Wake Up Sunshine (1970)

Performer: Chicago                                              Writer: Robert Lamm
Album US Chart Position: #4                                Label: Columbia Records
Musicians: Robert Lamm, Peter Cetera, Terry Kath and Danny Seraphine

As successful as their debut album, Chicago Transit Authority, was Chicago didn’t really hit their stride until the follow up album that eventually became known as Chicago II. A double album back in the LP era, there were four distinct sides and each had a certain personality. “Wake Up Sunshine” is the track that opens side two of the four. That side also contains a terrific medley that includes the double-sided hit single “Make Me Smile” and “Colour My World,” but the opening track and the instrumental, “West Virginia Fantasies,” are outstanding songs as well. It was probably about 1977 when I purchased the album in the cutout bin of the record store in the mall. I was familiar with the hits off of the album as we had played them in the high school band, but I wasn’t prepared for the sheer instrumental virtuosity of the band in this one concentrated set. Unlike a lot of double LPs, this one seems to fly by as quickly as a single and, with the exception of the side 3 suite by Terry Kath, almost all the songs seem as if they could have been released as singles and garnered a good amount of airplay on their own.

The song begins with a syncopated bass line by Peter Cetera and a catchy horn section melody played by trombonist James Pankow, trumpeter Lee Loughnane, and reed man Walter Parazaider, backed by Kath’s guitar and Lamm’s piano on the downbeats. The verses are great. The first line begins with Lamm singing, followed by Cetera harmonizing with him, and then Cetera finishing by himself. At the end of the line Cetera has a nice bass run into the second line, which ends with a very brief chorus that the horn section finishes off. The horns continue with a connecting section that goes into the bridge and ends with a nice trombone part by Pankow. Though the lyrics are ostensibly about the actual Sun, something along the lines of Paul McCartney’s “Good Day Sunshine,” I always felt as if the song was really about a woman, waking up in bed with her in the morning, and her being the sunshine in his life. I suppose this is because of the final line in the song that says, “You got to wake up, girl, and face the day ahead.” Like so many of their songs on this LPs, the ending is incredibly unique. The keyboard and guitar play a repeating variation of an arpeggio and continue it for a good twenty seconds before it simply cuts off.

I’ve always considered Chicago to be the finest purveyors of what I call jazz-rock. Unlike Steely Dan, they don’t necessarily employ jazz harmonies and for jazz purists the horn sections simply seems grafted onto pop tunes. But this isn’t jazz fusion, it’s rock and roll. The group was playing in the same territory that Blood, Sweat and Tears and Chase--and to a lesser extent Sons of Champlin--were working, but doing it with much catchier tunes and they themselves were an inspiration for groups like Tower of Power and Average White Band. The first time I played this album, after arriving home and unwrapping it in my bedroom and placing it on the turntable, I heard “Movin’ In” and I was sure that this must be one of Chicago’s singles that I wasn’t quite as familiar with. But it was never released as a single at all. I had the same reaction to “Wake Up Sunshine,” and it’s a testament to the band’s abilities at the time that their records contained so many other album cuts that had the same melodic artistry that made their singles such huge chart hits.