Glen Campbell's Swan Song
In June, country music legend Glen Campbell announced he is suffering from Alzheimer's disease. The 75-year-old singer-songwriter-guitarist was diagnosed with the degenerative disease earlier this year, and as a means of expressing his deep and abiding gratitude, Campbell is treating his fans to one final album and a string of shows that will close the book on an illustrious career that has spanned more than five decades.
Ghost on the Canvas, Campbell's 55th studio album, is set for release on August 30. The collaborative effort once again pairs the singer with producer Julian Raymond, who rejuvenated Campbell's career back in 2008 with Meet Glen Campbell, an eyebrow-raising collection of covers that included Green Day's "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)," the Velvet Underground's "Jesus," Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers' "Walls," and the Foo Fighters' "Times Like These." As a companion piece to that album, Ghost on the Canvas features contributions by Billy Corgan, the Replacements' Paul Westerberg, Jakob Dylan, Chris Isaak, Brian Setzer, and Cheap Trick's Rick Nielsen, among others. The record also includes original material written by Campbell and Raymond from notes of their personal conversations over the years. According to Raymond, the songs address every part of Campbell's epic life, from the battles with his demons—three failed marriages, years of cocaine and alcohol abuse—to the peace he has finally found with his wife of nearly 30 years.
In support of his new album, Campbell is hitting the road this fall with the Glen Campbell Goodbye Tour. He played his first show last month in Biloxi, Mississippi, as a sort of warm-up for the string of dates that will keep him on the road indefinitely. As a way of providing the singer a home-away-from-home feel during the tour, his family will be tagging along. In fact, his three youngest children will be joining him on stage—sons Cal on drums and Shannon on guitar, and daughter Ashley on banjo and keyboard.
The singer decided to go public with his condition before embarking on the series of farewell dates as a pre-emptive strike should he falter during a performance and have his sobriety brought into question, an all-too-real possibility considering a recent interview with Rolling Stone. Signs of Campbell's disease were painfully evident when the singer launched into his 1975 Number 1 hit "Rhinestone Cowboy" during the interview and flubbed the hook, singing, "Like a rhinestone cowboy!/Riding out on a horse in a star-spangled radio!" According to the magazine, Campbell stopped to correct himself. "Radio?" he said. "I mean rodeo." When Campbell attempted to continue, the words eluded him completely.
There are indeed moments of confusion, memories that refuse to coalesce and words for simple things that remain just out of reach. He even has trouble remembering the making of Ghost on the Canvas. But for the most part, Campbell does not realize he has Alzheimer's. He is, in fact, untroubled by the gravity of it all, and maintains the breezy attitude that has served him well over the course of his life.
Glen Travis Campbell was born on April 1936, in Billstown, Arkansas, the seventh son in a family of twelve kids. He received his first guitar when he was four years old and was taught to play the instrument from various relatives. Campbell played consistently throughout his childhood, and gravitated toward jazz players like Barney Kessel and Django Reinhardt. He also sang in a local church where he honed his formidable vocal skills.
By age 14, Campbell had dropped out of school and had begun performing with a number of country bands in the Arkansas, Texas, and New Mexico areas, including his uncle's group, the Dick Bills Band. When he was 18, he formed his own country band called the Western Wranglers, and began touring the South with the group. Shortly afterward, Campbell migrated to Los Angeles, California, where he played on records by Bobby Darin and Rick Nelson and quickly earned the reputation of being an excellent, highly adaptable guitarist. Despite his inability to read music, Glen joined a crack team of session players known as The Wrecking Crew, that also included pianist Leon Russell. As a member of The Crew, he recorded many iconic songs like The Byrds' "Mr. Tambourine Man," Simon and Garfunkel's "Bridge Over Troubled Water," and The Monkees "I'm a Believer." In 1963 alone, Campbell played on some 586 cuts, and countless more that decade, including recordings by Phil Spector, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, and the Righteous Brothers.
In late 1964, Campbell stepped in as temporary bassist for Beach Boy Brian Wilson, who had suffered a nervous breakdown while out on tour with the band. The gig lasted six months during which time Wilson wrote Pet Sounds, one of the most influential records in the history of pop music and one of the best albums to come out of the 1960s. Campbell played on five cuts off the album. At the end of his tenure with the group, the Beach Boys offered him a permanent spot in the band, but Campbell politely declined.
After several attempts at a solo career failed to gain him much notice outside a small section of the country audience, Campbell's breakthrough finally came in late summer of 1967 with John Hartford's "Gentle on My Mind." The song became a Top 40 hit on both the country and pop charts and won Campbell the Grammy that year for Best Country and Western Recording. By the end of the year, Glen Campbell had caught fire with the release of the Jimmy Webb-penned hit, "By the Time I Get to Phoenix," which reached Number 2 on the country charts and Number 26 on the pop charts.
Campbell's success continued in 1968 as "I Wanna Live" became his first Number 1 hit and "Dreams of the Everyday Housewife" reached Number 3. The following year, CBS television hired him to host the variety show The Glen Campbell Good Time Hour, which became quite popular and helped establish him as not only a country star, but a pop music superstar.
Throughout the late '60s and early '70s, Campbell continued to rack up hit singles, including the number one hits "Wichita Lineman" (1968) and "Galveston" (1969), plus the Top Ten singles "Try a Little Kindness" (1969), "Honey Come Back" (1970), "Everything a Man Could Ever Need" (1970), and "It's Only Make Believe" (1970). In 1968, he began recording duets with fellow country artist Bobbie Gentry. The duo had hit singles with their versions of the Everly Brothers songs "Let It Be Me," which reached Number 14 in 1969, and "All I Have to Do Is Dream," which peaked at Number 6 in 1970. Campbell also began a film career in 1969, albeit a brief one, appearing in the John Wayne movie True Grit that year and Norwood, which flopped, the following year.
By 1972, Campbell's record sales had begun to slip. After "Manhattan Kansas" reached Number 6 that year, it became increasingly difficult for him to break into the Top 40. Adding to his decline, Campbell's television show was canceled. As his career began to wane, the singer sank into drug and alcohol addiction that would plague him for some time to come.
Glen Campbell thundered back into the Top Ten in 1975 with "Rhinestone Cowboy," a huge hit that reached Number 1 on both the country and pop charts. Over the next couple years, he had a number of Top Ten country hits, including "Country Boy (You Got Your Feet in L.A.)" and "Don't Pull Your Love"/"Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye," which also reached the pop charts. In 1977, he had his final number one hit with "Southern Nights," which topped both the country and pop charts.
Following the success of "Southern Nights" and its follow-up, "Sunflower," Glen Campbell fell off the charts, although he did have a string of lesser hits and was an immensely popular performer in concert and television. During the mid-'80s, he experienced a brief commercial revival as the singles "Faithless Love," "A Lady Like You," and "The Hand That Rocks the Cradle" all reached the country Top Ten. By that time, Campbell had begun to clean up his act. Over the course of the mid-'80s, he kicked his addictions to drugs and alcohol and became a born-again Christian. Appropriately, he began recording inspirational albums, yet he didn't abandon country music altogether. As late as 1989, Campbell was again breaking the country Top Ten with his smooth, synth-laden contemporary country-pop.
Campbell began recording less frequently in the early '90s, especially since he could no longer reach the charts and the radio, since they were dominated by new country artists. Over the course of the decade, he gradually moved into semi-retirement, concentrating on golf and performing at his Goodtime Theater in Branson, Missouri. In 1994, he published his autobiography, Rhinestone Cowboy.
Although Alzheimer's disease is slowly stripping away the memories and abilities that once defined one of music's greats, Glen Campbell considers himself blessed. He is surrounded his family and friends, and still maintains the capacity to do what he loves best—make music. "Music is a natural memory aid," says Campbell's wife Kim. "The love he gets from all the fans is really encouraging, so that's why we want to do it as long as we can, because it's healthy for all of us. Music is good medicine."
For more information on Glen Campbell's Goodbye Tour, please visit www.ticketmaster.com/Glen-Campbell.
