Glen Campbell, Goodbye: A Tribute From Andy

Glen Campbell: 1936 - 2017 (81 Years)
A Tribute From Andy

I remember Glen Campbell because he was my wife's favourite singer. She was always singing, Annie's Song and others like Wichita Lineman and Galveston. Witchita Lineman is one of the 1001 Songs You Must Listen To Before You Die by Robert Dimery. 

Also, 500 Miles and A Place In The Sun were easy songs to relate to. I was not attracted to Campbell and his songs at first but began to appreciate him with such lyrics:

                                You Tube Video by Mark Moscatello
Like a bird on a tree
I keep waiting to be free
Moving on, just moving on...

I first heard the Engelbert Humperdinck version but with Campbell's style, typically rustic, an open air feel and with that country lilt, I thought it was movin' enough. 

                                
Annie's Song too (from John Denver actually) was another one that attracted me. Again the words, with poetic nuances, made me listen:

You fill up my senses like a night in the forest
Like a mountain in springtime, like a walk in the rain

There was a multiplicity of meaning here and taking me away from:

Well, there's one for the money, 
Two for the show
Three to get ready,
Now go cat go... (Elvis Presley)

Glen Campbell was already well established when I first learnt about him and by the late 60's when I met my future missus, we always had a comfortable discussion about this session guitarist and country singer. 

It was an appropriate and polite chatting point during the coffee hours at Wonderland Milk Bar above DBS Bank at East Coast Road, just next to the Roxy Cinema. Or was it somewhere else?

I learnt what a Linesman was, never knowing that they existed since we don't have them in Singapore. Or do we? The other two hits were Try A Little Kindness and It's Only Make Believe. There was Rhinestone Cowboy and Southern Nights.

One of Campbell's biggest hits, By The Time I Get To Phoenix, according to Blue Eyes Frank Sinatra is, "the greatest torch song ever written."

This singer, with his rugged smile, went on to become one of the best-known country singers internationally. He sang and recorded nearly 900 songs on his 70 albums and sold 45 million of them during his career.
Rest In Peace Mr Glen Campbell. Your songs, like your name, will live for a long long time.

And she'll cry, just to think, I'd really leave her
Though time and time I've tried to tell her so
She just didn't know I would really go.

Wonderland Milk Bar or coffee house above DBS Bank @ East Coast Road beside the Roxy Cinema, a rendezvous for chit chats and food.

Images: Google.