"Wow, he has lots of other records besides Supernatural". (I actually overheard this at Tower Records about 10 years ago when I was standing across from some young ladies who were leafing through Santana CDs).
Carlos Santana is a musician I have always admired.
I first got turned on to his thing when I was about 12. A friend's older sister had the "Moonflower" album and we listened to it over and over. I had never heard anything like it and I was immediately hooked. There are some guitar players that you can recognize after hearing just a few notes, and Santana is one of them for me. Since then, I've seen him live numerous times and have enjoyed his vast catalogue dating back to the late 60s, through some of his more experimental phases in the 70s ("Love, Devotion, Surrender", anyone?) and even through his (sometimes) sub-par 80s output.
What I think I admire the most about him is not only as a guitarist (though he still ranks as one of the best in my book, despite his having lost a little of his technique over the past few years). More than that, I admire his entire approach to music in general. He's always put together the most amazing bands with incredible players and he was always able to inject a little something extra into his playing. Call it spirituality, call it other-worldliness...just don't ask me to try and describe what I mean beyond this, because it will come off sounding stupid. Suffice it to say that there's always been an indescribable quality about Carlos the musician/guitarist that, to me, has placed him above most of the other professional musicians out there. I never once got the feeling that Carlos ever played a single note without really meaning it.
Most younger kids these days probably know Santana from his recent string of hit albums that he's recorded under the aegis of legendary music producer Clive Davis. Mr. Davis has certainly hit on a formula that has clicked: team Carlos with a lineup of modern-day pop singers and reach that elusive crossover market. Santana's recordings over the past 10 years have been his best selling of his career. "Supernatural", released in 1999, has sold over 15 million copies. I haven't seen the actual statistics but I think this has to be his best-selling release to date.
I can't honestly say I was a huge fan of the Supernatural-era Santana, or of the several albums that have followed over the past 10 years (all of which followed the same Clive Davis formula). To me, these albums sound over-produced and over-sterilized. It's as if the Santana band - still firing on all cylinders - got together with a bunch of top-40 singers to record some new tunes, and then Carlos would come in after the fact and lay down some random guitar tracks over what was already recorded. Still, I have to say that his playing never really lost that indescribable something on these albums. He still played everything as if he meant it. And...good for him for reaching what's probably the financial pinnacle of his recording career - if anyone deserves such success, it's Carlos.
All of which brings me to his latest release, "Guitar Heaven". Again, this one follows the same Clive Davis formula but on this release Carlos and his band cover classic guitar tunes from Led Zeppelin, Cream, the Rolling Stones, etc. Some of these covers are done pretty well ("Sunshine of Your Love" stands out for me so far), while some of them are what-were-you-thinking awful (AC/DC's "Back in Black", which is recorded with someone named NAS who raps the lyrics with what I swear sounds like the auto-tuned cast of Glee singing the choruses...just terrible). At this point, I think the Clive Davis formula has grown stale.
As a guitarist, Carlos' chops are not what they used to be...that's been apparent over the past few albums - but they seem even more sloppy on this new release. What's worse, though, is that I don't get that feeling that Carlos means what he's playing any more. Even more so than the past few albums, this one really sounds like Carlos is simply phoning it in. It doesn't really have the identity of the Santana band. Maybe this is what naturally happens after you've been through the Clive Davis machine for 10+ years; gotta appeal to the American Idol-buying public or your career is kaput-ski. I think that's a sad place to see someone like Carlos end up.
I like to think that maybe there's still enough creativity in the man to break out of this rut and record a new album of his own music, with only his own band again (please, no more "guest artists" on every track), and produced by someone else other than Clive Davis. One can only hope. In the meantime, I think I'll listen to Moonflower again.
Hey Steve, you could write album reviews. This is really good reporting. I love Carlos' music ever since I heard that first album back in 1969.
ReplyDeleteI recently checked out the Woodstock performance and what struck me was how supportive each and very member of the band was toward each other as they played, I could see it in there body movements as well as hear it.
In the late 70's I played with a Latin-rock band from the Mission District in SF and through their connections with the Santana band and on several occasions got to jam with each member of Santana except Carlos himself.
I share a similar regard to Carlos' playing-when I hear him I know it's him, his sound is all his own and I too think that, when it's genuine, that every note he plays he puts his whole self behind.
I'm going to be covering on drums some of the classic Santana numbers and posting to You Tube.