For someone who never had aspirations to become a country music performer, Glen Campbell certainly built an immensely successful career doing just that. And that success spanned multiple genres, charting 80 songs on Billboard’s country, Hot 100, and adult contemporary charts. Of those 80 songs, 29 cracked the top 10 and nine reached No. 1. On this day in 1968, Campbell landed his sole career No. 1 on the Billboard Top LPs chart with Wichita Lineman.
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Wichita Lineman, Glen Campbell’s 11th studio album, ruled the country charts for an astonishing 20 weeks and gave the three-time CMA Award winner his only double-platinum record in the U.S. As stated above, it was also Campbell’s only time to top Billboard’s Top LPs, a precursor to today’s Billboard 200.
Glen Campbell Would Eventually Replace Himself at No. 1
The album’s title track was another example of an award-winning, geographic-based formula for Campbell and songwriter Jimmy Webb, who also wrote the 1967 hit “By the Time I Get to Phoenix.” That song reached No. 2 on Billboard’s Hot Country Singles chart and won two Grammy Awards, so it’s no surprise that Campbell begged Webb for another “place-based” song.
“Some time earlier,” Webb told The Independent in 2008, “I had been driving around northern Oklahoma, an area that’s real flat and remote – almost surreal in its boundless horizons and infinite distances. I’d seen a lineman up on a telephone pole, talking on the phone. It was such a curiosity to see a human being perched up there.”
Webb wrote the song and handed it over to producer Al De Lory, whose uncle worked as a lineman in Kern County, California. “As soon as I heard that opening line, I could visualize my uncle up a pole in the middle of nowhere,” De Lory said. “I loved the song right away.”
Hailed as “the first existential country song” by The Independent, “Wichita Lineman” topped both the Hot Country Songs and Adult Contemporary charts, also reaching No. 3 on the Hot 100. The album of the same name held firm atop the country charts until April 1969, when Campbell replaced himself with—what else?—Galveston.
Featured image by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
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