There weren’t many guitarists who made Jimi Hendrix sweat, but in 1968 he saw one who got under his skin. It was at the Whisky a Go Go in Los Angeles, where Hendrix caught a set by the then-unknown group Chicago Transit Authority. Impressed by their performance, he made his way backstage and raved, “You guys are motherfuckers. The horns are like one set of lungs, and your guitar player is better than me.”
That guitarist was Terry Kath, a founding member of Chicago, whose life came to an abrupt and tragic end almost 50 years ago when he put what he thought was an unloaded gun to his head and pulled the trigger.
A self-taught musician who discovered the guitar as an early teen, Kath played in a series of bands — the Mystics, Jimmy Ford and the Executives, and the Missing Links — that ultimately led to the formation of Chicago. Kath was one of the main architects of the Chicago sound, one that fused jazz, R&B, pop and hard rock.
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His songwriting skills, as well as his Ray Charles–influenced soulful vocals (he sang lead on hits such as “Colour My World” and “Make Me Smile”), helped make the group one of the most popular acts of the ’70s.
Kath had all the markings of a guitar hero. His innovative, overdriven solos blasted through Chicago’s imposing horn section like they were fired from a nail gun, and he made an indelible first impression with the blistering improvisational track “Free Form Guitar,” on the group’s 1969 debut album, Chicago Transit Authority. His solo in the group’s 1970 hit "25 or 6 to 4“ is regularly listed among the top guitar solos in rock.
But even as the sound of his guitar dominated the airwaves, he never ascended to the ranks of other guitarists who traditionally made top-10 lists.
“I think it’s because he didn’t try to grab the spotlight,” says his daughter Michelle Kath Sinclair, who conceived and directed Chicago: The Terry Kath Experience, the 2018 documentary about the late guitarist. “He was more about the music, and less about ‘look at me.’ The whole fame thing never sat well with him.”
Sinclair started the project around 2012 after discovering a box of items belonging to the father she never knew. “I wasn’t even two years old when my father died, and in many ways I got to know him by making the film.”
A key part of that experience was discovering the long-lost guitars he used in Chicago. Kath was associated with a small number of electrics, namely two Gibson SGs (a Standard and a three-pickup Custom), a Fender Stratocaster and a Gibson Les Paul Professional Recording, along with an Ovation acoustic.
He was more about the music, and less about ‘look at me.’ The whole fame thing never sat well with him.”
— Michelle Kath Sinclair
However, he is most often identified with the guitar he played late in his life — a Fender Telecaster he adorned with Pignose amplifier decals.
Sinclair had no idea where her father’s guitars were. Calls to the family of Kath’s late guitar tech, Hank Steiger, went unanswered, and she tried in vain to locate them for years.
Acting on a tip from her uncle, Sinclair finally tracked down four of the instruments at her step-grandmother’s house in Florida: the Ovation, the Strat, the SG Custom (with the pickups removed) and the celebrated Tele. The cases had been stashed away for decades and never opened.
“Finding my dad’s guitars was huge for me personally, but it also really mattered in the film,” Sinclair says. “Finding the Tele was a big deal. It would have felt strange to be like, ‘Well, I found the other guitars, but not that one.’
“I was so excited when I opened the case and there it was. It was kind of a ‘Holy Grail’ moment.”
He liked to drink and take drugs. But I don’t think he was depressed. It was more of a way for him to escape the rigors of touring.”
— Michelle Kath Sinclair
With Chicago’s success came the usual ’70s excesses, and in the film the group members offer vivid accounts of their drug use. Sinclair doesn’t whitewash her father’s predilections.
“He liked to drink and take drugs,” she says. “But I don’t think he was depressed. It was more of a way for him to escape the rigors of touring. If he was unhappy, I think it was just because the band was always on the go.
“He also liked shooting guns and carrying them around. It was like this ‘Wild West’ thing with him.”
The combination of drugs and guns ultimately proved fatal for Kath. In the early morning hours of January 23, 1978, after an all-night party at the house of Chicago roadie Don Johnson (no relation to the actor), the guitarist started playing around with a 9mm semi-automatic pistol.
He was playing with that stupid little automatic he had, and it went ‘boom.’ I hate it when people say he committed suicide. They don’t know shit.”
— Jerry Vaccarino
“Terry had been up for a couple of days, and things got discombobulated,” says Jerry Vaccarino. A Chicago roadie in the ’70s who has also served as road manager for the Eagles, Vaccarino bristles at the idea that Kath committed suicide.
“He was playing with that stupid little automatic he had, and it went ‘boom.’ I hate it when people say he committed suicide. They don’t know shit.”
Sinclair prefers to focus on her father’s life and accomplishments, and the music he left behind.
“He did so much in a very short period of time, and it’s still a big part of people’s lives — even for me,” she says. “When my husband proposed to me, ‘Colour My World’ came on, so I was hearing my dad’s voice during this big moment. That’s pretty amazing.”
