Listen Now
Buy the Album at Rhino.com

Written by: Jimmy Webb
Produced by: Al De Lory
Released: Nov. '68 on Capitol
Charts: 15 weeks
Top spot: No. 3

Inspired by the isolation of a telephone-pole worker he saw on the Kansas-Oklahoma border, Webb wrote this in 1968 for Campbell, who had asked if Webb could come up with another "By the Time I Get to Phoenix." Campbell changed a guitar part and kept the keyboard from Webb's demo; the chiming sound at the fade, evoking telephone signals, was done on a massive church organ.

Appears on: Wichita Lineman (Capitol)

Next: There Goes My Baby

Back to RS 500 Albums!
Back to RS 500 Songs!