defend the indefensible: CHICAGO (the band)

Absolutely, "Dialogue" is one of their best, I think. Also, "Introduction" off of the debut and "Movin' In" on II...love those horn solos, like Parazaider's kind of free jazz switching to Loughnane's tijuana thing. "In the Country"...they had a lot of great songs just early on.

The first Chicago incarnation is toe-tappable when I remember it but don't actually listen to it.

The Cetera-heavy incarnation is the worst shmaltz imaginable.

i think there's even a peter cetera solo single i like, but i can't remember the name.

Yeah, I'm being dicty about Kath I guess. I dunno, he could play, I get that--I suppose it's my prejuidice against that *kind* of guitar-playing, maybe? Like I could say the same thing about Zappa--good, yeah, but I am put off by the linearity of it all, that post-west-coast single-string shit. And I know, I know, Kath did other things. I have bad memories of hearing that stuff as a child, too, I always hated "25 or 6 to 4" and "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is." I'm biased toward rhythm guitar players, I guess, and Chicago just always seemed like one thing superimposed on another, and the guitar always sounded tacked on somehow. But I actually do like "Wishing You Were Here" OK, and even "Harry Truman" (Randy Newman missed him) is tolerable. And that one with the wood-like cover ("Chicago V"?) is one I kinda remember liking somewhat. And, I was in high-school jazzband and all those guys were always talking about Maynard Ferguson and Chicago and BS&T and Bill Chase, meanwhile I was listening to Howlin' Wolf and Junior Parker and Stax, so I guess also, to lay it all out in shuck-and-jive, I always associate Chicago with those jazz-head motherfuckers and their "charts" and all that crap--that jazzbo snobbery of their "good music."

it exists until the cta starts renovating the fullerton stop. i don't know when that will happen.

Their '80s hits may be better or they may be worse, I can't tell. But they're definitely more frequently played on the radio, so I'm sure to be uncharitable. Dunno if I've heard Pete Cetera's solo stuff and don't care.

Actually, I implicitly praised it in my blanket-endorsement of all their 70s singles. :)

The former just blows the shit out of the latter though by a googol country miles... if not for, well, every song "Questions 67 and 68", "Free Form Guitar", "I'm A Man" (that endless drum break!), "Liberation" once it gets warmed up...

So, my question, the followup to Chicago (would that be Chicago III since it's the third album? or is it Chicago II, therefore making the numbering/naming convention off by one?)... worth getting, if I absolutely love the first one, and kinda sorta dig the second?

"Dialog" is an INCREDIBLE song. Ditto "Feelin' Stronger", "Wishin' You Were Here" and a number of even their later hits. The drums on every song I've ever heard are creative as Hell, too. And I'm partial to the other singer, the rough-voiced guy who sang "Listen".

I would say Chicago V is a pretty underrated, one. I read somebody call it the greatest Canterbury prog album an American band ever made, which is a funny description (probably because of the first song, "A Hit by Varese", with the Fender Rhodes, etc.).

Chicago VI is the most lackluster of the first seven, IMO. Chicago VII, I think, is the one with the fusion-instrumental stuff on it, right?

Speaking of stuff bringing people to tears, I have to say, "Wishing You Were Here" has always done that for me. Even when I was a little kid and mostly hated them. I always liked "Colour My World" for its weirdness. I mean, listen closely, it is really weird.

Compositionally they are unassailable. Most people hate them for their sound.

New doc coming out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=OeZ2BRHojTs

Some of their stuff is pretty good. I echo the "Make Me Smile" comments up there, and i saw a video from Tanglewood '70 where the guitar solo on 25 or 6 to 4 was mindblowing, has to be seen/heard to be believed.

Yeah, the earlyish records definitely have their moments. But the MOR ballads (and Terry Kath's "don't worry, it's not loaded") were their death knell. There aren't many bands I hate more than ballady/post-accidental-suicide Chicago. Fucking "Stay The Night" is such an irredeemable ball of shit.

That later period Chicago is really bad.

the mid-seventies ballad stuff I hated when I was a kid but it reaches me now - "if you leave me now," "hard to say I'm sorry"

"wishing you were here" is drop-dead beautiful. the intro could easily lead into a dark pink floyd ballad (like, oh, "wish you were here"), but instead it opens up into a full-on beach boys gospel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tzxXh9n4iM

i guess that, since peter cetera did his best work on his own (the peerless Glory Of Love), you can't really defend the band he was in.

― fsharp, Sunday, February 13, 2005 1:20 PM (10 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i'm glad there is at least one other person here who unashamedly likes this song. (hits the same sweet spot as that REO Speedwagon ballad, "keep on lovin you" or whatever.)

"old days" is incredibly obvious but it can kinda get to me at the right moments, you know?

chicago strikes me as an interesting (in theory; sometimes in reality) melding of progressive rock with the horn charts-heavy mid-late 60s blue-eyed soul strain of e.g. the buckinghams. that's not a combination that one associates with many other bands.

i like how even when peter cetera isn't multi-tracked he somehow sounds like he is harmonizing with himself. how does he do that?

Look Away, the greatest of Chicago sonsg.

i heard a chicago song on the radio today, one i'd never heard before: "make me smile"

i kind of like it. sounds maybe like the grass roots covering a van halen tune

i see Alfred gave it "good to great" status back in '19

"Make Me Smile" is great, one of Kath's better vocal performances. also on a killer album (Chicago 2)

I've never been a fan, but I eventually found a way to enjoy some of their stuff. I borrowed the Group Portrait box set (the one with the awful cover everyone hated) and even though I didn't like a lot of it, I ended up burning a disc for reference - pretty much every single from CTA to VIII but using the full-length LP versions found on the box set. It wound up being a fairly decent listen for me, leaving behind much of their worst while presenting their most likable stuff in a far more palatable context. ("Make Me Smile" is on there.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=La0RQucMSlY

Even their early "good records" are highly inconsistent, but there's a number of interesting deep cuts up to Chicago VII. Terry Kath's guitar prowess is well-known, but Peter Cetera was actually a really dynamic bassist and maybe the best player in the group. There are even passages on III that could pass for contemporary Soft Machine (check out the duelling trombones over 5/8 backing in "Mother").
Songwise their peak is probably V, when Robert Lamm was doing most of the writing. The production goes really soft on VI, and though I love the melody of "If You Leave Me Now", they soon ran the ballad approach into the ground.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_torOTK5qc

Leonid & Friends - When you want to hear a bunch of Russian musicians absolutely killing it on Chicago tunes (and other '70s horn bands like EW&F and Tower of Power).

Plus, you won't get caught with "Chicago" in your YouTube search history.