Glen Campbell had a promising start to his country music career. At just 10 years old, he opened for the legendary Hank Williams alongside his uncle. The rest of the road to stardom wasn’t quite as smooth, however. As a teenager, the Arkansas native moved to Houston and began playing the local music circuit. Eventually, Campbell would relocate to Los Angeles, where he became a highly in-demand session musician. On this day in 1975, years of grinding would all come to fruition when he kicked off a two-week run at No. 1 with “Rhinestone Cowboy.”
Videos by American Songwriter
Glen Campbell Really Related to His First No. 1 Hit
Country singer Larry Weiss wrote and released the song “Rhinestone Cowboy” in 1974, but found little commercial success. Late that year, Glen Campbell heard it on the radio. The lyrics hit home for the crossover king, who at this point had been toiling for 20 years. After nearly getting dropped from Capitol Records in 1966, Campbell longed to be “where the lights are shinin’ on me / like a rhinestone cowboy.“
Campbell bought the song on cassette and listened to it on repeat, and learned it. Later, he brought it to Al Coury at Capitol Records. Coury also had a song he wanted Campbell to hear—it was called “Rhinestone Cowboy.”
“I heard the song on KNX FM [Los Angeles] and said ‘Hey, I’d like to record that song,” said Campbell during an appearance on the The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson in 1975.
Campbell’s version became an international hit and shot to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, the Country, and the Adult Contemporary charts, marking the first time a song topped all three since Jimmy Dean’s “Big Bad John” in 1961. It also earned him numerous awards from the Country Music Association and Academy of Country Music, along with Grammy nominations for Record of the Year and Best Male Pop Vocal Performance.
[RELATED: 3 Songs You Might Not Know Glen Campbell Played on as a Session Musician]
For Campbell, “Rhinestone Cowboy” represented finally making it to the top. The son of Arkansas sharecroppers was now “riding out on a horse in a star-spangled rodeo.”
“I thought it was my autobiography set to song,” Campbell wrote in his 1994 autobiography of the same name, Rhinestone Cowboy.
Featured image by David Redfern/Redferns
Leave a Reply
Only members can comment. Become a member. Already a member? Log in.