Isle of Wight Festival, Afton Down, Isle of Wight, Britain, 8-27-1970 to 8-30-1970 - 8-28-1970: Part 3: Chicago

The next big act to play the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival was Chicago. As you can see from the cover photo for this album, night had fallen by the time they took the stage. By that time, the crowd had reached its maximum size of about 600,000 to 700,000 people.

Chicago released their second album, "Chicago" (retroactively called "Chicago II") in early 1970. It was a big success, spawning three Top Ten hits in the US, "Make Me Smile," Colour My World," and "25 or 6 to 4." So the band was a very popular concert draw at this time.

This is the entire set. It was released in 2018 as the album "Chicago: Live at the Isle of Wight Festival." The sound is excellent, so I didn't have to make any edits or remixes this time.

Tracks 42 to 47 make up a song cycle called "Ballet for a Girl in Buchannon." I could have posted that as one giant track, but I broke it up into each named section. 

Walter Parazaider, Chicago's saxophone player, later recalled the festival: “They had us in a holding area, with cottages and everything, which was just spectacular. The weather was great. Isle of Wight was our first experience of [playing festivals]. And you talk about people being really young – eyes as big as silver dollars, and taking everything in. The whole spectacle of it was amazing. It was massive. When you get that amount of people, just a whisper from a crowd is a roar. If you don’t keep within yourself, you could just as easily throw your horn in the crowd and run around like a lunatic, just freaking out. ... The crowd was very receptive. That first album had 'I'm a Man' on it – a Spencer Davis Group tune – and it had gone over quite well in England. They knew the material, and we were quite well received. It was one of the highlights of our career. It was a knockout."

Note that, like the previous album in this series, the first track here is not 01. Instead, the numbering continues where the previous set (Tony Joe White) left off. I'm going to stop mentioning this, but assume this pattern continues for the rest of the albums. I reset back to 01 each new day of the festival. This makes it easier if you want each day of the festival to be one non-stop listen.

This album is an hour and 29 minutes long.

Oh, and just for fun, here's a photo showing just how large the crowd of 600,000 or more actually looked like.

31 Introduction (Chicago)
32 South California Purples (Chicago)
33 Beginnings (Chicago)
34 talk (Chicago)
35 In the Country (Chicago)
36 Intro [Instrumental] (Chicago)
37 Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is (Chicago)
38 talk (Chicago)
39 Mother (Chicago)
40 It Better End Soon (Chicago)
41 talk (Chicago)
42 Make Me Smile (Chicago)
43 So Much to Say, So Much to Give (Chicago)
44 Anxiety's Moment - West Virginia Fantasies [Instrumental] (Chicago)
45 Colour My World (Chicago)
46 To Be Free [Instrumental] (Chicago)
47 Now More than Ever (Chicago)
48 25 or 6 to 4 (Chicago)
49 talk (Chicago)
50 I'm a Man (Chicago)

https://www.upload.ee/files/17175740/VA-IsleofWghtFestivlAftnDwnIsleofWghtBrtain__8-28-1970_Pt3Chicgo.zip.html

alternate link:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/Qu3Lanvw

The cover photo comes from this exact concert. 

UPDATE: On September 28, 2024, I updated the cover image by upgrading it with the Krea AI program.