Chicago, the legendary Rock & Roll Hall of Fame band with more than 100 million albums sold worldwide, bring their iconic sound to Ovation Hall at the Ocean Casino Resort in Atlantic City, NJ for a unique event which finds them joined by special guests Robin Thicke, Chris Daughtry, Steve Vai, VoicePlay, Judith Hill, Robert Randolph and Christone "Kingfish" Ingram. This once-in-a-lifetime event showcases Chicago's greatest hits and celebrates the 55th anniversary of their groundbreaking double-platinum debut album, THE CHICAGO TRANSIT AUTHORITY. The recording also captures "unplugged" a cappella arrangements and reimagined Chicago hits in an emotionally moving centerpiece.

This collection spans their entire career, from their '69 debut Chicago TRANSIT AUTHORITY to 2006's Chicago XXX. Includes hits from the band's entire career, inclduing "25 or 6 to 4", "Saturday in the Park," "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?," and many more!

Chicago was one of the most successful bands of the rock era, racking up 21 Billboard Top Ten hits between 1970 and 1990, a period where they survived the departure of key band members while also subtly adapting to changing times. That's not an easy task for any rock band and it's especially difficult for a group like Chicago, a band that placed equal (if not greater) emphasis on horns as guitar. Picking up where Blood, Sweat & Tears left off, Chicago initially specialized in jazz-inflected prog-rock, using the sides of a vinyl record as canvasses for sprawling, adventurous rock. Chicago quickly learned how to channel this expansive sound into concise pop songs, scoring hits in the early 1970s with such punchy tunes as "25 or 6 to 4" and "Beginnings," while also showing facility with sweeter melodies on "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?" and "Saturday in the Park." As the decade progressed, the band began to emphasize their softer side with bassist Peter Cetera singing such mellow standards as "If You Leave Me Now," "Baby, What a Big Surprise" and "Hard to Say I'm Sorry." The band stayed in this lane after Cetera's departure in the mid-1980s, not missing a beat with new lead vocalist BIll Champlin; he sang the number one hit "Look Away," as well as "I Don't Wanna Live Without Your Love" and "Look Away." Hits dried up in the 1990s but Chicago remained a pop/rock institution, with original members keyboardist Robert Lamm, trumpeter Lee Loughnane and trombonist James Pankow leading a rotating cast of supporting members through regular tours and albums.

Chicago was one of the most successful bands of the rock era, racking up 21 Billboard Top Ten hits between 1970 and 1990, a period where they survived the departure of key band members while also subtly adapting to changing times. That's not an easy task for any rock band and it's especially difficult for a group like Chicago, a band that placed equal (if not greater) emphasis on horns as guitar. Picking up where Blood, Sweat & Tears left off, Chicago initially specialized in jazz-inflected prog-rock, using the sides of a vinyl record as canvasses for sprawling, adventurous rock. Chicago quickly learned how to channel this expansive sound into concise pop songs, scoring hits in the early 1970s with such punchy tunes as "25 or 6 to 4" and "Beginnings," while also showing facility with sweeter melodies on "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?" and "Saturday in the Park." As the decade progressed, the band began to emphasize their softer side with bassist Peter Cetera singing such mellow standards as "If You Leave Me Now," "Baby, What a Big Surprise" and "Hard to Say I'm Sorry." The band stayed in this lane after Cetera's departure in the mid-1980s, not missing a beat with new lead vocalist BIll Champlin; he sang the number one hit "Look Away," as well as "I Don't Wanna Live Without Your Love" and "Look Away." Hits dried up in the 1990s but Chicago remained a pop/rock institution, with original members keyboardist Robert Lamm, trumpeter Lee Loughnane and trombonist James Pankow leading a rotating cast of supporting members through regular tours and albums.

Nassau Coliseum New York 20th May 1977. CHICAGO S FINAL PERFORMANCE WITH GUITAR LEGEND TERRY KATH NASSAU COLISEUM, 1977 Until his untimely death on January 23rd 1978, eight months after the concert featured on this 2 CD set, Terry Kath had been Chicago s lead guitarist, having been with the band since their formation as Chicago Transit Authority, in 1967. Jimi Hendrix once told saxophonist Walter Parazaider, "Jeez, your horn players are like one set of lungs and your guitar player is better than me." Kath had to play both lead and rhythm with Chicago, in addition to singing on certain tracks, and make it sound as strong and powerful in front of Chicago s prominent horn section. In this, he did exceedingly well. This show opens with Kath s Mississippi Delta City Blues , originally found on Chicago XI. The show was performed on May 20, 1977 at The Nassau Coliseum on Long Island. At the time up and coming super-reporter Geraldo Rivera hosted an annual charity raising event entitled The One to One Telethon , to raise money to update and/or eradicate the gloomy insane asylums that were mistreating mentally challenged individuals in NYC back then. 1977 s One to One Telethon featured this concert by Chicago. Two sets with a break in the middle. The concert was broadcast live on FM radio - WLIR 92.7 in the greater New York area.

Despite the possible euphemisms of the title, 2006's Chicago XXX is not the band's raciest album since Hot Streets, nor is it their installment in the extreme-action spy series kicked off by Vin Diesel - instead, it's the veteran group's first proper studio album since 1995's flop Night and Day: Big Band, and considering that was a detour into retro-swing, XXX is their first mainstream pop album since 1991's Twenty 1, which is a 15-year gap between pop records. That's an awfully long wait - in the meantime, the band has been putting out live albums, Christmas records and hit comps, bringing the total up to 30 LPs - but apart from the diluted trip-hop beat from "Feel (Hot Single Mix)" that kicks off the album, you'd never know that XXX was made and recorded in 21st century…

Chicago returned from a career dip in 1982 with "Hard to Say I'm Sorry" and continued to hit with power ballads, among them "Hard Habit to Break" and "You're the Inspiration," all sung by Peter Cetera. But the streak continued after Cetera departed in 1985, as Jason Scheff stepped in and Chicago went on to score hits like "Will You Still Love Me?," and "Look Away," which are all heard here.

Recorded in 1993, Stone of Sisyphus didn't appear as scheduled in 1994 due to Chicago's record label, Warner, believing the album to be too uncommercial. As it often happens with unreleased records by major acts, a legend built up around the scrapped record, at least among devoted Chicago fans, the kind who would appreciate the musical stretching found on Stone of Sisyphus. Frankly, they may be the only group to appreciate the departures on Stone of Sisyphus, as it's a curious creature - a splashy, expensive mainstream album that's restless yet not quite experimental but entirely devoid of pop songs. If this had been the Chicago of the early '70s, who specialized in ten-minute jazz-rock songs on their series of double albums, perhaps it would have been easier for the label to accept the variety of sounds here, but this was a Chicago coming out of five years of big placid adult contemporary hits…

Forty-five years into the band's career, the seemingly straightforward numerical system Chicago follow to title their albums has gotten confusing. Their 2014 offering Now: Chicago XXXVI is clearly their 36th record but it is only their 23rd studio album and, to muddle matters more, it is their first collection of brand-new original material since Chicago XXX in 2006 (the 2008 release of Chicago XXXII: Stone of Sisyphus doesn't really count, as that was initially scheduled for release in 1994, which would've made it Chicago XXII or so). Hence, the decision to put "Now" in front of Chicago XXXVI instead of behind: it emphasizes that this record showcases the band in the present, not the past. That Chicago's Now sounds tethered to the Chicago of the early '80s is neither here nor there…

The Chicago Transit Authority recorded this double-barreled follow-up to their eponymously titled 1969 debut effort. The contents of Chicago II (1970) underscore the solid foundation of complex jazz changes with heavy electric rock & roll that the band so brazenly forged on the first set. The septet also continued its ability to blend the seemingly divergent musical styles into some of the best and most effective pop music of the era. One thing that had changed was the band's name, which was shortened to simply Chicago to avoid any potential litigious situations from the city of Chicago's transportation department – which claimed the name as proprietary property. Musically, James Pankow (trombone) was about to further cross-pollinate the band's sound with the multifaceted six-song "Ballet for a Girl in Buchannon." The classically inspired suite also garnered the band two of its most beloved hits – the upbeat pop opener "Make Me Smile" as well as the achingly poignant "Color My World" – both of which remained at the center of the group's live sets.

Rhino's 2012 box set The Studio Albums 1969-1978 rounds up their remasters of what many consider Chicago's golden period: the band's first ten albums. Every one of the albums from 1969's Chicago Transit Authority to 1978's Hot Streets is here, packaged as paper-sleeve mini-LPs. For hardcore fans, this is a handsome way to get the remasters, and for more casual fans, it's a convenient and relatively affordable way to get the best albums of Chicago in one place.
Over the years Chicago gradually changed membership, likewise the direction of their music shifted as well. Eventually the lengthy arrangements and jazzy solos of the earlier albums gave way to sophisticated pop and lite rock that matched the age of their maturing audience. One of the most enduring acts in the history of rock, Chicago continues to record and tour to this day.

At the time of the release of Robert Lamm's debut solo album, Skinny Boy, in 1974, it was easy to think that the singer/songwriter/pianist intended to launch a solo career, even though no announcement was ever made that he was leaving Chicago. The group was at the peak of its popularity at the time, having recently released the third of five consecutive number one albums, Chicago VII. But Lamm, who had written most of its early hits - "25 or 6 to 4," "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?," "Beginnings," "Saturday in the Park" - was facing increasing competition from other writers in the band. And Skinny Boy, though its title song (also the album's single) had appeared on Chicago VII, was a departure from the group's sound, especially in that it entirely eschewed the use of a horn section (though Chicago guitarist Terry Kath was all over it)…

The '90s found Chicago's lineup minus drummer Daniel Seraphine, but with guitarist Dawayne Bailey, who had been a sideman, a full-fledged member. It also found the group at the closest thing to a career crisis in a decade. This album sold poorly and spun off only one Top 40 hit, "Chasin' the Wind," despite containing some typical, if not outstanding, material in tunes like "You Come to My Senses" (which belatedly scaled the adult contemporary chart) and "Explain It to My Heart." Clearly, a new approach was in order.

Featuring the band’s latter day line-up, Chicago XXVI: Live in Concert is composed mostly of their wealth of hits, with three studio recordings ending the album, one of which, Jackie Wilson’s (Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher, featuring non-band member Michael McDonald on lead vocals.

It's fair to say that most of Chicago's hit singles were love songs, which makes compiling an album like Rhino's 2005 collection Love Songs a bit of an easy task.