Each Friday I pick a song–new, old, borrowed, blue–that’s been on my mind and in my ears, and write a short post about it.
This is “Wichita Lineman” by Dick Slessig Combo:
“Wichita Lineman” was written by Jimmy Webb, and made famous in its original recording by Glen Campbell. It’s easily one of the most beautiful popular American songs of the twentieth century. Earlier this week I stumbled onto this 43-minute version of it by Dick Slessig Combo, a group made up of musicians better known for their work with other groups. It’s a wonderful thing to behold: a very slow, instrumental interpretation of a song pretty much everybody knows, and which affords an opportunity to listen to it new, and to notice, stripped to its basics and stretched far beyond its original time, just how elegant the song really is. I also found this interesting blog post from 2015 about Dick Slessig Combo’s version of the song.
