Flush with success at branching out into movies, despite my trepidations, here I am treading on REALLY dangerous ground. Reviewing a CD, using words to describe what something sounds like.

I think nearly everyone of my circle of friends had the original Santana album, simply titled,..well..err...”Santana”, I suppose. It didn’t have a separate name, but it was distinguished by a very intricate black and white drawing of a big cat’s face on the cover.

This of course was back in the days of 12” vinyl (no, NOT cylinders, OR 78s, you smart arse!), when the size of the cover allowed for prominent artwork. We’d all sit around in an alcohol/exotic smoking-mixture-induced haze, working out how many other images could be had from the drawing. “Oooh, look, another native girl where the tiger’s eye was, etc. etc.”

I seem to recall I liked the music too, tracks like “Jingo” and “Evil Ways”

I had heard subsequent Santana albums, but had never been moved to buy them, a case, in my opinion of the original being the best. Then we were burgled and all of our records, vinyl and CD, were stolen. It’s strange how something like such a calamity actually becomes an opportunity to take stock, and query your own taste in music. Inevitably, insurance pay-out in hand, off I went to get replacements, but came back with a Santana’s Greatest Hits Album, since the ten tracks on this compilation featured a large contingent from the original Santana album, and some other fine tracks like “Oye Como Va”, which, prior to going to Spanish evening classes, I thought was “Oh Yeah, Come Over”!

Anyway, time passed, and tastes changed.

Apart from digging out the compilation album now and then, Santana didn’t get much air-time in our house – we had after all got nearly 500 other CD s to juggle with, (he said in “smug mode”).

Then, one day last year, my wife came home with “Supernatural”, an album reputed to be a re-launch of Carlos Santana and pals for a more modern era. I can’t say that the WHOLE album grabbed me, they rarely do, but the track entitled “Smooth” which was also to appear as a single, was superb in my opinion, as was “Corazon Espinado*”, with its latin style interspersed with matey-boy Carlos’ characteristically haunting guitar work.

Heh, that’s not bad - only 400 words before I get to the point. I’m slipping!

*(Can’t help smiling – Spellcheck has just suggested I change “Corazon Espinado”- broken, or splintered heart, to “Corazon Empanada”, which as far as I can make out, would transform it to some kind of offal pie!)

SANTANA – SHAMAN

Tom Jones did it with “Reload”, and now Carlos Santana has done it, both with Supernatural and Shaman. Done what?

Issue an album that is a largely collaborative work, with many tracks featuring another well-known artist, usually as the vocalist. The album contains a hefty (for these days) 16 tracks, which I’ve listed below.

1. Adouma
2. Nothing At All (Featuring Musiq)
3. The Game Of Love (Featuring Michelle Branch)
4. You Are My Kind (Featuring Seal)
5. Amore (Featuring Macy Gray)
6. Foo Foo
7. Victory Is Won
8. America (Featuring P.O.D.)
9. Sideways (Featuring Citizen Cope)
10. Why Don't You & I (Featuring Chad Kroeger of Nickelback)
11. Feels Like Fire (Featuring Dido)
12. Let Me Love You Tonight
13. Aye Aye Aye
14. Hoy Es Adios (Featuring Alejandro Lerner)
15. One Of These Days (Featuring Ozomatli)
16. Novus (Featuring Placido Domingo)

CONCLUSION

This might seem an odd place to put the conclusion, mid-way into the opinion, but if you’ve read enough to decide whether this might or might not be your kind of album, then you may not want to read my meanderings as to what I thought of various tracks.

Some die-hard fans will no doubt scoff at the idea of this album, where some of the tracks have their beloved Santana reduced to what is in effect, a backing band, but I can’t criticise a band for wanting to move on, rather than churn out the same formula, just to keep the supporters happy*.

(*all except Status Quo of course. Whenever you hear anyone say “Ah, they don’t write songs like that any more”, just tell them 'The Quo' DO!)

After all, some Santana fans who bought the first album are now “pushing up” grass, rather than smoking it, so from a purely practical point of view, it pays to adapt to survive! I wouldn’t want to put off existing Santana followers, but hopefully, this album will find them some new ones too.

Incidentally, we bought this album in a local Woolworth’s while away on holiday in Scotland for what I THOUGHT was a very reasonable £9.99, considering it was a new release, only to find on returning home and cranking up the PC, that www.play.com in Jersey will send it to you VAT- and postage-free for £8.99. Oh well!

THE TRACKS

In describing tracks, please allow for the fact that I’m no music encyclopaedia and may make a few gaffs where experts fear to tread – heh, I just BUY the things and LISTEN to them, so I can only tell you what they remind me of, to give you a flavour of the album. To be honest, I wouldn’t know a crescendo or an arpeggio if they collectively bit me on the arse.

1. ADOUMA - Having primed us to expect something different, the first track, Adouma, strikes you as classic latin Santana – maybe they thought they’d break us in gently to the concept! The only thing about this track is that I can’t understand or even make out a word of the lyrics, except frequent repetition of the title, but I like the way in which it gets down to business and achieves its urgent pace early on in the track – I personally love driving to it, but whether it encourages me to drive faster is another matter!

2. NOTHING AT ALL – A slower paced track with English lyrics, the singing voice of Musiq having more than a trace of later Stevie Wonder tracks (or maybe Terence Trent D’Arby numbers) about it.

3. THE GAME OF LOVE – This is a bit more ballad-like with vocals by Michelle Branch giving this more an air of one of her songs, with characteristic Santana little in evidence, except as a highly competent backing band.

4. YOU ARE MY KIND – Now this more like it. Not only do I really like Seal’s voice, but also this track affords more opportunity for Carlos’ plaintiff guitar solos.

5. AMORE – This more latin-ish sounding track features Macy Gray on vocals. Ms Gray’s voice has a gravelly, yet impish malevolence to it, the same one that makes me smile whenever I hear Eartha Kitt, despite not being able to stand the woman!

6. FOO FOO – At last, Carlos and the gang go it alone again! Get yer maracas out, fellas! This highly charged little track has stinging trumpets right out of a Mexican mariachi band, and sudden pauses for the band to shout interjections, mainly in Spanish, (all except for the guy who utters “Pardon me, I don’t speak Spanish!”). I can almost see them in their frilly-sleeved shirts doing all kinds of things with all those dead animal shells that pass for percussion in latin America! As Rayman_UK has pointed out, there is a chorus of what sounds distinctly like “Bugger, bugger, bugger, bugger” in this track, which leaves you wondering if someone hadn’t caught their “maracas” on something nasty!

7. VICTORY IS WON - A very down-tempo affair, especially coming so soon after Foo Foo. Judging by the lack of vocals, this is an all-Santana effort. I did find this track a little old fashioned with extensive use of Hammond-organ, à la Booker T & The MG’s. OK for a slow smooch and/or grope, but it didn’t grab me other than that!

8. AMERICA - Decidedly non-latin this one, with more of a heavy metal feel to it. Some of the lyrics put me in mind of the late Phil Lynott. Get the exotic smoking mixtures out again ma, and where did you put the lava lamp – I feel like staring at it! Either that or find me my air guitar! What do you mean, it’s in the loft?

9. SIDEWAYS - A very bluesy beginning melts into a more mainstream melody, but with the blues guitar always there in the background “singing” the responses to the vocalist. It just kinda fades in, and then it fades out…..

10. WHY DON’T YOU & I - Classic Santana guitar work combined with the gravelly voice of Chad Kroeger. Can’t think of much else to say about this track except that I like it, particularly in those rare moments when I actually get to sit mid way between two speakers turned up LOUD.

11. FEELS LIKE FIRE - This track features the highly-successful Dido as the lilting vocalist. Somehow, the gentle combination works well, with both herself and Santana putting their stamp on the track, neither being overshadowed by the other.

12. LET ME LOVE YOU TONIGHT - There is a distinct 70’s feel to this track, the melody being something that America or Toto could have performed, and there’s more than a hint of Bee Gees style in the backing vocal chorus. To my mind, it never seems to get going and then it’s gone…..

13. AYE AYE AYE - Out come the dead animal shells again as it’s back to the Latin rhythms! At least there’s a title lyric you can sing along with! This number is timeless in so much that you could imagine it on any Santana album, including the first

14. HOY ES ADIOS - Translated, this means “Today Is Goodbye”. As you would expect from the title, this track is down tempo, to such an extent that even I, with two year’s worth of Spanish evening classes under my belt, can keep up with, and understand the lyrics, but then pop-music lyrics are relatively uncomplicated affairs – “you’re leaving”, “I want you back” etc.

15. ONE OF THESE DAYS - The vocalist on this track, J B Eckl, sounds somewhat like Seal, who featured on a previous track, and to a certain extent, the track itself has that wide-open feeling that certain Seal offerings also have.

16. NOVUS - I’m going to stick my neck out here and ask why on earth did they include this track on a Santana album? Featuring Placido Domingo (oh for a quiet Sunday around here!), with clear operatic diction just doesn’t “fit” the style the album. Also, the orchestral treatment, violins et al, smothers any stamp that Santana might have put on this track. Its major virtue is that it’s the second-shortest track on the CD!

FOOTNOTE

This will most probably be my first* and last CD review (thank goodness, I hear you mutter), the reason being, that I’m now utterly sick of listening to this disc again and again for the purpose of writing this review. I’ll have to rest it for at least six months before playing it again! I was the same with the new Dido album that my wife insisted on playing at any available opportunity.

*Not strictly my first, as I wrote one about two years ago when you got 10p for cobbling together 120 words or so, but the FIRST of “the modern era”.