Jerry Scheff’s biggest claim to fame was as Elvis Presley’s bass player. His legacy is that he passed his talent and a musical career on to his son. As most Chicago fans know, that kid was Jason Scheff, who replaced Peter Cetera in 1985 and stayed with Chicago for more than 30 years.
When it came time to record Stone of Sisyphus, Chicago began writing songs that weren’t about love, breakups and related topics. Jason Scheff fell right in line with the rest of the band, who wanted to break out of the power-ballad mold. He succeeded with “Bigger Than Elvis.”
The song is a tribute to Jason’s father. On the surface, it sounds and feels like the work Chicago had released on both 1988’s Chicago 19 and 1991’s Chicago Twenty 1, but upon digging deeper you will find that it’s far better than the romantic dreck on their previous records. Chicago’s composers almost never wrote deeply personal lyrics, but on “Bigger Than Elvis” the younger Scheff pretended to be a Southern California singer-songwriter by revealing that he loved Jerry while missing him terribly for spending too much time on the road.
Stone of Sisyphus producer Peter Wolf was inspired by listening to Jason Scheff’s stories about his father, and he and his wife helped the bassist write the song. Jason asked Jerry to play on the song and Presley’s famous vocal group, the Jordanaires, contributed harmonies.
Unlike the heavily synthesized tracks of previous Chicago albums, “Bigger Than Elvis” is largely acoustic. James Pankow added a very nice horn chart – especially near the end. The results come close at times, but lack the overly melodramatic vocals of previous Jason Scheff ballads.
Overall, “Bigger Than Elvis” is a very nice if not overwhelming piece of work on a set of 12 tunes that proved Chicago was truly inspired once again.
