ALL the indicators are pointing to a fresh start for Glen Campbell. The country/easy listening veteran has apparently put his drug and alcohol travails behind him and, at the age of 72, has been welcomed back to the bosom of his former musical home,
Capital Records.
Like Neil Diamond (with the help of Rick Rubin), Campbell's re-emergence is being pushed as an opportunity to introduce his music to a younger audience who may only know him as the perma-smiling guy with the side parting on old album covers. Hence this collection of somewhat youth-friendly covers and the cheesy yet classic album title which begs the question: if you haven't already met Glen Campbell, then what have you been doing with your record collection all this time?
Campbell's definitive recordings of Jimmy Webb's songs should be part of any music fan's basic curriculum – Wichita Lineman remains one of the most sublime numbers in the pop canon.
Campbell has one of those voices which drip with character and integrity and, on this evidence, he is still in beautifully evocative form. He sails through ten elegant, assiduously-chosen covers in little over half an hour. Some of his choices are initially surprising but it is the mark of an accomplished interpreter that he can tackle everything from John Lennon to Green Day with such credibility.
That said, he does not appear to be interested in radical reinterpretations. You can still hear the musical voices of the original artists shining through in his gently wistful cover of Jackson Browne's These Days and in his two Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers outings. He also sticks very close to the original arrangement of Sing – one of the best songs in the Travis catalogue – while teasing out some lovely, warm country inflections which further enhance the song's universal healing sentiments.
Lyrically, Campbell is a sucker for the heart-on-sleeve openness of U2's All I Want Is You and Lennon's Grow Old With Me, both executed with great dignity. Not for him the raw wounds of Johnny Cash's Hurt (another Rubin project). Instead, he exposes his emotional vulnerability by giving the Velvet Underground's Jesus a simple old-time country gospel makeover, while his plaintive take on The Replacements' Sadly Beautiful really highlights the words.
His decision to tackle works by the Foo Fighters and Green Day is novel, but the results serve as a reminder of the melodic strengths of these two giants of alternative rock. Campbell garlands the Foo's Times Like These with a swelling string arrangement and plangent guitar solo reminiscent of those halcyon Jimmy Webb numbers and delivers a wonderfully earthy vocal which takes relish in the lyrics. It is also remarkable how naturally Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life) fits his breezy country folk style.
Although he still favours graceful symphonic pop over acoustic austerity, this sensitively compiled and produced comeback suggests Glen Campbell would make a fascinating subject for the full Rick Rubin treatment.
The full article contains 510 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
