And everywhere he goes he takes his memories of this special person with him. The story of a man who can’t settle down and doesn’t know when to stop travelling.īut once, a long time ago, he met the most special person he encountered in his entire life. “Gentle On My Mind” isn’t just packed full of great lyrical devices like that, though. I must say that even the expression “keeps you in the backroads by the rivers of my memory” is worth a Grammy all by itself. It’s knowing that your door is always open And your path is free to walk That makes me tend to leave my sleeping bag Rolled up and stashed behind your couchįor a song that Glen Campbell (and, indeed, Dean Martin) delivered with a slightly humorous twinkle in his eye, “Gentle On My Mind” is a deeply sad song.Īnd it’s knowing that I’m not shackled By forgotten words and bonds And the ink stains that are dried upon some line That keeps you in the backroads By the rivers of my memory That keeps you ever gentle on my mind What a song it is, instantly recognisable from these opening lyrics… Hartford’s original version picked up the Best Folk Performance and Best Songwriting. Glen Campbell’s version won two of the four Grammys “Gentle On My Mind” received back in the 60s - Best Country Solo Male and Best Country Performance. But that version was so professionally done, as one might expect from a group of such talented musicians, the record company just did a couple of light edits here and there and released the demo as the single. Perhaps fittingly, he worked up a rough version with his Wrecking Crew bandmates to use as a demo. However, one day Glen Campbell heard John Hartford’s version of “Gentle On My Mind” on the radio and begged to record it himself. He could probably have made a decent living as an in-demand studio musician for as long as he wanted. Glen Campbell had a level of technical ability on the guitar which few could match. The Wrecking Crew were the secret sauce, usually uncredited, behind hits by the Beach Boys (“Help Me Rhonda”, “I Get Around” and “Good Vibrations”), the Mamas and Papas (“Monday, Monday” and “California Dreaming”) as well as the Crystals, Sonny and Cher, the Carpenters, Frank Sinatra and many more. He was a regular guitar player in what became known as the Wrecking Crew - the loose Los Angeles-based group of session musicians which included Hal Blaine and Leon Russell and which played on many of the best-known songs of the 60s and 70s. Glen Campbell is also an immensely talented musician. The flow of royalties from writing a massive hit record gave him the freedom to pursue his own direction as a musician.Īlthough others would bolster John Hartford’s royalty cheques in later years, it was Glen Campbell’s version of his song which first hit the top of the charts. He was always grateful to “Gentle On My Mind”. His musical talents and his skill for witty, idiosyncratic lyrics were popular with the public, so he toured regularly. He was much in demand as a fiddle player and banjo player. John Hartford was a prolific and talented multi-instrumentalist who released 30 or so albums over his career. Songs which take weeks or months to grind out are not usually nearly as good because they are put together via a more rational thinking process and have much less of the divine in them. His own memories took over and, like every other time when a songwriter receives a gift of music or lyrics from the gods, wrote the song in about half an hour.īrilliant songs are nearly always written quickly, the product of some kind of divine intervention. Hartford wrote the song after watching the film “Doctor Zhivago”. John Hartford’s song is about a restless character who finds it hard to settle in one place. Although Hartford found some success with his own version, most people in the UK will know Dean Martin’s or Glen Campbell’s versions better. “Gentle On My Mind” was written by John Hartford. Let’s face it - a song that can win five Grammys over 50 years for three different artists must be pretty good. This 1967 song won four Grammys, shared between two different artists, that year and picked up another Grammy in 2014 for the version I’m writing about today. I came across a great version of “Gentle On My Mind” this week. Foremost among them,was this delightful re-working of Glen Campbell’s breakthrough hit, “Gentle On My Mind” by The Band Perry… When it was clear Glen Campbell was fading there were tributes from across the music industry. “Gentle On My Mind” - Glen Campbell/The Band Perryįollowing Glen Campbell’s recent passing I thought it was time to revisit an article I wrote a couple of years ago.
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