While nearly everyone was aware of Glen Campbell’s battle with Alzheimer’s disease over the past several years, it was still very tough to many of us to hear about his passing on Tuesday at the age of 81. While certain moment in his life have received more attention recently, it’s important to recognize all the different ways he had an influence on pop culture over the years.
While Glen had been releasing singles since 1958, it would take until another nine years before any of them got national attention. During that time, however, he was a highly sought-after session musician, and became friends with such stars along the way as Elvis Presley, whom he assisted on the music for “Viva Las Vegas” (although not the title song). Glen played rhythm guitar on a wide variety of hits from the 1960’s: Ricky Nelson’s “Hello Mary Lou”; Wayne Newton’s “Danke Schoen”; Jan and Dean’s “Surf City”, the Righteous Brothers’ “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'”; Merle Haggard’s “Mama Tried”; and even Frank Sinatra’s last solo #1, 1966’s “Strangers In The Night”.
Back in 1961, however, he’d already left an impression on a future collaborator, when a teenage Jimmy Webb bought his first record: a copy of Glen’s self-written “Turn Around, Look at Me”, which would later be a hit for the Vogues. In 1967, Glen recorded Jimmy’s “By The Time I Get To Phoenix” – and it wasn’t until after the song’s success that the two men finally met in person, leading to a lasting friendship.
Glen then became a star in his own right, finding success with more Jimmy Webb material (“Wichita Lineman”, “Galveston”), an occasional acting role (most notably working with John Wayne in “True Grit”, whose title song gave him another hit), and hosting CBS’ “The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour”. That show had started out as a replacement series for the Smothers Brothers’ own variety program, and featured his cover of John Hartford’s “Gentle On My Mind” (re-released to greater success in 1968) as its theme song. He even performed it on the show once with John himself.
After the show ended, he tended to do better on country radio than top-40, but he rebounded in a big way later in the ’70s, with both “Rhinestone Cowboy” and his cover of Allen Toussaint’s “Southern Nights”.
Glen made tabloid headlines in 1980 for dating fellow country star Tanya Tucker, although shortly afterwards he met and married Kim Woolen, with whom he remained married for the rest of his life. He had some legal troubles in the early ’80s, but Glen still managed to come back with several more country hits throughout that decade. One of the most memorable was yet another Jimmy Webb tune that was later covered by Linda Ronstadt, “Still Within The Sound Of My Voice”, and gave him his last top-5 country hit.
When even country radio was no longer supportive by 1991, Glen turned to gospel music. Later in the ’90s and into the 2000’s, many of his recordings were simply covers of either his own material or other artists’ familiar hits. [He also had another run-in with the law in 2003 for drunk driving, leading to a ten-day jail sentence.] By 2008, however, he staged yet another successful return to the spotlight, thanks to the curiously titled “Meet Glen Campbell”. The album had him taking on more challenging material, featuring mostly covers of recently promoted rock songs, and the results were terrific. Among the highlights was his take on the Foo Fighters’ “Times Like These”.
A little over two years later, we heard the sad news of Glen’s diagnosis with Alzheimer’s – and the inspiring news that Glen would go on a final concert tour as long as he could still sing and play. Shortly after this he released the album “Ghost On The Canvas”, his highest charting album in 34 years, and a touching video to accompany the title song.
I attended his performance at New York City’s Town Hall in January of 2012, and it was a great experience. Sure, he relied occasionally on a teleprompter to remember some lyrics, but this was a heartfelt performance in front of a highly appreciative crowd, and his set list nicely spanned the course of his lengthy career.
A set of re-recorded hits, “See You There”, followed in 2013, while the 2014 documentary “I’ll Be Me” gave us some insight into his struggle with Alzheimer’s over the previous few years. Its theme song “I’m Not Gonna Miss You”, which Glen co-wrote with frequent collaborator Julian Raymond (who was also the film’s executive producer), received an Oscar nomination and a Grammy award.
As it turns out, there was one more album to come from Glen. In June of this year, just two months before his passing, Glen released another album of covers, “Adiós”, whose title cut (another frequently covered Jimmy Webb tune) was released as a single on July 25th.
As tough a battle as this had to be for him and his family, he has to be praised for the amount of attention he brought to a disease that’s affected so many individuals and their households. Over the years, Glen Campbell will be remembered by many not just for his memorable recordings, but for the inspiring efforts he made to fight off this degenerative disease for as long as he could. We’ve lost the ‘Rhinestone Cowboy’, but from both musical and medical standpoints, it’s clear that his influence will continue for years to come.
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