Jimmy Webb recalls the desolate stretch of Oklahoma that inspired Wichita Lineman. 'Flat for 50 miles,' he says. 'Nothing out there except endless railroad tracks and telephone poles. Then suddenly there's a guy at the top of one of the poles. I never saw him again, but I never forgot him.'

Webb wrote the song about the telephone worker's solitude and an imagined conversation with a distant lover. Glen Campbell released it in 1968 and it became a major hit. Webb, now 80, spoke by video call from his kitchen in Long Island. He said listeners have read the song in unexpected ways. One correspondent thought it was about a football lineman. A woman believed the young man in the song is electrocuted.

Webb also wrote By the Time I Get to Phoenix, Galveston and MacArthur Park, all from the 1960s. This year, Nick Cave and Flea recorded Wichita Lineman, and Guns N' Roses played it live. In February, Webb was also linked to the 2026 awards, after Kendrick Lamar's TV Off, which samples a jazz version of MacArthur Park, won best rap song. Webb has three Grammys.

A new album of found songs

Webb had planned to step back from touring. He changed his mind after noticing that his longtime friend and collaborator Art Garfunkel, 84, was booked to play the Royal Albert Hall in London. He has since continued to perform and has released a new album, his first in 13 years. Producer Fred Mollin encouraged the project by pointing out how long it had been.

The album, Yours for the Taking: The Found Songs of Jimmy Webb, features new recordings of previously unheard songs. Webb wrote three or four songs a week during his busiest years. Some were rejected by artists and others were left unfinished. He later returned to them and reworked them. 'As a young songwriter, you don't want to put those songs with your others,' he said.

One song on the album, I Miss the Mistakes, was intended for Dolly Parton. Webb first wrote Winter Clothes, sung with Graham Nash, for Frank Sinatra. Webb recalled playing it for Sinatra and realising it might not be ready. Sinatra told him the song was not quite finished. Webb said he finished it decades later.

From church songs to Motown

Webb, the son of an Oklahoma Baptist preacher, began by writing songs for church. As a teenager, he heard Turn Around, Look at Me by Glen Campbell on the radio while driving a tractor. He said he decided then that Campbell was the singer he wanted for his songs. Six years later, Campbell's recording of By the Time I Get to Phoenix sold a million copies.

Webb said Campbell later asked him for another song about a town. Webb wrote Wichita Lineman, and Campbell recorded it before it was complete. Webb said Campbell told him it was finished. Galveston, an anti-war song written during the Vietnam conflict, further established their working relationship.

Hurt, friendship and hard drinking

Some of Webb's best-known songs came from personal pain. He wrote MacArthur Park after ending his relationship with Susan Horton, who had also inspired By the Time I Get to Phoenix. The seven-minute song was a Top 5 hit for Irish actor Richard Harris in 1967. Donna Summer later took it to No 1 on the disco chart in 1978.

Webb described his work with Harris as a close partnership. 'He was like my older brother,' he said. Webb recalled touring Ireland during the Troubles and playing a Belfast club guarded by men with machine guns. He said his heavy drinking began during that period.

Webb also recalled a night at Harris's London flat, when the actor drank heavily and began taking off his clothes. Webb went to bed. Hours later, a cab driver returned Harris, who was wearing only underpants. The driver said he had found him on the King's Road, where he had been singing.

Webb also formed a close friendship with singer Harry Nilsson. The two were drawn into John Lennon's well-known 'lost weekend'. Webb said he has outlived many of the people who shaped his life. He said he thinks about Nilsson and Harris often.

Sobriety and a message for older generations

Webb has not drunk alcohol since 2002. He said he once could not perform without drinking first, and he did not play his first sober show until 24 years ago. He said he now feels more comfortable with his voice. 'Now I'm at the age where I don't give a damn what people think,' he said.

Webb also commented on the state of society. He said people have placed too much value on material things. He said he wants his album to show that people of his age can still feel, care about future generations and remain active. 'Turning 80 doesn't mean we have to sit around like lumps of coal,' he said. He has already begun writing songs for another album.