ON THIS DATE (43 YEARS AGO) October 25, 1971 – Chicago: Chicago at Carnegie Hall is released. Chicago at Carnegie Hall is the first live album by Chicago, released on October 25, 1971 as a four LP vinyl box set, and double-LP set. It reached #3 on the Billboard 200 Top LPs chart; the single Colour My World hit #7 on the Billboard Hot 100. While touring in support of Chicago III, Chicago booked themselves into the Carnegie Hall for a week in April 1971 and recorded all of their shows. Deciding that most of the songs performed there (virtually, the first three double albums, together with the new A Song For Richard And His Friends) were worthy of release, producer James William Guercio compiled a mammoth four-LP box set collection for release as Chicagos fourth album (that distinction being responsible for the albums nickname of Chicago IV). Columbia Records were very skeptical on the risk the extended set posed, and with a decrease in royalties to counter that fear (a similar situation befell their 1969 debut The Chicago Transit Authority), Chicago released Chicago at Carnegie Hall that October to a mixed reaction. While the set sold very well, the critics found the album too long - and even indulgent with its moments of tune-ups. The band themselves have remained divided over the years to the merits of the album. The original LP release of this set contained two giant posters of the band, a poster of Carnegie Halls exterior, an insert about voting information, and a 20-page softcover booklet containing photos of the band members playing during the concert and a full touring schedule from their first tour through their 1971 U.S. tour on the back. ______________________________________ LINER NOTES (from the “Chicago Box Set”) Chicago At Carnegie Hall was perhaps the most elaborate record album released by a rock group up to that time, and a testament to Chicagos success. For various reasons, however, it is an album that holds mixed memories for the band members. One objection concerns the circumstances of the recording itself. We werent fond of it, says Cetera, mainly because we were told it would be unrestricted, do what we want, and that was agreed upon, whereupon, when we came for the sound check, for every one mike that normally you would see in front of us, there were maybe three mikes taped together. It wasnt like a normal sound check all of a sudden, it was like we were doing a sound check to do a recording, and it totally inhibited our performance. I remember within the first two or three songs of the opening night of that, Im sitting there singing and playing, and all of a sudden the level on my bass drops considerably, and I turn around and theres a roadie out there messing with my knobs. Im wondering, What the hell are you doing? He goes, Well, the sound truck told me to tell you to turn down, and since I couldnt tell you, they told me to go out here and turn you down. Thats kind of what happened all the way along with everybody, and it just totally inhibited the heck out of us. Parazaider, on the other hand, discusses the bands thinking in doing the album. The reason behind the live record for Carnegie Hall is, we were the first rock n roll group to sell out a week at Carnegie Hall, and that was worth rolling up the trucks for, putting the mikes up there, and really chronicling what happened in 1971, he says. This was Carnegie Hall, we were trying to get the sounds right. But it may have been precisely because it was Carnegie Hall, an acoustic wonder for acoustic instruments but a notorious foe of amplification, that getting the sound right was so hard. I hate it, Pankow says. Well, I hate the horn sound. The acoustics of Carnegie Hall were never meant for amplified music, and the brass was amplified, solely, obviously, to compete with the rhythm section, which is amplified, and for whatever reasons, the sound of the brass after being miked came out sounding like kazoos. Robert Lamm, however, defends the album as an accurate record of what happened. I have rarely ever heard a live recording that wasnt studio-enhanced later on that really sounded anything like a studio recording, he notes. But what this was supposed to capture was an event and the excitement and the things that happen when a band plays live, and I think it does that famously. That was an exciting week, to actually play in Carnegie Hall. Lamm got the chance to premiere a new song that never appeared on a Chicago studio album, A Song For Richard And His Friends. April, 1971, was a long time before Watergate, and the resignation of a U.S. president was an unknown thing, but that didnt stop Lamm from offering a helpful suggestion to Richard M. Nixon. I love that song, Lamm says, and later on I did a version of it for a solo album [not released] where, in the tag chorus I add the line, Thank you, John Dean. Ive been told by one of the foremost psychics in Los Angeles that Im psychic, I just dont know it. Of course, another criticism made of the Carnegie Hall album when it came out was that it was overblown. The album may have marked the last nail in Chicagos coffin as far as rock critics were concerned. It had also encountered difficulties at CBS because of the attendant expense, prior to its release. I had a big fight with Clive over the package, says Guercio. They thought I was extravagant. I said, What is this all about? A dollar nineteen? Eighty-nine cents? Listen, Im paying for it. What do you mean? I said, I will pay - whats your break-even, whats your break point? Well, if we sell 500,000, the cost of the package goes down dramatically. And that was the agreement I made on that record, I remember very well. I said, If it doesnt sell a million units, send me the bill. Now shut up. Whats next? Thats how the packaging happened. I rolled the dice every time cause I believed in what I was doing. The bill never arrived. Chicago At Carnegie Hall went gold out of the box, and has since been certified for sales of two million copies. But that hasnt stopped the criticism. (The album was recently listed seventh in a book compiling the worst rock n roll records of all time, largely on the grounds of excess.) Cetera especially shares the critics feelings. The Carnegie Hall album was one of the things that started out to be a plus, but ended up being a big minus, he says. I think we chronicled a period of time in our career, and it was a good thing, Parazaider replies. The album was a success. And whatever one thought of it, thats true. Until the release of Bruce Springsteens live album 15 years later, Chicago At Carnegie Hall stood as perhaps the best-selling box set by a rock group ever. It marked the end of a chapter in Chicagos history. https://youtube/watch?v=UXb8ZDuICCs
Posted on: Mon, 27 Oct 2014 10:01:56 +0000
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