The Glen Campbell Album


I don't know why my brain sometimes mixes up Glen Campbell and Pat Boone. It does some times, but thankfully the title of tonight's album is The Glen Campbell Album, so i don't have to worry about that problem. I do still have to worry about my phone demanding 2 Ns at the end of Glen, but that's more Skip's problem than mine (wink). 

Fair warning, it's a Pickwick album. Actual named artist, though, so at least it's a coin toss in terms of audio fidelity. Unlike Chuck Thompson, Glen Campbell IS a famous guitarist with a vast catalog of session work and solo celebrity offerings. He's no Roy Clark, but he doesn't look too much the fool playing alongside Roy Clark as he often did. I know i mentioned he did an album with Tennessee Ernie Ford a while back, but i'm just not ready for that weirdness yet. Let's just do a singles compilation tonight. 

These are Capitol recordings, so i kind of expect big orchestral backing, huge vocal reverb, the kind of sappiness that accompanies the closing credits of a feature film, the Hollywood kind of Country. Let's find out. 

Strong start with a remarkably good rendition of the Roy Orbison classic Only The Lonely. I won't go track by track, but side 1 is pretty great. Sure it's Country-ish, but like Musical Theater Country. That's the orchestration talking, 'cause yeah these are all showpieces. It is really all Orbisonesque to my ears. Now on to side 2. 

Damn, Through the Eyes of a Child is like a bizarro Bond Theme, or something. Super cinematic, and then right back to the confusing mash of slow-dance pop-rock with over-emoted crooning. I take back the Pat Boone thing i said, Prima Donna is a lot more Frankie Avalon than anything. 

So, yeah, there's barely anything Country about this album except the name Glen Campbell. It sounds like all the early 60s, it's all Oldies radio staple Adult Oriented Light Rock, you could imagine proper Pop-Punk versions of most of these songs, and Glen Miller sings pretty. No, he's no Karen Carpenter, but he's lovely all the same. 

Now, as for audio quality, it's definitely a middle of the road Pickwick album. Most of this batch doesn't have inner sleeves, but the surface of this thing is NM. It's still glossy, no marks or signs of rubbing, less surface noise than any modern vinyl i've opened this year, which you wouldn't know by listening to it because the source tapes were clearly worn out before the lacquers were even cut by Keel over on Long Island. It's certainly not unlistenable, especially by Pickwick standards, but even 2am AM broadcasts through a 1" tweeter sound better than the backing tracks on a couple of these songs. 

It's lovely though, i definitely have some new found respect for the one-N Glen. Maybe we'll try a two-N Glenn tomorrow for some variety. The more the merrier, i suppose.

And Thenn there was Glenn

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