The Chicago Experience

As a young person in the 1970s, I had a few favorites.  I was enthralled by the prog-rock movement spearheaded by Yes and Emerson, Lake, & Palmer; and my boyhood dreams of being a musician were fueled by the likes of them.  I had a few guitar heroes:  Robert Fripp, Peter Banks, Jan Akkerman among them, but there was one lurking in the background that I didn't acknowledge until later in life.  Terry Kath.

If we go back to the early 1970s (where I come from) the world of pop music was cluttered with nonsense, and even as a youth, I recognized it.  My bus rides to school were dominated by questions like, "Have you heard 'Hocus Pocus' by Focus?" and if you were listening to 92.5FM (WIFI) so that you could hear the "long version" of Yes' "America."'

You have to remember, those were the days when, if you didn't hear something live, you couldn't "YouTube it" or go back to your DVR and re-watch it.  It was a "hear it live or not at all" society.  Hence, The Beatles' epic performances on "The Ed Sullivan Show."  We didn't have reruns.

When the first Chicago Transit Authority album came out in 1969, most of us heard "Beginnings" or "Questions 67 & 68" on pop radio, but there was so much more.  Like "Free Form Guitar," which blew the mind of a 12-year-old and "Listen" and "Poem 58" that never made it to the big-time AM radio stations that we were listening to in those days.

By the time the second Chicago (they had been re-named) album came out, the big deal was the Suite on side two.  We listened to it over and over.  What we neglected were the first four songs, that were mere masterpieces, and I suspect that the band thought so, too.  Only on repeated listenings do they shine over the second side.  Hindsight.
The third album was a pure masterpiece, and the kid was dumbfounded.

Christmas of 1971, this 14-year-old gets "Live at Carnegie Hall" (Chicago IV) as a gift and goes nuts.  I was way too young to have attended a concert, so this was the best I could do. It was many years later that I got to go to Carnegie Hall to see Marc Maron and thought, "So, this is where Chicago played that show?" I was awestruck, and a little goofy I guess.  I pictured the band on that big stage, recording that album and my mind wandered.

By the time Chicago V came out, I was full-on fanboy.  I remember coming home from the record store with the album, and showing it to a gas station attendant who was (obviously) much older and as big a fan.  The album had an insert with a giant poster of each band member, and we looked at it together.  I had the album before he did! As usual, it was amazing. "Saturday in the Park" and "Dialogue" were my favorites, but the entire album was still up to their standards, I thought.

I stayed with them through Chicago VI and VII, but my fandom was beginning to wane.  As with the prog-rock era, the tempo was changing, and my love of the band was still there, but the music was losing touch with me.  We were growing apart.

I don't know how many they are up to now - 35?  It's questionable, and with the loss of Terry, my mind and taste has wandered.

Recently, I watched "The Terry Kath Experience," a beautiful documentary put together by his daughter Michele - expertly, I might add.  The film has re-invigorated my interest in the band and Terry's work, in-particular.

Watching videos of the band has alerted me as to Terry's influence, and his "band leader" experience. As a young person, I never realized.  To a young teenager, it was all about the horns and the overall experience.  To us, Danny Seraphine was a God, and may still be - but the focus of the band was the horns and drums.  Little did we know that the true heart of the outfit was Terry.

Obviously, it's sad that his life ended the way it did, but I have come to realize that he would not have  continued with the band as it evolved.  Perhaps he saw that, and I'd like to think that he did.

The sad part is that we never realized what his music would have been without the horns, as it appears that he would have wanted.  It's interesting to me that the big part of Chicago was the horns, but the lesser part of it to Terry was - no horns.  If you go back and listen to "Poem 58" and "Listen" you can hear what Terry envisioned the band being without the horns.

We can only speculate.  Over what John Lennon would have done, what Jim Morrison would have done.  Jimi Hendrix.  Janis Joplin. Michael Hedges - certainly.  Freddie Mercury. Chris Cornell.  The list goes on ...

Certainly, Terry Kath had much more music in him, and while it's sad that we did not get to hear it, it is joyful that we got to hear what he had in his heart.

Because it lives in our hearts.