Rhinofy-I've Been Searchin' So Long

It's my favorite Chicago track.

That's right, I got on the bandwagon early, with the initial double album, which is still the best, which sold for $3.44 at Korvette's. I played that thing incessantly, bought the second double album and gave up thereafter, the band went too pop, they seemed to go where the hits were, credibility was sacrificed.

And hits there were. All enjoyable, all too light, until this masterpiece was released in 1974.

I've got to give the track credit, it starts somewhere completely different from where it ends up, hell, it starts somewhere completely different from where it goes twenty seconds into the song, which is an eternity in pop music. But this intro could not be cut off, the same way that of "California Girls" could not be excised.

And that's just the point, the reason "I've Been Searchin' So Long" is so magical is because of the Beach Boys, their harmonies, the Southern California band was coming under the wing of Chicago's producer James William Guercio.

And the song ambles along, a walk in a Midwestern park on an early summer day, and then, when you think it's going nowhere, just drifting along, at nearly three minutes in, it EXPLODES!

It starts to accelerate at the two and a half minute mark, but then thirty seconds later, the horns start to flourish and then...

"Searchin'
For an answer"

Aren't we all!

But now there's a plethora of vocalists in the studio, the men of Chicago the boys of the Beach...

"Baby
It's only natural
Good things
In life take a long time"

Meanwhile, Peter Cetera is singing in counterpoint. There's an entire choir wailing. You're woken up in your seat, you cannot help but pay attention.

And at this point, Terry Kath is still alive. And he whips out his guitar and starts slashing and burning whilst the horns continue to wail and then it all comes to a halt, stops on a dime, it's done, and you're sitting there wondering what you experienced, with only one desire, TO HEAR IT AGAIN!

So you push the radio buttons trying to find it. And when you do, you think it's just another lame Chicago song, one you've tired of, but then you realize it's ""I've Been Searchin' So Long" and you're waiting...for that incredible climax, for that moment of release.

"Now I know my life has meaning"

The singer is talking about finding his love, but you've found yours too, this song.

We've been searchin' so long, and still are, for hit songs that break the formula and titillate us.

"It's only natural"

It's as in the pocket as any Beach Boys song, it resonates so, it truly is only natural.

And I love it!

Spotify link: http://spoti.fi/1xjzX9D


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