One afternoon in the spring of 1978, I was riding shotgun in my mom’s white Delta 88 Oldsmobile. That car had the stickiest seats I’ve ever known — black pleather.
As we pulled into our driveway on Marion Boulevard in Forest, Mississippi, the DJ at the local radio station, WQST, announced a giveaway. The second caller would win an album. I’m not even sure I caught the album or the artist. I was too excited about the possibility of winning something.
We had a big ole driveway. I flung the car door open before my mom pulled all the way into the carport. I ran inside and dialed, as in literally dialed — on a rotary phone — 469-3701. (There are enough clues in the preceding sentence for a good archaeologist a thousand years from now to date it within 25 years.)
The DJ answered. I breathlessly asked, “What caller am I?”
He said, “You’re caller No. 1.”
I hung up and dialed all seven digits again. To my amazement, the phone rang. I said, “What caller am I?”
He said, “This time you’re caller No. 2 and have won a double album of ‘Glen Campbell Live at the Royal Festival Hall.’”
The station had experienced a fun two-year run by bringing in a DJ named Big Daddy Bobaloo and rebranding from WQST to T92. Hence, every morning, Big Daddy Bobaloo would say, “This is Big Daddy Bobaloo on T92.”
For that brief period, T92 was like magic. Everybody I knew had been listening to Big Daddy in the morning.
On the day I was caller No. 2, I was ecstatic, but even at 13, I understood what my big win meant. If one eighth-grader on a rotary phone could be both caller No. 1 and caller No. 2, T92’s days were numbered.
That afternoon, I did my best to convince my mother to take me to pick up my prize, never mind that we didn’t have a working record player. She was of a more reasonable mind and said we could go the next day.
And so we did.
I had been babysitting a lot and had a little stash of cash.
Within weeks, I had enough in hand to go to the Western Auto and buy myself a stereo with two large speakers. It had a cassette player, and I could make mix tapes. The combination of the Glen Campbell double album and the stereo changed my life. I retired the flip-clock radio Santa brought me two Christmases earlier.
Granted, Glen Campbell was the only album I had for a month or so, but at least it was a double album — there were lots of song options. I listened to the album over and over again, stacking the two records, listening all the way through and then turning them over. Glen Campbell wasn’t exactly what the rest of the eighth-grade cool kids were listening to, but I dissected those songs and what he said in between them like a science experiment.
To this day, I can quote pieces of what Campbell said between the songs. He had traveled to England for the concert on the Concorde.
An Air France Concorde takes off at Roissy airport, north of Paris, for a test flight over the Atlantic ocean to check systems at supersonic speed Monday, Aug. 27, 2001. The tests are among the conditions set to gain clearance to resume commercial flights, as all Concorde planes have been grounded since the July 25, 2000, crash outside Paris that killed 113 people. (AP Photo/Laurent Rebours) Keyword Aviation Business
“And that thing goes so fast,” he said, stretching out the word “fast” like it had 19 a’s in it.
A year ago, I decided to revisit as many of the songs I’ve loved along the way. I highly recommend the exercise. I hadn’t listened to Glen Campbell earnestly for years. When I did, I was struck by how good the music was — not how good it was for a 13-year-old girl who didn’t know any better. Just how good it was.
He opened the album with a song by Janis Ian called “Stars” that segued into “Rhinestone Cowboy.” Jimmy Webb conducted the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra for much of the album, including his own song, “Wichita Lineman,” which has remained one of my favorites throughout the decades.
I’ve tried twice to buy a copy online and have come up empty. This week, I listened to as many of the recordings as I could on YouTube. Music is the closest thing I know to time travel.
I am happy that 13-year-old me appreciated that music.
Back then, on occasion, I quasi-forced my friends to listen to my big prize. They were kind about it, but they never shared my enthusiasm. So, mostly, I listened to Glen on my own, dreaming about what it would be like to be a rhinestone cowgirl or to fly on the Concorde.
That thing went so fast.
