone posted on facebook that he and his wife were members of a Messianic Jewish group for a number of years:


Campbell, who was raised in the Church of Christ,^[47] joined a Baptist Church in Phoenix along with his wife Kim.^[48] In a 2008 interview, they said that they had been adherents of Messianic Judaism for two decades...^[49]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glen_Campbell

Interesting interview. He was good friends with Glen and talks about when he noticed something wrong with him.

Jimmy Webb on Glen Campbell: 'The American Beatle Has Passed'

http://www.rollingstone.com/country/...aign=080917_16

He was one of my favorites back then!