{
    "id": 358125,
    "slug": "the-wichita-lineman-dylan-jones",
    "nstc": null,
    "title": "The Wichita Lineman",
    "subtitle": null,
    "collection_title": null,
    "collection_part_number": null,
    "annotation": null,
    "description": "}Cameron On Cameron{ and }When Ziggy Played Guitar{ author Jones goes on an investigative journey into the story of Jimmy Webb's 1968 song 'The Wichita Lineman', blending close-listening, interviews and travelogue\n\nThe sound of 'Wichita Lineman' was the sound of ecstatic solitude, but then its hero was the quintessential loner. What a great metaphor he was: a man who needed a woman more than he actually wanted her.\nWritten in 1968 by Jimmy Webb, 'Wichita Lineman' is the first philosophical country song: a heartbreaking torch ballad still celebrated for its mercurial songwriting genius fifty years later. It was recorded by Glen Campbell in LA with a legendary group of musicians known as 'the Wrecking Crew', and something about the song's enigmatic mood seemed to capture the tensions in America at a moment of crisis. Fusing a dribble of bass, searing strings, tremolo guitar and Campbell's plaintive vocals, Webb's paean to the American West describes a telephone lineman's longing for an absent lover, who he hears 'singing in the wire' - and like all good love songs, it's an SOS from the heart.\nMixing close-listening, interviews and travelogue, Dylan Jones explores the legacy of a record that has entertained and haunted millions for over half a century. What is it about this song that continues to seduce listeners, and how did the parallel stories of Campbell and Webb - songwriters and recording artists from different ends of the spectrum - unfold in the decades following? Part biography, part work of musicological archaeology, The Wichita Lineman opens a window on to America in the late-twentieth century through the prism of a song that has been covered by myriad artists in the intervening decades.",
    "additional_content": null,
    "bestseller_60": null,
    "imprint": null,
    "language_code": "eng",
    "original_language_code": null,
    "page_count": null,
    "duration_seconds": null,
    "publication_date_first": "2019-01-01",
    "publication_date_latest": "2019-01-01",
    "cover_url": null,
    "editions": [],
    "ratings_count": 0,
    "read_count": 0,
    "review_count": 0,
    "favorite_count": 0,
    "reading_status_read_count": 0,
    "reading_status_reading_count": 0,
    "reading_status_want_to_read_count": 0,
    "rating_average": null,
    "ratings_distribution": {
        "1": 0,
        "2": 0,
        "3": 0,
        "4": 0,
        "5": 0
    },
    "created_at": "2025-09-19T13:28:14+00:00",
    "updated_at": "2025-11-05T00:30:18+00:00",
    "publisher": {
        "id": 4225,
        "slug": "faber-faber",
        "name": "Faber & Faber",
        "created_at": "2025-09-19T13:09:16+00:00",
        "updated_at": "2025-09-19T15:10:07+00:00"
    },
    "contributors": [
        {
            "id": 219387,
            "slug": "dylan-jones-2",
            "key_names": "Jones",
            "names_before_key": "Dylan",
            "prefix_to_key": null,
            "contributor_role": "A01",
            "readable_contributor_role": "Author"
        }
    ],
    "genres": [],
    "subjects": [],
    "campaigns": []
}