June 19 – Turntable Talk 27: As Windy City As The Sears Tower

Welcome back to Turntable Talk! This is our 27th round, believe it or not. By now all our regular readers know how this goes, but for any new readers, first off, welcome! I hope you find it interesting and check back from time to time here – new posts go up daily and we run the ‘Turntable Talk’ feature usually once a month. And second, briefly, on Turntable Talk we have a number of guest columnists from other music sites, sounding off on one particular topic. We have an index of past topics, with the final one of each in the link, others could be found going back day by day from each of those.

This month, our topic is a little different – Art Rock. No, we’re not digging into obscure rock that somehow seems a tad too experimental for the masses, but the actual art of music. In specific, album art and packaging. Of course, that was a bigger deal when vinyl ruled… that big 12” square canvas that was a record cover let a lot of imaginations and artistic talents run wild! It created an initial impact. Even the Grammy Awards noticed that; since 1959 they’ve given out an annual award for Best Album Cover or Recording Packaging. Frank Sinatra won the first one; since then The Beatles Revolver and Sgt. Pepper, Chicago’s X, Supertramp’s Breakfast in America, Linda Ronstadt’s Get Closer and the Rolling Stones Tattoo You are among the many winners. Thus, we’ve asked our contributors to highlight an album which had packaging they found exceptional.

Next up, today , from the Atlanta area and The Sound of One Hand Typing, we have John who no doubt has had two eyes looking for something to applaud here.

Our task this month was to comment on the visuals of music: a specific album cover that we consider outstanding, or aspects of the album jacket that are important to us. Having been a fan of the band Chicago since their first album, I immediately thought of the logo that has come to represent the band since their second album.

Chicago’s original name was The Chicago Transit Authority, and that was the name of their debut album. Soon after it was issued, the real Chicago Transit Authority, the public company that operates the buses and light rail inside the city, sued them, demanding that they change their name immediately, if not sooner. Deciding that the city of Chicago was too big to sue the band, they proclaimed in the liner notes for that first album that henceforth they would be known as Chicago.

Wikipedia tells us

Upon being renamed from Chicago Transit Authority to Chicago, the band sported a new logo. Its inspiration was found in the design of the Coca-Cola logo,in the attitude of the city of Chicago itself, and in the desire to visually transcend the individual identities of the band’s members. It was designed by the art director of Columbia/CBS Records, John Berg, with each album’s graphic art work being done by Nick Fasciano.Berg said, “The Chicago logo…was fashioned for me by Nick Fasciano from my sketch.”

The logo has appeared on each album after the first one, and on advertisements, posters, and various of the band’s ephemera. On the album Hot Streets (also known as Chicago XII), for the first time the individual band members were shown on the cover, and the logo was reduced, but was still there (that was the first album after the tragic death of guitarist Terry Kath).

On the album Twenty1, the logo is there, but in the background.

The band’s most recent album, Chicago XXXVIII: Born For This Moment, shows the logo in all its glory, in gold on a black background.

The point is, that logo on the outside is almost as important as the album on the inside. In a way, it’s like the slogan of another great Chicago product line, Zenith: “The Quality Goes In Before The Name Goes On.”

June 14 – X Led To Chicago’s Biggest Hit, ‘Bar’ None

---

Ultimate Classic Rock had it right. “There aren’t many things we can really count on in life,” they pondered, “but during the ’70s you could pretty much bank on a new Chicago record every year, and expect to see it near the top of the charts.” Indeed you could, and they did their part for the Bicentennial Year, releasing Chicago X on this day in 1976. By then they were famous for numbering their albums (this was indeed the tenth, although that included one live one and their Greatest Hits) and for having their stylized logo somewhere on the album cover. In this case, it’s etched into a big chocolate bar being opened, hence its nickname among some fans as “the chocolate bar record.”

In some ways, it was pretty much the same as before for them. They had a reasonably consistent eight member lineup, they used producer James Guercio as always and recorded it at the Caribou Ranch they so loved in Colorado. But there were noticeable changes too. For instance, none of the 11 songs roll past four minutes – a stark contrast to their early days of often long, meandering almost jam-session like works. It also seemed like Peter Cetera was taking the spotlight more and more, although at this point Chicago was still a basic democracy and most of the members got to contribute to the writing and singing. UCR note that Robert Lamm had done a whole lot of the writing not long before that but was wearying of it a little and “other members of the band stepped up.” Lamm still wrote four, but several others, notably Cetera started to take more of an active role in that. And it paid off in a big way with the single “If You Leave Me Now”, which he wrote and sang (oddly Guercio played most of the guitars on it, not regular six-stringer Terry Kath.) That would win them a Grammy, top the charts… but possibly put them squarely in the “easy listening soft rock” room of the music world from thereon in.

After “If You Leave Me Now”, the album’s most noted song was another single, “Another Rainy Day in New York City”, also sung by Cetera but written by Lamm.

The album was good, but different than say their first six or so, with less horns, less rock, more tightly-cropped pop songs. As Ultimate Classic Rock said, “they entered the studio on a creative upswing” and they were “still more than the sum of (their) parts” but… it “lacked the compositional depth and musical muscle they’d shown earlier”. Still, outside of the “lyrically dunder-headed ‘Skin Tight‘ and ‘You Get It Up’” they figured it to be a very good pop album. Allmusic later concurred, giving it 3-stars, singling out the hit single, and also noting that while they “effectively abandoned their extended free-form jazz leanings for more succinct pop” they “could (rock) as evidenced by the Terry Kath, full-tilt rave up ‘Once or Twice.’”

How did the public feel about the shift? Well, it’s hard to say. “Another Rainy Day in New York City” wasn’t a big hit, reaching #32 at home and #37 in Canada and “You Are On My Mind”, a rare Chicago song with James Pankow singing missed the top 40 altogether. But “If You Leave Me Now” was close to the anthem of the Bicentennial summer, being their first #1 single, and topping charts in Canada and Britain (which had been lukewarm to them until then) and earning them their one and only platinum single. The album on the other hand was their first since 1971 not to go to #1 domestically, hitting #3 (and the same mark in Canada and Australia as well) and #21 in the UK, where their previous four hadn’t even hit the charts). It also is now double-platinum in the States, where it was actually the first one of theirs to be recognized at platinum status. To mark that occasion, Columbia Records gave them a 25 pound, platinum chocolate bar to look like the one on the album cover! Whoever’s sitting on that these days has a pricey little knick-knack… it would be worth about $350 000.

Grammy voters liked the “new” Chicago too; they won their first of the awards for the album, for Best Pop Performance by a Group or Duo (on “If You Leave Me Now”), Best Vocal Arrangements for the same song and for the creative cover, which won Best Album Packaging. By the way… if you are interested in album covers and packaging, you’ll want to be sure to check in here next week…

April 28 – Chicago Were In Transit To Stardom

A big band, in every sense of the phrase, had its “Beginnings” on this day in 1969. Chicago‘s debut album, which was using the band’s original name “Chicago Transit Authority” hit the shelves 55 years ago.

Chicago (or CTA) had formed two years prior in the Windy City and much like Blood, Sweat and Tears, incorporated a liberal use of horns in their jazz-rock music. They signed to Columbia Records, home to BS&T, thanks largely to their producer James Guercio, who had also done the work with the other band. He lobbied hard for Chicago, and eventually Clive Davis agreed saying later it was an obvious fit for the label who enjoyed the “blending elements of jazz, pop and rock (which was) ground-breaking.” Others suggest he hesitated, thinking them too similar to his other horn band. Either way, they went with Columbia and had a rocky relationship with Davis who liked their music but not their demands for things like double-albums and posters included inside the LP.

Chicago Transit Authority (later nicknamed “Chicago I”) was audacious as a debut. It was indeed a double-LP, with nearly 78 minutes of music over 12 songs, only two of which were under 4” in length. The final track, “Liberation” ran over 14 minutes. While the band boasted several singers, several writers and an unusual (for rock) trio of horn players – Walter Parazaider, James Pankow (who also handled the cowbell) and Lee Loughlane – at this point in time, Robert Lamm, the keyboardist, was clearly in charge. He wrote most of the tracks and sang lead on over half of the songs including the appropriate for a debut “Beginnings.” Peter Cetera, later to take a more prominent role, shared vocal duties on “Questions 67 & 68” and did a bit of the writing.

Remarkably the seven-man outfit recorded the entire body of work in five days in New York City, with the final mixing taking another five. The six-minute plus “Free Form Guitar”, guitarist Terry Kath’s homage to his friend Jimi Hendrix, was recorded all in one take. The album however, sounded anything but raw or unplanned.

While it contains a trio of songs now considered not only among the band’s best but among Oldies Radio’s mainstays, it wasn’t an overnight success. The first single, “Questions 67 & 68” barely charted at first, and “Beginnings” didn’t at all. And the album languished in the low parts of the Billboard charts. However, their fanbase grew and the release of their second album made them popular, at which point this record rose up the charts, eventually to #17 in the U.S. and #10 in Canada. It stayed on the charts for 171 weeks, setting a record for longevity in 1974 (although at the time there was another album on there which would eclipse that soon – Dark side of The Moon.) After being sued by the commuter transportation company and having to lose the “transit authority” off their name, and having success with Chicago II, Columbia wisely re-released singles off the debut in 1971… to much better reception. “Beginnings” would rise to #7 and “Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?” did as well, and hit #2 in Canada in 1971. The album eventually earned them a double-platinum award and a nomination for the Best New Group at the Grammys. They lost that one to Crosby, Stills & Nash… as did Led Zeppelin.

Allmusic rate the record as a 4-star effort, saying “few debut albums can boast as consistently solid an effort.” Classic Rock Reviews agrees, saying that they “fused brass, jazz, soul and blues-based rock & roll, and with three lead vocalists and composers, the group’s sound was as diverse as their influences” and thinking that on some of the songs, especially “Does Anybody…”, the entire group brought along their “A-game.”

Apparently we agreed, as the record began a streak of 12-straight albums from them which hit the American top 20.

March 24 – Chicago Thought 8 Was A Cardinal Number?

People like things they can depend on. And in the 1970’s, you could depend on the jazz-rock combo Chicago for a couple of things – putting out an album per year and being able to know which album it was in their discography, since each was titled for the number of release it was. So, predictably on this day in 1975, a year and two weeks after their VII album, they were back with Chicago VIII. Some have suggested maybe being less predictable might have helped…as might a little more time, since as allmusic put it, on this one they sounded “road-weary and running low on steam.”

While the previous album was somewhat daring, being a double album with much of the first disc being instrumental jazz, for this one they decided to put out a much more straight-forward set. Ten songs, just under 40 minutes, pretty much consistently pop/soft rock tunes. The most surprising thing about it may have been the packaging. The cover had the usual band logo, but set against an “embroidered” bird image, which looks a great deal like the symbol for the St. Louis Cardinals (the arch-rival team of Chicago’s favorite sons, the Cubs). As well, the original LP included a poster and T-shirt iron-on of the band for added value.

The added value might have been needed as VIII is seldom noted as being one of the band’s better works, despite having one of their best and most-enduring singles in “Old Days.”

Almost everyone likes that nostalgic look back at things like Howdy Doody and drive-in movies written by their trumpeter James Pankow (although Pankow wasn’t a primary writer for Chicago, he did manage to write a good percentage of their best-loved songs including “Color My World” and “Searching So Long”). The rest of the songs were not as memorable. The first single, “Harry Truman”, was described as “depression-era jazz” like “Old Days” looking back nostalgically. On this single though they were pining for a president they could get behind, like Truman, rather than “lies from men who’d sell us out.” The frustration is understandable given that the album was recorded in summer ’74, with a backdrop of Watergate and Nixon’s resignation. The recording was done at Caribou Ranch again, with their favorite producer of the era, James Guercio being helped out by another famous producer, Phil Ramone, doing the mixing.

Guercio and Ramone combined couldn’t help make the material sound terribly exciting though. Allmusic later rated it only 2-stars,lowest of the band’s first dozen albums and suggesting that only “Old Days” and the mildly-adventurous, 7-minute “Thank You Great Spirit” were notable, suggesting too that Peter Cetera, singer on six of the tracks seemed “lazy.”

The public may have agreed. Although the album did hit #1 in the U.S. – their fourth straight – and #3 in Canada, and again went platinum in the States, it spent fewer weeks on the chart than any of the predecessors had, facilitating Chicago IX , a greatest hits compilation, only six months later. Remarkably, given how seldom it gets played on oldies radio, “Harry Truman” was a top 20 hit for them and “Old Days” made it to #5. That made it their 14th top 20 hit of the decade, a number at the time equaling another famous utilizer of Caribou Ranch… Elton John.

November 8 – Chicago, Elton Bought Into The Rocky Mountain Way

In our previous post today, we mentioned Elton John’s Caribou album, among others. Some might wonder where he got the idea for the title. It wasn’t a nod to the big northern moose-lookalikes. Instead it was named after the recording studio he made the record at – Caribou Ranch. He was far from the only star who would call it temporary home from time to time. So, let’s have a look at one of the country’s most popular studios in its day.

True to its name, Caribou was indeed a ranch. Although synonymous in the music world with “Chicago”, it’s located in the Rocky Mountains, not far from Boulder, Colorado and, being less than 50 miles outside of Denver, close enough to a major airport to allow easy access for stars to drop by from pretty much anywhere. In the 1960s, the Western Stage Coach was filmed on its 4000 acres.

Fast forward to the ’70s and Columbia’s top producer was James William Guercio. He’d done records for the likes of Blood, Sweat & Tears and others but had become closely associated with the band Chicago, being their normal producer. He didn’t like working in the big city, nor the restrictions he felt unions placed on him in the big studios. So he decided to take matters into his own hands and bought the ranch. He converted a barn there into a state-of-the-art (for the times) studio and upgraded some of the cabins for artists to stay in. It was ready to use by 1972, and by way of happy coincidence, Joe Walsh was living nearby and working on a record. He had troubles in his own studio, so he popped by Caribou to finish recording his Barnstorm album. While there, he wrote his first hit, “Rocky Mountain Way.” “The Rocky Mountain way is better than the way I had,” he’d later say, “because the music is way better.”

He told his friend Rick Derringer about the place, and he went and recorded his hit “Rock & Roll Hootchie Coo” there. Soon Guercio had his own band in and Chicago recorded albums VI through XI there. The film about Terry Kath’s life showed how much the band loved the place. It was Party Central when they were around, and with all that open space, Kath could go out and play with guns, a hobby of his which eventually led to his unfortunate demise.

Word of the place’s appeal and sound quality soon spread, and Elton booked it for his follow-up to Goodbye Yellow Brick Road – what would be Caribou. He loved it… even though making music there wasn’t as easy as some studios due to its physical location. It’s about 8000 feet above sea level, and the air is thin. “It could be really hard to sing at such a high altitude,” he would write in his memoir. He threw tantrums at times due to that but all-in-all “it was great up at Caribou. The studio was much more plush than the Chateau (d’Herouville, the French studio he’d recorded at several times) . You stayed in beautiful log cabins filled with antiques… there was a screening room for movies…” And while recording there, friends would stop by including Stevie Wonder “who turned up one day and took a snowmobile out and insisted on driving it himself”. Elton marveled that Wonder didn’t kill himself or anybody else, John Lennon also popped by, helped him do his cover of “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds” there and was doing a good job of staying anonymous in Colorado… until Elton joined him to do a little shopping and eating in the town nearby… dressed in a pink fur coat and being chauffeured in a huge limo. On the negative, Elton also remembers it being the place where he first encountered cocaine. “the first line I snorted made me wretch… talk about God’s way to tell you leave it right there.” Of course, he didn’t follow that advice for years.

Elton would record three albums there, and the star factor, combined with the scenery and yes, the sound made the studio famous. The thin air seemed to give the music a bit more of a resonant, fuller quality somehow than sea level studios and the second half of the decade, it was a busy locale for stars making hits. No surprise John Denver made use of it – though ironically his song “Rocky Mountain High” was done in New York – but it was also utilized by artists including Rod Stewart, Steely Dan (briefly), Supertramp, Tom Petty, Stevie Nicks, Peter Frampton… even Michael Jackson who for a time had interest in buying it off Guercio. In time, 45 top 10 albums would be recorded at Caribou and 18 Grammy Winning ones.

However, times, tastes and technologies change. Demand for the studio decreased in the ’80s. State of the Art for 1971 was no longer state of the art in 1981. It came to a crashing end in 1985, while Christian crossover artist Amy Grant was on her way in from Nashville. A faulty space heater caused the barn to catch fire and much of the structure burned to the ground. About $3 million in damage was done; it’s noted that even some gold records on the walls were destroyed by firemen’s chainsaws working their way through to the blaze.

Guercio decided not to rebuild. By then digital technology was taking over and he wasn’t as fond of that as his old standby analog equipment. As well, the once young, single guy not averse to partying was now a family man and he didn’t like having his children exposed to so much of the rock & roll lifestyle. It was one of his kids who apparently first discovered the fire. He salvaged and restored the main console though, and sold it to a studio in Europe.

It would seem that he and his family lived there for years to come, but in the late-’90s he began to sell off Caribou. About half – 2000 acres – were picked up by the county for conservation use, while he’s apparently also overseen some housing on the rest. In 2015, he held an auction for some of its artifacts, including a baby grand piano Elton had used there (it got over $50 000) and an old Corvette which had been sort of a “staff car” to run people into town when needed.

So, like Elton John and Chicago, Caribou was a big and beloved part of the ’70s music world, though unlike them, it’s now merely a memory.

August 20 – Illinois’ – And West Virginia’s – Favorite Trombonist

Happy birthday to rock’s best-known, and probably just “best” trombonist. Chicago’s James Pankow turns 76 today. Of course the list of rock trombonists isn’t lengthy, but even if it were Pankow would probably top the list.

Pankow actually was originally from St. Louis, and his dad was a musician and the family moved to the Chicago area when he was young. He gravitated towards horns at an early age and won a music scholarship to Quincy College, but before he’d finished with college he’d met Walter Parazaider, who invited him to join his band, The Big Thing. With a few quick personnel changes, they quickly became the Chicago Transit Authority, then simply Chicago. Pankow is one of three original members still in the band, 56 years on (the others being Robert Lamm and Lee Loughnane).

While Chicago had a string of “soft rock” hits in the ’70s, the thing which made them so distinctive and certainly set their first few records apart was their prominent use of horns. Pankow leads the “brass” section, arranging their bits for the others, typically Loughnane and Parazaider through most of their career. But that’s not all, he’s also been one of the band’s regular songwriters, composing (and at times writing entirely) hits including “Searching So Long”, “Old Days” , “Just You’n’Me” and “Feeling Stronger Every Day.”

 

And while “Til The End Of Time” wasn’t a single, the Chicago X song was unusual in being not only written by him but sung by him – one of a very small number of times we really hear his voice on their records.

Although synonymous with Chicago (the city and the band), he’s been honored by a city in West Virginia. Buckhannon, WV declared an official James Pankow Day in 2019 on his birthday to recognize his immortalizing the town in the song “Ballet For a Girl In Buchannon (sic)”. That one was based on real life, it seems; he fell in love with a young teacher in Chicago but she left to further her studies in that West Virginia community, derailing their romance.

August 20 seems a pretty good day to be born if you aspired to a music life. Also born on this date are the likes of Robert Plant (75 today), Doug Fieger from the Knack, Isaac Hayes and Thin Lizzy’s Phil Lynott.

June 25 – Second City Band’s Sixth Shifted Direction

One of the most iconic American bands of the ’70s continued producing and morphing on this day in 1973, with their sixth album coming out. Fittingly it was called Chicago VI. It continued to ease Chicago from their jazz-rock, horn-bedazzled beginnings to a smooth, easy-listening pop outfit tailor-made for AM Radio of the day. Much of that may have stemmed from an apparent power shift in the band from some form of even democracy and perhaps viewing guitarist Terry Kath as a “leader” towards it being steered by the familiar voice of bassist Peter Cetera.

It wasn’t a glaring change mind you; by and large the lineup stayed the same (although they did add in percussionist Laudir De Oliviera on this one), they used their regular producer James Guercio and the horn section was still in place. Something different was that they recorded at Guercio’s own studio, Caribou Ranch in Colorado for the first time. A documentary about Kath showed that the band loved it there…but it may have been the worst thing for them. They ramped up their hard-partying, drugs-aplenty lifestyle at the Ranch and, being that it was a Western ranch, there were guns too which they loved playing around with. That would end up leading to Kath’s demise a few years down the road.

For all that the ten-song album sounded pretty good. Well-written, well-played. While they shared songwriting duties, keyboardist Robert Lamm was arguably still the main writer, coming up with three of them all by himself, but that was a change from their previous one, where he’d come up with eight out of the ten songs, including the hit “Saturday in the Park.” Trombonist James Pankow seemed to be stepping up a bit more and wrote most of the two singles off this album, “Feeling Stronger Every Day” ( a bit of a throwback to their early sound) and the romantic “Just You and Me.” Perhaps those were indicative of the album, which seemed a mixture of songs about the state of the world (“Something in this City Changes People”, “What’s the World Coming To?”) and love songs (“Darlin Dear”, “In Terms of Two”). Interestingly, future star-producer Phil Ramone helped Geurcio and did the final mix. A shift towards radio-friendly tunes was evident in that the long, meandering pieces that marked their first couple of records were gone and nothing on this one ran over five minutes.

At the time, critics seemed lukewarm towards it, and the band. The fact that there was a scolding song called “Critic’s Choice” on it didn’t win the band any extra favors in the press; it had lyrics like “you parasite, you’re dynamite, an oversight – misunderstanding what you hear!”. Rolling Stone suggested “it should now be clear that Chicago has become the prisoner of its own image” a band with “overbearing allegiance to the freak flag of hippiedom”. However, they did approve of the singles (“more or less outstanding commercial ditties”) and admitting Terry Kath’s “’Jenny’ is a real treat…an ethereal ballad about the love between a man and a dog.” Years later, allmusic gave it a solid 4-stars, about normal for the band’s ’70s output, pointing out it had a “decidedly more middle-of-the-road sound” than previous Chicago works but that worked well in its “succinct pop and light rock efforts.” It compared “Darlin’ Dear” to one of Little Feat’s better efforts.

The album was released in both stereo and quadrophonic editions, and if you get a later CD reissue, it contains a nice bonus track of them doing “Tired of Being Alone” with the one and only Al Green.

They might not have been the critics’ choice, but they were a lot of the public’s. “Just You and Me” made the top 5 in the U.S. and Canada and earned them their second gold single. “Stronger Every Day” was an American top 10 as well. Outside of North America, the appeal was much more muted – it didn’t even hit the charts in the UK! But at home, it spent five weeks at #1, and went double-platinum.

They called it “Second City”, but at the time 50 years back, Chicago might have been the “First City” of AM radio.

January 26 – People Didn’t Need Authority To Board The Chicago Train

Rock is often considered sexy and about sex, but seldom have bands been as “horny” as Chicago in their early days. Of course, we mean that literally – they along with Blood, Sweat and Tears were the leaders in a move to bring horn sections into rock at the end of the ’60s. We hear that clearly on their sophomore album, now nicknamed “Chicago II” which came out on this day in 1970.

we say “nicknamed” because technically the album was simply entitled Chicago. Their debut, released eight months earlier had been called Chicago Transit Authority but they’d dropped the last two words after being threatened with a lawsuit by the Windy City commuter bus and train system of the same name.

If the band lost a couple of words from their name, they gained some strong musical direction… and one of music’s best-known visuals, their curly logo which first showed up on this record. They got the idea for the logo which has appeared on all their albums since, from Coca-Cola’s cursive emblem.

Chicago at the time was a seven-man ensemble many consider the “classic” lineup for the band which has seen members come and go rather regularly through its 55 year run to date. Bassist Peter Cetera and guitarist Terry Kath pretty much split the lead vocals while Robert Lamm played keyboards and added backing vocals and their was James Pankow on trombone (plus lesser-known Walter Parazaine and Lee Loughlaine on more horns plus drummer Danny Seraphine.) Of the seven, the trio of horn players plus Lamm are still in the touring version of the group. The writing was a little more widely-distributed; while Kath and Cetera wrote a large portion of it, Pankow also added significant parts including the album’s standout, “Ballet for A Girl In Buchannon”. That one is hardly a household name, and at 13 minutes, understandably isn’t a mainstay of radio but is typical of the album and contributed two of their best-known songs: “Make Me Smile” and “Color My World.” It is one of three lengthy pieces on the double-album which are sprawling and composed of several different, distinctive parts.

The band put the album together surprisingly quickly, inside of a month during the summer of ’69 under the guidance of their producer of choice, James Guercio. Thanks to the essentially double A-sided single “Make Me Smile” / “Color My World” and the song Billboard pick as their best (albeit not best-selling) of their career, “25 or 6 to 4”, the record shot up the chart and quickly eclipsed the first album’s sales. The album hit #4 in the U.S., #5 in Canada and #6 in the UK and went platinum at home. In Canada, it ended up triple-platinum, making it their best-seller outside of a Greatest Hits package. “Make Me Smile” was their first top 10 hit in the states, going to #9 while the next single, “25 or 6 to 4” rose to #4 (and #2 in Canada.)

And by the way, what of that song? Some thought “25 or 6 to 4” was drug slang, or maybe some weird morse code for a famous person. Writer robert Lamm throws cold water on those conspiracy theories saying he was writing it in the middle of the night and merely jotted down the time as a working title. He began it around 3:34 or 3:35 AM, hence “25 or (twenty) six to four.” The song lives on anytime of the day not only on radio but on parade routes as well. An Omaha newspaper ranked it as the #1 Marching Band Tune of all-time.

Critics were mixed as to how they felt about it. Some saw it as new and progressive. The hometown Chicago Sun-times thought them “one of the most exciting, most original, most accomplished jazz-rocks in existence.” New York’s Village Voice only gave it a “D+”, calling it “sterile and stupid.” Eventually it probably came down to whether you thought rock was a stagnant, narrow genre or a growing sound willing to incorporate elements of other genres. Allmusic definitely goes with the latter, giving it 4.5-stars, best of the ’70s catalog and praising it for “complex jazz charges with heavy electric rock and roll that the band so brazenly forged” to create “some of the best and most effective pop music of that era.” Ultimately, we agree with them. Rock as we know it wouldn’t have gone on to what it was in the ’70s and ’80s if not for innovators willing to expand its boundaries in the early days, from The Beatles to Led Zeppelin to yes, Chicago.

April 28 – When The Windy City Began To Blow Its Own Horn(s)

A big band, in every sense of the phrase, had its “Beginnings” on this day in 1969. Chicago‘s debut album, which was using the band’s original name “Chicago Transit Authority” hit the shelves 53 years ago.

Chicago (or CTA) had formed two years prior in the Windy City and much like Blood, Sweat and Tears, incorporated a liberal use of horns in their jazz-rock music. They signed to Columbia Records, home to BS&T, thanks largely to their producer James Guercio, who had also done the work with the other band. He lobbied hard for Chicago, and eventually Clive Davis agreed saying later it was an obvious fit for the label who enjoyed the “blending elements of jazz, pop and rock (which was) ground-breaking.” Others suggest he hesitated, thinking them too similar to his other horn band. Either way, they went with Columbia and had a rocky relationship with Davis who liked their music but not their demands for things like double-albums and posters included inside the LP.

Chicago Transit Authority (later nicknamed “Chicago I”) was audacious as a debut. It was indeed a double-LP, with nearly 78 minutes of music over 12 songs, only two of which were under 4” in length. The final track, “Liberation” ran over 14 minutes. While the band boasted several singers, several writers and an unusual (for rock) trio of horn players – Walter Parazaider, James Pankow (who also handled the cowbell) and Lee Loughlane – at this point in time, Robert Lamm, the keyboardist, was clearly in charge. He wrote most of the tracks and sang lead on over half of the songs including the appropriate for a debut “Beginnings.” Peter Cetera, later to take a more prominent role, shared vocal duties on “Questions 67 & 68” and did a bit of the writing.

Remarkably the seven-man outfit recorded the entire body of work in five days in New York City, with the final mixing taking another five. The six-minute plus “Free Form Guitar”, guitarist Terry Kath’s homage to his friend Jimi Hendirx, was recorded all in one take. The album however, sounded anything but raw or unplanned.

While it contains a trio of songs now considered not only among the band’s best but among Oldies Radio’s mainstays, it wasn’t an overnight success. The first single, “Questions 67 & 68” barely charted at first, and “Beginnings” didn’t at all. And the album languished in the low parts of the Billboard charts. However, their fanbase grew and the release of their second album made them popular, at which point this record rose up the charts, eventually to #17 in the U.S. and #10 in Canada. It stayed on the charts for 171 weeks, setting a record for longevity in 1974 (although at the time there was another album on there which would eclipse that soon – Dark side of The Moon.) After being sued by the commuter transportation company and having to lose the “transit authority” off their name, and having success with Chicago II, Columbia wisely re-released singles off the debut in 1971… to much better reception. “Beginnings” would rise to #7 and “Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?” did as well, and hit #2 in Canada in 1971. The album eventually earned them a double-platinum award and a nomination for the Best New Group at the Grammys. They lost that one to Crosby, Stills & Nash… as did Led Zeppelin.

Allmusic rate the record as a 4-star effort, saying “few debut albums can boast as consistently solid an effort.” Classic Rock Reviews agrees, saying that they “fused brass, jazz, soul and blues-based rock & roll, and with three lead vocalists and composers, the group’s sound was as diverse as their influences” and thinking that on some of the songs, especially “Does Anybody…”, the entire group brought along their “A-game.”

Apparently we agreed, as the record began a streak of 12-straight albums from them which hit the American top 20.

March 11 – Chicago Looked To The Beach, Boys

A big city, a big band. It was a good day for soft rock or easy-listening music 48 years back. Chicago put out their seventh overall album (six studio plus one live album), appropriately enough called Chicago VII on this day in 1974. It continued their path to being one of the biggest pop/rock bands of the decade and to see them evolve in several ways.

As Rolling Stone pointed out, Chicago “derives its sound from Stan Getz, cool jazz, big, brassy dance bands” and was unusual in the rock genre in their early days (of the late-’60s and beginning of the ’70s) for having upbeat numbers with a prominence of horns. Songs like “Beginnings” and “25 or 6 to 4” made them known, but by the mid-’70s they were getting mellow and smoother, with songs like “Just You And Me” from VI. VII managed to look back, and forward simultaneously.

It was a double album, and in effect, two records in one stemming from differing ideas within the then seven-man band. Some felt the group had veered away too far from its roots and wanted to go back and put out a pure, jazz-themed album. Others, like Peter Cetera who was increasingly becoming the dominant member, felt they needed to continue on their arc towards being creators of studio-perfect, pop songs. The result was a compromise – a 15-piece, 72 minute double album. All of side one and much of side two was instrumental and very jazzy, fully utilizing the horns; while the second record contained a variety of more typical pop songs. Little coincidence that all three singles came from the pop tail-end of the record: “Searching So Long”, “Wishing You Were Here” and “Call on Me.” The three sounded both unified but different, with different members writing each of the songs but Cetera doing the bulk of the lead vocals on all. The most upbeat of them, “Call on Me” used a few of the horns the band was known for and also showcased the tropical percussions of Laudir de Oliviera, who’d go on to join the group full-time for their next album. The lush “Wishing You Were Here” had a distinctly Beach Boys vibe to it, in part because Carl and Dennis Wilson and Carl Jardine of that band doing backing vocals. The Beach Boys happened to be at the Caribou Ranch studios Chicago was using (a studio made famous months later by Elton John who recorded there frequently and named one of his albums Caribou for it) at the same time. The two bands hit it off and toured together the following year.

It’s probably fair to say that a number of fans were surprised by the first disc when they got the album home, and may not have listened to it that much. But the singles, and some of the other “pop” album cuts (like keyboardist Robert Lamm’s “Skinny Boy” with the Pointer Sisters doing backing vocals on it) pleased and the album would go to #1 in the U.S., their third in a row, and earn them a gold record after only one week. About a decade later, it would become one of their 18 platinum albums to date. “Call on Me” became their 10th top 10 single at home; they’d have to wait a couple more years before they’d get a #1 song with “If You Leave Me Now.”

An interesting thing about Chicago was that their members names were not well known and their faces anonymous but their albums were among the most-recognizable on the shelves. Typically they all used their Coca-Cola inspired logo prominently displayed on the cover (Rolling Stone were derisive of them but did call that script-written name “perhaps the best artist-marketing device in rock”) , but done in different ways. VII was the “leather” album, with the name looking like it was embossed into leather.