I was listening to a recent interview with Carlos Santana the other day. I had never really listened to any interviews with Carlos Santana... it was really not what I expected... but maybe I should have. :)
http://www.pbs.org/kcet/tavissmiley/video/share.html?s=tavi08s236cq84d
for me there was only one drummer and that was keith john moon! the who talked about their bad performance but keith was on fire!
Interesting points. Carlos put his group together as a drum heavy unit because that's what was in him at the time. It was tribal. It was earthen. It was DEEPLY spiritual and Latin. That's who he was. He's grown and changed, like we all do. He definitely cleansed the sound of his group. You either like it or you don't. I don't, but that's me. Personally, I couldn't stand that Rob song...the goofy tune he won the grammy for off that album he won the grammy for. (no, I did not miss the irony there) It's just too accessible. There was no risk. No risk at all. He began the group and manned it with risk takers...as was pointed out. He no longer walks those roads.
Dead on, McJ. But I remember reading a Rolling Stone cover story on Santana around the time of his comeback, and he had an interesting slant on it: he believes that an angel came to him in a dream and told him to "reconnect the molecules with the light," which he took as an instruction to bring uplifting music to as many people as possible. To do that, he had to make an accessible record. That's why he met with Clive Davis and told him that he wasn't interested in being a nostalgia act; he needed to make a record that would put him back on the charts. It ended up being the biggest seller of his career.
That said, I never liked the record--and I'm a guy whose wife bought him an original poster from one of Santana's earliest gigs at the Fillmore West.
As for early Santana: my first memory is of my dad plunking me down on the shag carpet in the late 70s and playing Abraxas (and Dark Side of the Moon) for me. I tell him that he's only got himself to blame for the fact that I filled his house with noise during my teenage years. :) And Shrieve's solo at Woodstock... man. It's been my all-time favourite drum solo since the day I first heard it. Such maturity, sensitivity and groove, with a healthy dose of chops. True music.
As for Shrieve claiming not to have been there, the whole Santana band claimed to have dropped acid early in the day believing they'd be playing way late - then had their showtime brought forward so they must've been seriously flying (in more ways than one) when they did the show.
Maybe he didn't actually feel like he was there......
Now there's an interesting point. That sincerely could have been the joke of the statement in that interview. I never thought of that. If that was it, I missed the joke for years and years. Dang. Makes me feel like I'm sitting at the nerd table.
Maybe he wanted to focus on HIS instrumentals and not the drums?Maybe "we" liked him for the early, drum heavy stuff because "we" are on a drum forum and could be slightly biased?Maybe on guitar forums they are discussing why Carlos had such drum heavy stuff early on and when he made his comeback finally got it right with the axe?Just a thought.Eye BallCar Driving2D' DrummerCool1drumhack
that was passive aggressive
just a thought
