Chicago Biography

One of the most prolific bands around, the group issued at least one release (studio album, live album, compilation) every year between 1969 and 1982.

They have 21 studio albums, 3 official live albums, and 9 compilation albums in a 41 year career.

The band has retained its core of founding members. Of the six original members who made up The Big Thing (Parazaider, Lamm, Pankow, Kath, Seraphine, Loougnane), the DePaul connection remains intact, with only Kath and Seraphine absent. Cetera, the seventh member of Chicago Transit Authority, stayed for 18 years. Champlin has been in the band 27 years, Scheff 23, Imboden 18, and Howland 13. The current lineup has been together for 13 years.

Kath’s death made him a dubious nominee for the infamous Darwin Award. The gun enthusiast was at a party (although accounts differ) where he started fooling around with his collection of guns. He first put an unloaded revolver to his head and pulled the trigger. Then he picked up a semiautomatic, showed his friend that the clip was empty, not realising that there was a bullet already in the chamber, restored the clip to the gun and pulled the trigger, killing him instantly.

http://www.timmwood.com/kathdeath.html
http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin1994-04.html

Kath had many admirers, not least of them Jimi Hendrix who told Chicago that their guitar player “was better than me”. His band mates were in awe of his ability to play by ear, to hear something once and play it back instantly.

In 1969, Cetera got into a fight at a Dodgers baseball game in Los Angeles. The resulting broken jaw meant that he had some quiet time to write some songs and thus establish himself as a contributor.

Imboden actually saw Chicago Transit Authority perform at the Shrine Auditorium circa 1968, when the band had just relocated to LA from Chicago.