IF YOU LEAVE ME NOW

Ah yes, the real reason I steered clear of the band that were excellent in their jazz fusion early phase. They succumbed to the almighty dollar to produce saccharine slush of the highest degree. The ladies all loved this and sung it everytime it saturated the airwaves. Prog fans must have been infuriated at the direction the band turned to. In reality if you are into these 80s power ballad styles you would most likely love this. It is infectious and hard to get out of the head, in fact it haunted me for years. But I hated it and made up my mind to never get any of the band's albums. Yet the band have great jazzy albums in their early years of the 70s so i have turned to these albums that are a sheer delight. But this is the high falsetto, romantic schmaltz designed for swooning couples and people who prefer commercial ballads over innovative prog. For the rest of us, it is dreary, kitsch and dated quicker than Bucks Fizz. I never played the B side more than once. It was worse.

Oh?

My knowledge towards this band is actually very limited, I only know some few hits and have one full-length album, so I cannot really talk about them and criticize their existent (or inexistent) prog content. But well, a few days ago I was with a friend enjoying to some 80s pop music, and Chicago appeared with this classic song entitled "If You Leave Me Now".

This single features that song, a classic ballad that I actually like I think it is a pretty decent pop song. And the other track is "Together Again", it has some nice keyboards and a cool rhythm, however it is not really a memorable track. While listening to this I actually am not tempted to discover more Chicago music, but knowing they have a huge discography I may find some cool songs in one or two of their albums, who knows.

I would say this single is only for completionists. One star.