Santana III

by Santana

Product Description:

Santana: Carlos Santana (vocals, guitar); Jose Chepito Areas (vocals, flugelhorn, drums, congas, timbales, percussion); Gregg Rolie (vocals, piano, organ); Neal Schon (guitar); Michael Schrieve (vibraphone, drums, percussion); David Brown (bass instrument); Michael Carabello (congas, tambourine, percussion, background vocals).

Additional personnel: Rico Reyes (vocals); Luis Gasca (trumpet); Tower Of Power Horns (horns); Mario Ochoa (piano); Gregg Errico (tambourine); Coke Escovedo (percussion, background vocals); Linda Tillery (background vocals).

Recording information: Columbia Studios, San Francisco, California.

All it takes is a listen to the opening track and you know this band means serious business. From the very first measures of "Batuka," SANTANA III rocks on the eardrums like a ton of bricks. While the band's first album and ABRAXAS were widely celebrated at the time of their release, this masterly work steamrollered to #1 on Billboard for five consecutive weeks in 1971. By this point, the band was clearly more seasoned at arranging and making the studio experience work for them--the music is at once scorching, heavy, experimental, and disciplined.

Indeed, the Santana band had already come a long way on its Latin rock-blues-R&B-funk journey, and yet this would be the final recording with the original Woodstock-era lineup, with guitar genius Carlos Santana and organist/singer Gregg Rolie at the core of the action. Every track is a "deep cut." "Batuka" and "Toussaint L'Overture" feature the kind of classic, wailing Santana guitar riffs that always inspire a few notches worth of volume increase on the stereo. The band's pulsating Afro-Latin rhythm section is in full force on these tunes as well, and makes real mincemeat of the uplifting favorite, "Everybody's Everything."