CHICAGO

What's Sup Forums'a opinion on Chicago?

Personally I think they're incredibly underated, and they aren't talked about as much as they should be.

Too many niggers

Chicago Transit Authority is a fucking fantastic album. There aren't really any other albums that I listen to other than that all the way through, but a lot of standout songs and a few underrated ones like Dialogue II.

they were great at making pop hits that did well on the charts

unfortunately, they generally haven't been remembered too well and much of their catalogue is underappreciated

Chicago III [Columbia, 1970]

Duke Ellington never got away with a 15 minute, six part suite called "Elegy". What makes James William Guercio and his cronies think they can? Sterile and stupid. C-

Live At Carnegie Hall [Columbia, 1971]

I'm not claiming to have actually listened to this four-disc set--you think I'm a nut? But an event this monumental is too big to ignore and Chicago are a C minus band if ever I heard one. Anyway, the packaging offers contextual support for my opinion--shrink wrap so loose that people buying it as a Christmas gift for their girlfriends will suspect they have a review copy, while the lack of sleeve liners means that the only way to avoid scratching these plastic documents is to put the whole shebang out on the coffee table and never touch it again. C

Chicago VI [Columbia, 1973]

Any horn band reduced to copping from both Motown and America in addition to writing songs about critics is--how shall we say eet--running out of good press. C-

Meltdown [1980s]

Everything Rocks and Nothing Ever Dies [1990s]

Pretty fucking terrible. Your parents probably fucked to this stuff back in the day and who the fuck wants to picture that?

A band that is kind of a joke now because critics didn't like them.

Case in point.

Why didn't critics like Chicago?

First two albums are great. The rest not so much. The amazing guitar work by Terry Kath is the primary draw for me

They're mindless easy-listening schlock with no edge to it.

The original Chicago which was one of the few bands that started as a jazz-rock band with horns, was not the kind of band that everybody expected to sell well and become a super group but they defied the odds (such as not being a critic favorite as one example) by becoming a successful outfit in both the album and singles charts and three decades later, they finally got inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame just because of the body of work the original lineup from 1969-77. Like most bands of their era, disco, punk, and New Wave spelled the end of them.

>I COMMAND YOU IN THE NAME OF LUCIFER TO SPREAD THE BLOOD OF THE INNOCENT

Why am I getting impossible captchas now?

Probably had to do with them being white soul, something critics have never liked. It's why Earth, Wind, and Fire got in the RRHOF in 1994 and Chicago had to wait 22 years for it. The Bee Gees got in relatively early on, probably because they were just too big and iconic to ignore.

Chicago were an almost faceless member of the 70s corporate schlock rock axis of evil along with Foreigner, Doobie Brothers, Toto, Pablo Cruise, etc, in fact they may have actually been the progenitor of it. The 80s version of them got even worse.

as opposed to mindless edgy nighop which is so much more enlightened

critics are just dumb

They were called by those who love them "The Cadillac or Mercedes of Rock", the legendary radio host of The History of Rock & Roll, Bill Drake gave them the title "The King of the Brass Rock" while their detractors (Jan Wenner and his Rolling Stone Magazine) devalued them by calling them "The Mantovani of Rock".

Chicago, during its heyday, enjoyed the rare mixed distinction of reigning as the world's most famous-but-faceless rock stars.

I'd say they are more than half forgotten. The bins at thrift stores are filled to the brim with successful 70s acts that are almost forgotten today and Millenials have scarcely heard of them. Not everyone is Black Sabbath or Bowie, unfortunately.

Whether record bins at Salvation Army are filled with a particular artist doesn't indicate whether they are or aren't still relevant or listened to by Millenials. Chicago sold a ginormous amount of albums, they're more than easy to find (copies in good condition with all the liners are another story). CCR and Fleetwood Mac albums used to fill thrift stores until their hipster cred rose up again.

Chicago are a band of their time, definitely, I wouldn't say Millenials are totally unaware of them although definitely not to the same degree as Sabbath or Bowie.

Also a couple of dudes in a garage can't really cover their songs the way you can play the Back In Black or Iron Man riff.

In the beginning, they were a bit of a cult band--in fact, Jimi Hendrix was a huge fan of Terry Kath. Their first album was a big hit and provided the springboard for them to blow up into one of the biggest touring acts in America in the first half of the 70s. Their album cuts were too long for the radio, so Columbia had to issue cut-down versions for single release. They were an unusual example of an album, as opposed to a singles, act that were extremely faceless. I think they preferred it that way, their keyboardist Robert Lamm once said they preferred to let the music speak for itself and they didn't want to become Mick Jagger-style cartoon characters where the band members' image and personality overshadowed the music.

Oh, and of course the critical disdain for them.

They're a nondescript band who were very much of their time, and don't have a lot of appeal outside of nostalgia. The 80s stuff was just elevator music. They're remembered about as much as they ought to be. Aside from a couple of songs maybe, they're not going to outlive their original audience.

They were hardly nondescript. They were and are instantly recognizable and unique sounding -- whether rocking out or going mellow. Whether one likes their sound or not is another thing. Viva la difference.

They were hardly all that unique sonically. As others have pointed out, there were vaguely similar-sounding hits from a vast array of bands (Spiral Staircase, Looking Glass, early Steely Dan, and I'm sure there are many others - maybe Stories, who had a big hit with their cover of "Brother Louie", etc. etc.).

The bigger problem is that visually they were entirely nondescript. I can picture The Bee Gees, Steely Dan, Earth Wind & Fire, even ELO. Chicago? Nondescript guys with long hair. Cetera became the face of the band in the '80s - unfortunately, few want to be reminded of that.

Yes in fact they actually opened for Hendrix in 1969 when they were still the Chicago Transit Authority.

If ELO has the "UFO", then Chicago has the logo. It's well known among millions and millions of people with any interest in popular music: we recognize it easily and we know that one can add to it any Roman numerals between 2 and 2000 and the result is a genuine Chicago product.

They went downhill after their first 3 albums. But those early albums, especially their first two, are pretty great and underrated.

I haven't listened to any of their albums but 25 or 6 to 4 is an 11/10 song

Who cares about the RRHOF anyway? It's just Jan Wenner's pet project and Chicago are one of the bands on his hate list.

Well, I agree that the RRHOF is messed up. Chicago certainly belongs in it, as do ELO and a bunch of other mega-platinum '70s rock acts.

And a bunch of vintage acts are better-known and better-regarded by Millenials than Chicago (David Bowie being an obvious example), including many that moved far fewer records.

Nothing particularly new about this, though. Doris Day was just about the biggest act of her time for example, but is virtually forgotten today. Ella Fitzgerald is certainly better known among contemporary audiences, but didn't move anywhere near as many records during her lifetime.

They're the second biggest-selling American band in history, behind The Beach Boys. Insert observation about the relative merit of American vs. British contributions to popular music here.

These guys were ginormous in the early 70s. The album Chicago (aka Chicago II) was the third best-selling album of 1970, behind only Bridge Over Troubled Water and Led Zeppelin II. Chicago Transit Authority was at #23. At the end of 1971, all three of their studio albums were in the year's top 20 sellers! (Chicago III at #10, Chicago Transit Authority at #15, and Chicago II at #19.) Chicago Transit Authority had climbed back up the list because Chicago released 6 hit singles in 1971 alone. They were in fact the #1 singles band in the 70s, which is all the more impressive for a band that didn't care about singles for the first part of the decade. (They obviously very much did after that.)

Chicago were an AM and FM staple throughout the 70s-80s, almost as played as the Doobie Brothers or Wings. The 80s stuff was a bit cringy but they can't really be blamed for it--you couldn't continue making 1971's music in 1985.

Jann Wenner is the easy bogeyman always cited as the sole reason why your favorite artist didn't get into the RRHOF. Some people believe that the RRHOF is a one-man panel where no other voices matter.

None of us know the truth, but I think this radically overstates the situation. While I'm sure Wenner holds a lot of influence, I don't think he overrules everyone else like some people believe.

Is it possible Wenner has kept Chicago out of the RRHOF all on his own? Sure, but I think it's more likely that the rest of the voters simply haven't advocated their inclusion that strongly. I don't think it's like everyone else screams and shouts that Chicago should be in the RRHOF but Wenner alone prevents it.

Is there any artists you can think of who've cited Chicago as an influence. I sure can't name any.

The problem with bands like Chicago is the whole anonymity thing. It creates an impression of the band being corporate product rather than real, working artists and that kind of music doesn't hold up well at all. It's a problem that all of those yacht/soft rock bands from the 70s-80s have. REO, Doobies, Pablo Cruise...can you even name any of their members without consulting Wikipedia?

Not everyone--Steely Dan and Fleetwood Mac are considered "acceptable" 70s soft rock and do have hipster cred.

>Chicago
>faceless corporate product
Maybe in the 80s they were but in the beginning they were kind of subversive--they played horns instead of guitars, they were against the Vietnam War, etc.

And just what is your idea of "personality" in a band anyway? Driving a motorcycle onstage dressed in leather daddy gear? Wearing clown makeup and spitting blood from your tongue? Shooting fireworks out of your guitar? Dressing in a schoolboy uniform? Having a giant Mohawk? I mean, what does that stuff have to do with the music?

>shit on bands that focus on chops and don't swing around on a wrecking ball in flesh-toned body stockings with their tongues sticking out

Oh, and Johnny Rotten was right when he called the RRHOF a clown college.

I'll grant you that much. Fine, ok. Chicago were kind of edgy in the early days when they were opening for Hendrix, but sure not after album four or so when they discovered that they could make $$$ by being a singles factory. The fact that they sold themselves out this hard is probably one of the big reasons why they've been critically snubbed for decades.

By half-forgotten I mean, in the critical sense. Some bands have the critical "imprimatur" from Day One and never lose it, or acquire it over time and never lose it. It seems to me Chicago don't "rate" critically in this sense, you don't see retrospective considerations.

This much I agree with you on. They were very definitely into the politics of the 60s and playing jazz back then was very bold and risky, especially the straight jazz they did as opposed to jazz-fusion, which was the "in" thing in the 70s. They refused to be a singles band in the beginning as well.

What happened after 1972 was admittedly a massive, massive sellout that ruined whatever hipster cred they might have had.

In retrospect, it's kind of easy to understand why critics didn't like Chicago back then. The band's logo and the anonymity of its members didn't go over well with the critics in the era of the sensitive 2deep4u singer-songwriter. The other thing is that they came from the Midwest, which was not seen as a cool, hip place like NYC or California. You can see how Midwestern bands like Grand Funk Railroad were consistently shat upon--Detroit and Chicago were gritty blue collar cities and Rolling Stone's writers had a disdain for the culture of that part of the country.

They took the anonymity thing a little too far especially with their album titles.

>Chicago III
>Chicago V
>Chicago XVIII

etc, etc. I mean, when someone mentions Let It Bleed or Black in Black or Ride the Lightning or Nevermind, you can instantly name a song from those albums. How the fuck could you even tell one Chicago album apart from another?

They had some politics at first, that's true although like most of their peers, their political side disappeared with the end of the Vietnam War.

Critics didn't like Chicago long before punk rock happened. Even their now highly regarded first three albums from 69-71 were met with poor reviews upon their initial release for the most part.

>Probably had to do with them being white soul, something critics have never liked
I grant you that, but I don't see where Chicago sound black at all. They superficially resemble the Commodores or Kool & The Gang without sounding like it at all. The horns are there, but "Brick House" or "Jungle Boogie" are conspicuously absent.

Chicago was the music you slow-danced to at your high school prom with the boring Christian girl who wouldn't do anything more than hold hands and give you a quick peck on the cheek. Commodores and Kool & The Gang were for the girl who was willing to go behind the bushes with you. ;)

As a kid, I never knew anything except 80s Chicago. And when I got older and started learning about 60s-70s classic rock, Chicago just never seemed to rate next to giants like Led Zeppelin, Stones, Beatles, Black Sabbath, Hendrix, Doors, The Who, Pink Floyd, etc, so never bothered with their original stuff.

The first two albums are all you need. But only the first CTA is really essential.

Alright, fine. But when I was a teenage metalhead, it wasn't very cool to listen to Chicago at all. I liked "Make Me Smile", but the other guys I played with didn't want to do it.

My dad played piano so I have a soft spot for rock albums with pianos in them.

Yeah, back in the day, Robert Lamm said they didn't care about the media or what Rolling Stone Mag or Christgau or whatever thought of them and they preferred to let the music speak for itself. They did definitely ruin their legacy with the horrible elevator music they put out in the 80s. I think one problem is that that slick California yacht rock sound fit Toto and Pablo Cruise fine, but Chicago were Midwestern guys and it didn't really work when they tried to do the Los Angeles thing.

Totes agree. They should have packed it in when Carter became president (when most bands of their era became obsolete) or when Terry Kath kicked it.

Chicago II is indeed a classic album front to back. However Chicago III is their progressive masterpiece. No hits on that, but damn any lover of progressive music should love that record.

Horn bands were not exactly a common thing in the early 70s, unfortunately this meant that Chicago ended up being a staple of high school marching bands when the school faculty figured out that this was a way to make playing in the school marching band more "cool". Nothing kills the coolness factor of something than having it played by your school marching band.

Yeh it was kind of like Black Sabbath in that way. These guys defied the usual conventions of a rock and roll band and went above the critics' heads.

You posted their best album.
Pre 1975 Chicago is enjoyable.
Post 1975 Chicago is tolerable, but not my thing.