Wichita Lineman

francer

Rocker said:

Guys, Wichita Lineman is a song.  A song that tells a good story.  Glenn Campbell was a fine guitar player who played lovely chords to support his singing.  IMHO that song does not 'work' when played instrumentally.

It’s almost as if everyone on this forum is obsessed with guitars …

ToneControl

ricky50 said:

Try this version - best I've heard 

very nice

I'd like to hear a Pat Metheny solo baritone arrangement too

Hattigol

Aren't they called Wichita Referee's Assistants these days?

EricTheWeary

If I sing it in my head it turns into the Pearl and Dean jingle. 

Cig35

ToneControl said:

ricky50 said:

Try this version - best I've heard 

very nice

I'd like to hear a Pat Metheny solo baritone arrangement too

Not Metheny, but at least a solo baritone arrangement...

 

ArchtopDave

ricky50 said:

Try this version - best I've heard 

I love this version as well. Somewhere I have books of the transcriptions of the first two Johnny A albums - there's a lot to like on both these albums if you like this style of instrumental guitar playing. 

Stuckfast

26 replies so far and only one attempt to answer the actual question! So thanks @digitalkettle -- anyone else care to chime in?

Blueingreen

I don't have anything like the theory credentials of some posters, but here's my take.

Around the time this tune was written a lot of pop songwriters were writing melodies using major chords that weren't necessarily in the same key.  It's all over Otis Redding/Aretha Franklin and Stax stuff generally, just for an example.  So you start with G major and when you play an E or an A or a B (where you might expect minor) you use major chords.

I think it's debatable whether there's much value in analysing that stuff in terms of a starting key and modulations.  You're using complex theory to explain something much simpler and instinctive: I can use a major chords that are not in the key and still find melodies that make them sound strong and right.

This tune is clearly more harmonically sophisticated than most of the Stax stuff, but I wonder if the same idea isn't being applied.  The overall key is in F but he uses G major and D major chords to give a sound that I think would have seemed quite hip in 1968:  it gives a sense of  soul or rock harmony as opposed to more traditional American songbook/functional harmony.  Take out those two major chords and the rest of the harmony looks much more conventional.

EricTheWeary

There’s a BBC article about the song with the background. In it says ‘…the song plays a clever trick by starting in the key of F major before switching to the relative minor, Dmajor and never fully resolving - echoing the lineman’s disjointed state of mind…’

Interestingly Webb didn’t think much of his own lyric, in isolation I think it’s a bit naff but saved by the vocal performance. 

Blueingreen said:

I don't have anything like the theory credentials of some posters, but here's my take.

Around the time this tune was written a lot of pop songwriters were writing melodies using major chords that weren't necessarily in the same key.  It's all over Otis Redding/Aretha Franklin and Stax stuff generally, just for an example.  So you start with G major and when you play an E or an A or a B (where you might expect minor) you use major chords.

I think it's debatable whether there's much value in analysing that stuff in terms of a starting key and modulations.  You're using complex theory to explain something much simpler and instinctive: I can use a major chords that are not in the key and still find melodies that make them sound strong and right.

This tune is clearly more harmonically sophisticated than most of the Stax stuff, but I wonder if the same idea isn't being applied.  The overall key is in F but he uses G major and D major chords to give a sound that I think would have seemed quite hip in 1968:  it gives a sense of  soul or rock harmony as opposed to more traditional American songbook/functional harmony.  Take out those two major chords and the rest of the harmony looks much more conventional.

IIRC Redding played guitar in open G so a lot of his songwriting was major chords only. I think some of the open tuning stuff by the Stones was also well outside the diatonic for a similar reason. But a lot of blues/ blues based music is not strictly diatonic and as you say that was the hip sound of the day. So wether Webb was trying to be a bit bluesy or add a sense of longing or just hit upon a happy accident we may never know. 

HPhillipsmusic

i actually read an entire book on this song earlier this year, one whole book on one (partly finished) song! 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Wichita-Lineman-Searching-Greatest-Unfinished/dp/0571353401

HPhillipsmusic

I think this version is the only worthy cover ive found

Brad

@digitalkettle - I think that’s pretty much on the money there. I’d argue there’s just enough ambiguity in places to label things slightly differently… but that would only to give other options for improv really. 

I’d never heard this song until it got called on a couple of occasions. With the way the changes move it’s a deceptively tricky song to play over!

 @Stuckfast it does indeed start in F, modulates and then works it’s way back to the key of F. How that came to be is up for debate. For me, there’s enough going on to suggest conscious harmonic choices, or choices that were arrived at intuitively, but from a place of harmonic understanding. 

mixolyd

guitarjack66

Lets not get into debating Gentle on My Mind!

Stuckfast

guitarjack66 said:

Lets not get into debating Gentle on My Mind!

Is there much to debate?

guitars4you

Stuckfast said:

guitarjack66 said:

Lets not get into debating Gentle on My Mind!

Is there much to debate?

- No debate required - solo around 1.25

The only debate me and my dad had on this was Glen or Dean Martin

guitars4you

ArchtopDave said:

ricky50 said:

Try this version - best I've heard 

I love this version as well. Somewhere I have books of the transcriptions of the first two Johnny A albums - these a lot to like on both these albums if you like this style of instrumental guitar playing. 

I'm somewhat of a Johnny A fan - some very nice stuff 

DrCornelius

guitars4you said:

Stuckfast said:

guitarjack66 said:

Lets not get into debating Gentle on My Mind!

Is there much to debate?

- No debate required - solo around 1.25

The only debate me and my dad had on this was Glen or Dean Martin

That was awesome , what a talent GC was 

guitars4you

DrCornelius said:

guitars4you said:

Stuckfast said:

guitarjack66 said:

Lets not get into debating Gentle on My Mind!

Is there much to debate?

- No debate required - solo around 1.25

The only debate me and my dad had on this was Glen or Dean Martin

That was awesome , what a talent GC was 

agree - and you can tell how special it was ,when you look at the other guys around him, just smiling during that solo

Roland

Stuckfast said:

Yes UG is rubbish and a lot of the other versions on there are comically bad! 

The problem with many of these sites is that they copy each other’s content. So if a 15 year old in his bedroom in Wisconsin uploads a crap version that’s what every other site copies.