Great Hair, Great Songs

Glen Campbell - Meet Glen Campbell (Capitol)

Ok, I know what your gonna say, espically the Boss... like after I reviewed The Three Dog Night CD... 'What's Glen Campbell got to do with Punk Rock?!' Well sir, after what seems like a gazillion years of recording and touring, they didn't decide to call this new release "Meet Glen Campbell," for nothing. Glen covers... Hey wait a doggone minute! Didn't I see a copy of The Archies (cool name for a cat also) at The Boss' crib not long ago, right next to a couple of Ramones albums? LOL!

Well ok, maybe Glen Campbell isn't as uptight and outta sight as The Archies, but on "Meet Glen Campbell" he covers Tom Petty ("Walls," & "Angel Dreams"), Foo Fighters ("Times Like These"), Jackson Browne ("These Days"), Paul Westerberg ("Sadly Beautiful"), U2 ("All I Want is You"), Lou Reed ("Jesus"), Green Day ("Good Riddance (Time of Your Life"), and John Lennon's beautiful lament, "Grow Old With Me."

Campbell comes as close as any recent band has to translate the spirit of these ten songs into his own. He plies tales of tribulation, remorse, love, hope, and especially faith in a style that combines an acute understanding of all these genre's music dynamics with at times, grit and determination. He made "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)" even more sincere and passionate than the original, which is not an easy task. The closer, "Grown Old With Me," which was originally written by John & Yoko, demonstrates surprising melodic subtlety with the use of strings, mandolin, banjo and pedal steel guitar.

This album should serve well to those detractors who think of Glen Campbell as "The Rhinestone Cowboy," and maybe rightly so, but if like Neil Diamond, who did two creative albums with Rick Rubin, he chooses his songs, producers and band members well, this style should serve him well into the future.- Phil Rainone