Customer Reviews

III

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

After riffling through the reviews of most of the first seven Chicago albums, I see considerable disagreement about just when the group "went downhill." Several people seem to think it was right after the first two, so I'd better make my position clear at the start: I think Chicago was interesting and rewarding through the seventh album, and THEN the band began to deteriorate -- with middle-of-the-road but intelligent rocker Robert Lamm and hard rocking but thoughtful balladeer Terry Kath both falling into the background, composition-wise, and Peter Ceteta's soppy love songs taking center stage.

III was actually the first album I got to know, round about age 13 when my Dad brought it home. This was as varied as the band could get, from pretentious poetry ("When All The Laughter Dies in Sorrow" -- hey, I liked it at the time) and portentous rock (the final "Gathering Storm" suite), to thumping blues ("Sing A Mean Tune, Kid" and "I Don't Want Your Money") and sweet ballads ("At the Sunrise" and "What Else Can I Say"). "Loneliness Is Just a Word" features Kath's urgent regret; "Happy 'Cause I'm Goin' Home" is a driving jazz instrumental that highlights Walter Parazaider's flute work.

One Amazon reviewer calls "Flight 601" country, another regards it as subpar. I always liked it, and heard it as "Chicago does Crosby Stills Nash & Young" (it was quite useful for fooling people on blindfold tests). Contrary to South Dakota music fan's review, Kath's amusing suite "An Hour in the Shower" is obviously tongue in cheek about the singer's love for spam, and there is a fine, driving rock section during the "off to work" segment.

Two real rockers on the album (along with the aforementioned blues rockers) are "Mother," a savage ecological lament for Mother Earth that features some double tracking of Pankow's best trombone work, and "Lowdown," a more basic driving blues. The former put the band's often silly political stances (which they thankfully gave up, pretty much, after the fifth album) to good use for once.

I think this is a more consistent record than CTA and Chicago II, and rougher than my personal favorite, Chicago VII.

I just got into Chicago a few weeks back and decided to start chronologically by buying CHICAGO TRANSIT AUTHORITY and CHICAGO II first. I immediately took to them and anxiously looked towards the next bunch I intended to purchase. Within days, I brought CHICAGO III home with much anticipation. Although I didn't recognize any song titles as I did on the first two, I concurred that at 24 I wasn't even born when these recordings first saw the light of day so perhaps this was to be expected. Anyway, I hit play and the delightfully fresh and funky "Sing A Mean Tune Kid" began. 70 minutes later, as "Man Vs. Man: The End" came to a crashing end, I sat back, slightly perplexed and feeling as though I didn't quite get what I expected. I then imagined what the fans must have felt like in early 1971, when CHICAGO III came out. The songs didn't seem as immediate or commercial and it was more raw (perhaps a few too many "chug-a-chug-a -chug-a-chug- a-chug-a...1-2-3-4!" count-ins from Terry Kath which could have been cut out; my only real criticism of this fine album). With a few more listens, CHICAGO III began to reveals its strengths and I then realized that the band hadn't produced an inferior product at all - just a different type of one. In short, Chicago refused to sit on their laurels and progressed. For all the amazing qualities of the first two albums, CHICAGO III revealed the band's funky ("Sing A Mean Tune Kid", "Free"), raw ("I Don't Want Your Money") and even avant-garde (and therefore artistic) side ("Free Country and "Progress?". CHICAGO III is the typical album that requires a few listens and then it will unlock its charms. How can anyone not dig the jazzy and cool "Loneliness Is Just A Word"? The "Travel Suite" is enjoyable as well as Kath's five-part "An Hour In The Shower" and James Pankow's profound "Elegy" opus is enjoyable, especially the fun, interactive intrumental "The Approaching Storm" (although the first section, the spoken-word "When All The Laughter Dies In Sorrow" is slightly contrived). In the final analysis, CHICAGO III is a fine, successful and adventurous album by the young band who had just barely begun their journey. It's not perfect (is there such a thing as a "perfect" album?), but far better than its reputation as an inferior successor to the first two. In fact, had CHICAGO TRANSIT AUTHORITY and CHICAGO II never appeared, CHICAGO III would be even greater appreciated. Sometimes we must forget what came before in order to appreciate what comes later.

Of Chicago's early albums, this one took the longest to grow on me. Like I & II it's a mixture of styles sure to please and simultaneously confuse just about anybody. There's Blues & R&B ("Sing A Mean Tune Kid", "I Don't Want Your Money"), Country ("Flight 602") Rock ("Lowdown", a song that often turned up in concert) and songs with the kind of excessive-yet-wonderful horn sections they made their specialty ("Free"). But, like YES when that group started to gain popularity, their experiments started to get bigger and more pretentious, as this time we're given no less than 3 long "suites"-- one each from Robert Lamm, Terry Kath & James Pankow. "Free Country" (from TRAVEL SUITE) veers into KING CRIMSON "art" territory, while the spoken intro for ELEGY, "When All the Laughter Dies In Sorrow" almost seems a tribute to Graeme Edge's work with THE MOODY BLUES. But my favorite piece is the finale: "The Approaching Storm" and "Man Vs. Man: The End", a high-speed full-throttle freeform jazz instro that would be at home on the soundtrack of an action-adventure movie. Not for the casual listener, but well worth the experience!

Quite frankly, this album is almost as good as Chicago Transit Authority. Both of these albums are the perfect mix of rock, funk, and jazz. If you appreciate solos, Sing a Mean Tune Kid has what you want. Free sports Chicago's great horn section. Motorboat to Mars is a 1:30 long drum solo (only Chicago can do that :-) ). Chicago really tries some new styles in Chicago III. The best part of this CD is that there are so many different types of music on this album (jazz to rock to ballads etc). Chicago III is very energetic and has to be one of Chicago's most underrated and best CDs.

While I agree that this album came as something of a shock, following the superb first two albums, this is still a fabulous blend of styles. From the explosive energetic charge of "Sing a Mean Tune Kid" to the quietness of "Man vs Man", there is much to savor.

It does tend to wear out towards the fourth side, but the sheer poignancy of the poem "When the Laughter Turns to Sorrow" and the parallels to Vietnam manage to salvage the sluggishness of the material.

Overall, a remarkable achievement from an innovative band.

This is a fine album if not for no other reason than its unrefined and unpolished nature. Several songs chug along at a strong and upbeat pace and then explode into energetic guitar and horn solos. Do not expect to find any plush ballads or Top 10 hits on this album. Its an album worth pursuing. The album, however, shows signs that Chicago was stretching out their material. "Free Country" displays little more than a few minutes of bells and whistles and other noises that stretch out one protest street. Traffic noise as well as a toilet flushing similarly stretch out the final suite. Terry Kath's "An Hour in the Shower" finds him lamenting a hot political issue of the day - spam.

How can you beat such great music as "Motorboat to Mars" "Lowdown" and "Free"! This is the best brass work of any Chicago Album. If you like the horn section - This is a must

"Chicago III" was a more experimental outing by Chicago than their previous two albums. The styles range wider, with barely a nod to mainstream music of the late 60s and early 70s. It is likely that the ability to have such a large variety was made possible by the success of their previous two albums.

As originally released, this CD was a double album set. The CD clocks in at about 71 minutes. An amazing 71 minutes it is. Three suites on the album include 17 of the 23 tracks. The suites are organized as follows: the "Travel Suite" includes tracks 5 through 10; "An Hour in the Shower" includes tracks 13 through 17; and "Elegy" includes tracks 18 through 23. In effect, the album includes three conceptual sections and six additional, separate tracks.

The six separate tracks illustrate the musical diversity of Chicago. "Sing a Mean Tune Kid" is 70s funk with Chicago's trademark horn section jazzing up the funk. "Loneliness is Just a Word" is styled as a jazz song, with a flavor of bebop. Continuing with the changeups, "What Else Can I Say" has a bit of a country flavor but the guitars sound right out of a Beatles song. Part of the harmony also has a bit of Beatles' flavor to it as well. "I Don't Want Your Money" takes us to another corner of musical style with the hardest rocking selection of the CD.

The other two separate tracks are "Mother" and "Lowdown," both appearing between "Travel Suite" and "An Hour in the Shower." "Mother" combines strong horn music with a solid rock tapestry. The vocals here presage 10cc's later 70s music that would frequently use a similar style, though without the brass. Brass will always set apart and define Chicago's early music. "Lowdown" contains a strong organ lead-in a one of the more pop-like tracks on this CD, containing funky musical elements and style that were typical of that era.

The separate tracks tell the listener that this group has an incredible musical breadth. However, it is in the three concept portions of the album where Chicago stretches their musical muscle and lets you know that this group was helping define one or more directions for music.

"Travel Suite" fits well with the late 60s and 70s when many young Americans became nomads, wandering about the country in flower-painted vans and Beetles, on the search for enlightenment. The musical flavor here starts out like Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. However, the drum solo of "Motorboat to Mars," relatively rare in rock music, is experimental and definitely unusual, leading into the rock with horns song, "Free," the defining word for the travelers of the time. "Free Country" has musical elements I associate with King Crimson, though they are classical in some respects as well. The suite continues through "At the Sunrise" to "Happy `Cause I'm Going Home," a fitting end to a suite about wanderlust.

"An Hour in the Shower" is a group of bluesy songs that covers much in a very short period of musical time. The songs could all have been one song, but instead opens and closes with similar lyrics and style, and reflections on that style in the middle compositions. In some respects the style is similar to the technique The Moody Blues used to introduce and end smaller groupings of songs.

The final suite is "Elegy," a rather depressing grouping of songs, from the title, at least, that again would seem to fit well with the era of the late 60s. The songs seem to combine all the concern we had at the time regarding the war in Viet Nam, the side effects of technology, the state of the economy, the arms race, and whether we had the potential as a race to survive. The introduction to the suite is spoken poem, leading to two instrumentals with classical elements, almost seeming like a sound track to a movie. These two pieces lead to "Progress?" which uses, for the first and only time in my knowledge, the sound of a flushing toilet to end the composition. The instrumental with a combination of instruments and sound effects, asks the musical question whether the current state of our society is progress, or whether we are all in the toilet.

The next composition is "The Approaching Storm," another instrumental, with more rock elements. While the title would seem to indicate that it is an indication of travails for mankind, the music here is fast-paced guitars and strident horns, with little indication of the dark foreboding that the title would seem to indicate. The final selection, "Man vs. Man: The End," dovetails without pause with the previous selection. Finally some of the foreboding elements enter the music, and you come to sense that perhaps one of the ends for mankind is we against us, to the end.

"Chicago III" is a monumental work in that it combines so many musical styles and tries to do so many different things on one CD. There are few artists outside classical music that would attempt the scope of this CD. Furthermore, of those who would try something of this scope, few could pull it off. In some ways, "Chicago III" defined the peak of progressive Chicago, incredibly experimental and seemingly fearless for 71 minutes in 1971.

In comparison to the two masterpieces that preceeded this album (CTA and II), Chicago turned out this somewhat disappointing album. Overall, upon glancing at the track listing, one notices that much of the album is divided into segments, like II was. However, this gives the impression that this album was a commercial attempt to recreate the magic of II, and that truly becomes apparent upon listening.

That's not to say that the album is completely disappointing. Sure, the first song from the Travel Suite, the entire Kath segment, and Lowdown are all below par and can't even begin to compare to the writing from these members on II. However, the first 4 songs on the album, most of the Travel Suite, Mother, and the instrumental suite from Pankow at the end of the album make this experience worthwhile, even if not monumental.

One of the band's least-appreciated works, III runs like a rock-and-roll symphony of sorts. It's even divided into suites and has an almost-classical canon on it. All in all, III is one of their best.