Chicago - 1978-08-11 - Los Angeles, CA (pre-FM/FLAC)

(pre-FM FLAC)

Greek Theatre, Los Angeles, CA 

Supergroups In Concert, American Broadcasting Companies 
Broadcast date of May 12, 1979 (Premiere broadcast of SuperGroups...) 

Lineage: Original pre-FM vinyls > Audacity > Wav > Flac 

Robert Lamm 
Peter Cetera 
Donnie Dacus 
James Pankow 
Walter Parazaider 
Lee Loughnane 
Danny Seraphine 
Laudir de Olivera 

CD 1 - Sides 1, 2, and 3 
01. OCC 101 Intro - Bob Sirott 
02. Feelin' Stronger Every Day 
03. Dialogue Parts I & II 
04. Hot Streets 
05. OCC 101 Break - Bob Sirott 
06. Interview - James Pankow 
07. Just You 'n Me 
08. Ain't It Time 
09. OCC 101 Break - Bob Sirott 
10. Beginnings 
11. The Inner Struggles Of A Man 
12. Prelude (Little One) 
13. Happy Man 
14. Flight 602 
15. OCC 101 Break - Bob Sirott 
16. Interview - Peter Cetera 
17. If You Leave Me Now 

CD 2 - Sides 4 and 5 
18. Alive Again 
19. Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is? 
20. OCC 101 Break - Bob Sirott 
21. Interview - Pankow/Lamm/de Olivera/Parazaider 
22. Saturday In The Park 
24. (I've Been) Searchin' So Long 
25. Interview - Robert Lamm 
26. 25 Or 6 To 4 
27. I Just Want To Be Free 
28. I'm A Man 
29. OCC 101 Outro - Bob Sirott 

Total time 1:43:54 

Orchestra conducted by William "Bill" Conti. From Wikipedia: "...an American composer and conductor best known for his film scores, including Rocky (and all but one of the five sequels), For Your Eyes Only, and The Right Stuff, the latter of which earned him an Academy Award for Best Original Score." 

draftervoi's original notes: 
Chicago SuperGroups In Concert was the first "SuperGroups" syndicated broadcast on May 12, 1979. The show was pressed on three LPs, but only five sides had music. The sixth side is blank. The cue sheet lists the show as a production of American Broadcasting Companies. There's an ad in Billboard on Aug. 18, 1979 that says 300 ABC stations carried the show, so that may be a good guess as to how many copies of this show were pressed. 

The Chicago disc labels are numbered with the catalog number OCC 101. The next SuperGroups show I've identified is Foreigner, which used the code OCC and either 201 or 203 (I've seen both listed, so consider that number unconfirmed). The Foreigner show was identifed as broadcast on May 19, 1979 but is not mentioned in the Billboard ad... 

...which says the next show in the series was the Moody Blues. With the Moody Blues show, the series used a different code: The Moody Blues were SGC 101, followed by the Allman Brothers SGC 102, Peter Frampton SGC 103, the Cars SGC 104, Blondie SGC 105, Cheap Trick SGC 106, Journey SGC 107 and Alice Cooper SGC 108. 

The earliest of these shows were distributed in boxes, with similar cover designs. The background of each box was a solid color covered in a pattern of dots, with the artist's name on the front and the show credits on the back. The cue sheets were printed on premium paper, and the discs housed in plastic-lined disc sleeves. Occasionally they "themed" the color of the box: The Moody Blues box is blue, and Blondie is yellow. 

The original SuperGroups format had live concerts interspersed with short interviews, and no commercials. A "SuperGroups Theme Song" played at the beginning and end of the show. At least two of the shows (Foreigner and Alice Cooper) combined previously unreleased live material with several "faked" tracks from studio albums overdubbed with audience noise. 

Sometime in 1980 they dropped the premium presentation (boxes, cue sheets, disc liners) and added prerecorded commercials. Disc labels switched to a solid color - I've seen red, yellow, and silver used, and the numbering system was discontinued. Some of these are listed as "produced by D.I.R. Broadcasting Corp. for Super Groups In Concert" but also carry the ABC name. Spelling of the shows name often shifts from "SuperGroups" to "Super Groups." There was also a series using the Super Groups name called "A Night On The Road," produced by G.K. Productions with ABC. 

This version was digitized from the original syndicated radio discs and declicked in Audacity in September 2014. Included are 300 dpi scans of the front and back cover, a disc label, and all four pages of the cue sheet. Flac files of wavs. The only thing I edited out was the 700 Hz test tone. 

There's another version circulating with "Mongonucleosis" and "Got To Get You Into My Life" but without "I Just Want To Be Free." I haven't heard it, so I don't know if was also a SuperGroups show, an original over-the-air broadcast, syndicated by a different company...or perhaps two versions of the show were produced.