Documentary Review: The Terry Kath Experience

The Terry Kath Experience

Documentary

Directed by Michelle Kath Sinclair

When I mention the band Chicago, what do you think of? Syrupy love songs of the ‘80s and ‘90s and endless tours of the nostalgia circuit? That’s the recent and quasi-recent past, but that’s not the Chicago I remember.

The jazz-rock hippies of my childhood released double albums with songs in odd time signatures, with a prominent horn section and 12-minute songs based on classical music song cycles. And their original guitarist, Terry Kath, was deemed to be better than Jimi Hendrix by none other than….Jimi Hendrix. Unless you’re a musician or a longtime Chicago fan, you may not have heard of Terry Kath. He died in a freak accident in January 1978 when he was cleaning out one of his handguns.

The Terry Kath Experience, a documentary directed by Kath’s daughter, Michelle Kath Sinclair, retraces her Dad’s life via interviews with his friends, relatives, bandmates and fellow musicians. She was only two years old when he died and has little recollection of him. She produced the documentary through Kickstarter donations after traditional funding fell through due to the usual complaint - “limited appeal.”  

A daughter interviewing friends of the Dad she never knew gives the film an emotional appeal most other documentaries lack. (Of course, there are a few documentaries where an unrelated filmmaker interjects himself or herself into the subject’s life during the course of filming.) Even Peter Cetera showed up for this one. (He declined to be interviewed for the Netflix Chicago documentary.) There’s a clip of Kiefer Sutherland, Sinclair’s stepfather, at her wedding, recalling the day Kath died. 

There’s lots of archival footage - notes Kath was taking for his solo album, family photos and home movies, a concert filmed at Caribou Ranch and New Years Rockin’ Eve with the Beach Boys (both Dick Clark Productions).

In addition to her father’s bandmates in Chicago, Sinclair interviews all the usual suspects (Jeff Lynne, Joe Walsh, Mike Campbell, etc.) She also talks to a Chicago high school student who recreated Kath’s famous Fender Telecaster guitar after studying articles about the instrument in old guitar magazines. (Yes, there’s hope for the youth of today.)

Chicago at Caribou Ranch

The band’s first manager, James Guerico, bought Caribou Ranch, a recording studio/playground in Colorado for the band, and put them in Electra Glide in Blue, a movie he financed. But he also performed that obligatory rock manager move - cheating the band out of money. Like Cetera, he passed on the Chicago documentary, but grants Sinclair an interview

The documentary film crew pays a visit to the ranch on the day it’s slated for demolition. Camelia Kath recalls some of the memories in between the wood paneled walls. (The chivalrous way he wooed Camelia, whom he married in 1974, is endearing.)

A short interview clip reveals Kath wasn’t a connoisseur of groupies like many ‘70s rockers. Unfortunately, Kath did enjoy cocaine, another ‘70s vice, a bit too much, and that contributed to his early death.

The Chicago documentary Now More Than Ever (currently on Netflix) will fill you on the 40 years since Kath died. The band documentary also covers much of the same material in The Terry Kath Experience in more detail and with more era-appropriate drug and Playboy Bunny references.

Terry's famous Fender Telecaster

Sax player Walter Parazaider recalls Jimi tell him one night at the Whisky “Your guitar player is better than me.” (Probably the inspiration for the title The Terry Kath Experience.) The band’s keyboardist, Robert Lamm, among others, have said that Kath’s singing voice was that of a white Ray Charles. Those comments may sound over-the-top if you aren’t familiar with early Chicago. “Wait - this guy played guitar better than Jimi Hendrix and he sang like a white Ray Charles?” Here’s some supporting evidence.

25 or Six to Four (OMG Did they ever play this song on the radio ALL THE TIME)

After not hearing the song for years, you really appreciate it in all its glory.

If you doubt the accuracy of the statements about Kath’s guitar playing, this solo may convince you otherwise. 

Make Me Smile 

I’m a Man

Dialogue

Question 67 and 68

Cetera lip syncs to a recording in this clip. Check the comments section for Danny Seraphine’s memories of the filming and a great revelation from one viewer – “Whoa! Who’s that on guitar? I thought Chicago was weak-ass Dad music. That dude’s an animal.”

Takin It On Uptown

Little One (written for his daughter, it was the last song Kath ever sang with Chicago)

“Wishin’ You Were Here” (not to be confused with Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were Here”), and “Color My World” were other omnipresent songs in the early to mid ‘70s. There was no relief from Chicago ballads when I was in high school. Some kid played the intro to “Color My World” on the piano in the gym every damn day at the same time. Even the teachers complained, “Learn another song!!”

Listen to any pre-1979 Chicago album, especially Chicago Transit Authority and Chicago II, for more Terry Kath-era Chicago.

Michelle Kath Sinclair at  her father's alma mater, Taft High School in Chicago 

DVD Review : The Decline of Western Civilization, Part II: The Metal Years

                                                               Faster Pussycat

After remaining in official release limbo for decades, The Decline of Western Civilization: Part II: The Metal Years is now available as part of a  4 DVD (or Blu Ray) set of all three Decline movies directed by Penelope Spheeris – the original documentary about L.A.’s late ‘70s punk scene, the third installment, released in 1998, about gutterpunks in Hollywood and Decline II, about 80s Sunset Strip metal (aka hair metal). The set has a fourth DVD featuring additional footage from the documentaries.

The first and third documentaries dealt with Hollywood punk rockers, homeless or otherwise, and Decline II, the trio’s red-headed stepchild, looks at the style over substance days of Sunset Strip hair metal. The documentary features stars and wanna-bes of the Sunset Strip scene, fans, DJs, club owners, and several hard rock stars from the 1970s/early 1980s.

Spheeris interviews hard rock/metal icons the younger musicians hope to emulate. A chatty, level-headed Ozzy fixes breakfast and warns fledgling bands, “Be nice to everyone on the way up, cause you’ll see them on the way down.” The L.A. skyline gleams in the background as Lemmy talks about going for your dreams. Paul Stanley lies on a bed draped with groupies. Gene Simmons is surrounded by girls in lingerie buying lingerie. Alice Cooper notes, "Punk (rock) was getting to be techno.. metal saved rock 'n' roll for the '80s." and Steve Tyler and Joe Perry talk about the millions they made and blew on cocaine.

                                                             Ozzy in the kitchen

 

In her June 17, 1988 review, the New York Times’ Janet Maslin wrote, 

“In Miss Spheeris's earlier hell-in-a-handbasket documentary, the original ''Decline of Western Civilization'' about punk rockers, the brainpower quotient was somewhat higher than it is among heavy-metal fans. That's one reason that the new film is both so funny and so sad. For all the amusingly fatuous remarks heard here -and Miss Spheeris has a great ear for these - the overriding dimness of most of the fans and musicians is frightening.”

Giving the metal kids the benefit of the doubt, a filmmaker can spin the subject anyway he or she wants with leading questions and selective editing. Maybe there were smart kids who didn’t make the final cut or weren’t interested in being interviewed. If there were any honor students prowling the Strip circa 1987, they kept their IQs well under wraps. One of the featured bands, Seduce, seemed pretty pragmatic about the whole scene, including groupies. This earthiness didn’t translate into success or infamy. They released two albums on small labels, and are now nowhere to be found. Spheeris saves the only thrash band (and the smartest of the film's new bands) -Megadeth - for the end of the film.  Dave Mustaine may be many things, but he's no dummy. (Check out the extended interview with him in the bonus DVD.)

The newer bands have the gift of gab, but their subject matter is somewhat limited. There’s Nadir D'Priest and the band London, “the training school for rock stars” (Izzy Stradlin and Nikki Sixx, among others, went on to fame after leaving the group). They’re party monsters, but they come with a warning, as one bandmember exclaims “We are not role models for your life.” Odin, whose singer is touted as the next David Lee Roth, cavort in a hot tub with groupies, contemplating what will become of them if they don’t hit it big. Poison, whose first album was a platinum success, seem likeable and well-grounded in this early stage of their career. (The years, as we know, have not been kind.)  

                                                                "Actressing"

As for Decline II’s girls of the Sunset Strip, the female musicians (Vixen, Jaded Lady) are just as ambitious but not quite as dim as some of their male counterparts. The female fans are another story. The girls participating in the Gazarri Dance Contest seem happy to strip, I mean, gyrate, for the ogling hair metal judges. The reigning “Miss Gazarri” says she hopes to continue with her modeling and “actressing” after  she passes on her crown. (Christina Applegate allegedly based her Married with Children character Kelly Bundy on this aspiring thespian.) 

The onstage segments with London, Lizzy Borden, Odin and Faster Pussycat make the viewer ponder “So is this is what an NC-17 Spinal Tap would look like.”  London’s singer finally lights a Soviet flag on fire after a few miscues, and the band’s political anthem, “Russian Winter” won’t put Bob Dylan or Neil Young out of business. The extra interview footage  has several X-rated revelations. (Now where was that chain hidden again?) 

Decline II’s most infamous interview, with W.A.S.P. guitarist Chris Holmes, shows the dark underbelly to all the leather and studs bravado. Soused to the gills, Holmes sits in a raft in his swimming pool chugging from a bottle of vodka while his Mom looks on pool side. He jokes about groupies, being an alcoholic, and proclaims, “I’m a piece of crap.” Spheeris asks, “Think you might drink because you’re covering up pain?” “Yeah,” Chris answers, then dunks under the water, evading any self-analysis. (Watch the unedited interview on the bonus disc til the bitter end to feel really uncomfortable.) Update: Chris relocated to France and is still touring, recording, and making music videos. His latest album has the delightful title Shittin' Bricks. 

It’s easy to dismiss metal bands of the ‘80s Sunset Strip based on their looks and image. Most of these bands had musical skills and could entertain an audience. Unfortunately, 90% of them didn’t do anything but blindly follow the Aqua-netted path Motley Crue had paved (and not as well). Money talks – that’s one of the differences between the metal rockers in “Decline II” and the punk rockers in “Decline I”. In the original Decline, the kids made music their way and embraced rebellion against the norm. In Decline II, it was all about fame and money.

The fans and groupies who lived the scene look back at the time fondly. To the causal observer, it was a gold mine for derision and acerbic, play by play music video commentary. After awhile, even disparaging the bands got monotonous. There wasn’t a lot of deviation from the fluffy-haired sex and partying formula, and hair metal succumbed to overexposure (and grunge) around 1991.

Highly recommended as a reminder of the “What were they thinking?” 1980s, Decline II is all sex and drugs, alcohol and ambition, with none of the cerebral or societal discourse of Decline I or III. But sometimes, as another ‘80s icon sang, girls (and boys) just wanna have fun .