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Like its immediate predecessor, Rhinestone Cowboy, 1976’s Bloodline is produced by Dennis Lambert and Brian Potter and is something of a very loose concept album, where about half the songs have distinct thematic undercurrents that help bring the record together as a whole.
Here, many of the songs address familial situations, whether it’s relations between a man and wife or a man and his child.
So, the title Bloodline does indeed have significance; even if not every song here fits a particular theme, it certainly has an undercurrent of how a man is tied to his kin, his bloodline.
While this record didn’t produce crossover hits on the level of “Rhinestone Cowboy” or “Country Boy (You Got Your Feet in LA” — only the deliberate pop crossover medley of “Don’t Pull Your Love/Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye,” easily the weakest moment on the record, reached the Top Ten on either the pop or country charts — Bloodline is in many ways stronger than the Rhinestone Cowboy album, because it follows through its themes better and has a slightly stronger, or at least more consistent, set of songs.
Glen Campbell is at his most effective when he’s singing songs that are at least tangentially related to the main theme.
Take the two tales of fatherhood: The joint custody epic “See You on Sunday,” where he says goodbye to his kid for the weekend, is as heart-wrenching as the fatherly advice in “Christiaan No” is moving.
But it’s not just the songs that flow into the “bloodline” theme that work — “Everytime I Sing a Love Song” is a lovely ballad and Lambert/Potter’s opener, “Baby Don’t Be Givin’ Me Up,” is deceptively cheerful and all the stronger for it.
And the same could be said for the album — it’s soothing on the surface, but dig deeper, and real pain can be heard, making Bloodline one of Campbell’s most complex, and best, records.
Personnel
- Glen Campbell – vocals, acoustic guitar
- Dean Parks – electric guitar
- Ben Benay – electric guitar
- Fred Tackett – acoustic guitar
- Larry Carlton – electric guitar
- Joe Sidore – acoustic guitar
- Scott Edwards – bass guitar
- Lee Sklar – bass guitar
- Ed Greene – drums
- Dave Kemper – drums
- Billy Graham – fiddle
- Carl Jackson – banjo
- Dennis Lambert – keyboards, percussion
- Michael Omartian – keyboards
- Tom Sellers – keyboards
- Gary Coleman – percussion
- Paul Hubinon, Chuck Findley, Jim Horn, Tom Scott, Dick Hyde – horns
- Sid Sharp – concertmaster strings
- Ginger Baker, Julia Tillman Waters, Maxine Willard Waters, David Durham, Oren Waters, Michael Smotherman, Lisa Roberts, Glen Campbell – backing vocals
Production
- Producers – Dennis Lambert, Brian Potter
- Arranger – Thomas Sellers
- Engineer – Joe Sidore
- Recorded by Ralph Osborn III
- Mastering Engineer – Mike Reese
- Production assistant – Marsha Lewis
- Rhythm arranged by Michael Omartian on “Don’t Pull Your Love/Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye”, “Lay Me Down (Roll Me Out To Sea)” and “Bloodline”
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