Chicago

Chicago biography

Chicago is an American rock band formed in 1967 in Chicago, Illinois. The self-described "rock and roll band with horns" began as a politically charged, sometimes experimental, rock band and later moved to a predominantly softer sound, generating several hit ballads. They had a steady stream of hits throughout the 1970s and 1980s. Second only to The Beach Boys in Billboard singles and albums chart success among American bands, Chicago is one of the longest-running and most successful rock groups in history.

According to Billboard, Chicago was the leading US singles charting group during the 1970s. They have sold over 38 million units in the US, with 22 gold, 18 platinum, and 8 multi-platinum albums. Over the course of their career they have had five number-one albums and 21 top-ten singles.

Chicago re-teamed with producer Phil Ramone in October 2010 to begin work on a new album.

The band was formed when a group of DePaul University students, together with Marvin Cantera and Andre Jugo (music students who had been playing local late-night clubs), recruited a couple of other students from the university and decided to meet in saxophonist Walter Parazaider's apartment. The five musicians consisted of Parazaider, guitarist Terry Kath, drummer Danny Seraphine, trombonist James Pankow, trumpet player Lee Loughnane. The last to arrive was keyboardist Robert Lamm, a music major from Chicago's Roosevelt University. The group of six called themselves The Big Thing, and continued playing top-40 hits, but realized that they were missing a tenor voice (Lamm and Kath both sang in the baritone range); the voice they were missing belonged to local bassist Peter Cetera.

While gaining some success as a cover band, the group began working on original songs. In June 1968, they moved to Los Angeles, California under the guidance of their friend and manager James William Guercio, and signed with Columbia Records. After signing with Guercio, The Big Thing changed their name to Chicago Transit Authority.

Their first record (released in April 1969), the eponymous The Chicago Transit Authority (sometimes informally referred to simply as CTA), was a double album - very rare for a first release - featuring jazzy instrumentals, extended jams featuring Latin percussion, and experimental, feedback-laden guitar abstraction. It sold over one million copies by 1970, and was awarded a platinum disc. The album began to receive heavy airplay on the newly popular FM radio band; it included a number of pop-rock songs-"Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?", "Beginnings", and "Questions 67 and 68": they would later be edited to an AM radio-friendly length and released as singles.

Soon after the album's release, the band's name was shortened to Chicago, when the actual Chicago Transit Authority threatened legal action.

Greatest prominence

The band's popularity increased with the release of their second album, titled Chicago (also known as Chicago II), which was another double-LP set and was the group's breakthrough album. The centerpiece track was a seven-part, 13-minute suite composed by James Pankow called "Ballet for a Girl in Buchannon" (the structure of this suite was inspired by Pankow's love for classical music). The suite yielded two top ten hits: the crescendo-filled "Make Me Smile" (No. 9 U.S.) and ballad "Colour My World", both sung by Terry Kath. Among the other popular tracks on the album: Robert Lamm's dynamic but cryptic "25 or 6 to 4" (Chicago's first Top 5 hit), which was a reference to a songwriter trying to write at 25 or 26 minutes to 4 in the morning, and was sung by Peter Cetera with wah-wah guitar by Kath; the lengthy war-protest song "It Better End Soon"; and, at the end, Cetera's 1969 moon landing-inspired "Where Do We Go from Here?". The double-LP album's inner cover includes-in addition to the playlist-the entire lyrics to "It Better End Soon", and two declarations: "This album should be experienced sequentially" (this would suggest that Chicago is a concept album), and, "With this album, we dedicate ourselves, our futures and our energies to the people of the revolution. And the revolution in all of its forms."

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