Carlos Santana’s hit Black Magic Woman holds a special place in my musical memories for two reasons – a) it was the first pop song I ever heard on the radio – I believe I was in class 8 at school. And, b) it is a cover of 1968 hit by Fleetwood Mac, my third favourite band. It used to play so often on the radio, I initially thought it was the theme music for “In The Groove” which was the regular 8pm music program on Yuva Vani !

Santana (the band that is) came from the hippie days of 60s San Francisco, a latinized, bluesy version of Fleetwood Mac. Carlos himself, brought his Mexican roots to the game, creating an amazing Latin fusion Rock & Roll sound that was mind-blowing. His guitaring is of course legend – he is listed as no 20 on the list of all-time greatest guitarists!

My two favourite Santana albums are Abraxas from 1970 and Supernatural from 1999. Abraxas features ‘Black Magic Woman’ and the other monster hit ‘Oye Como Va’, which is another cover of a song from the early 60s. Abraxas made Santana a household name. The funky Latin dance rhythms combined with the Spanish slide guitars and the exotic drums made Santana’s music irresistible. Importantly, it was happy music!  It immediately makes you want to get up, light a cigar and look for your senorita to swish and sway with you. Black Magic Woman is brilliant, Carlos’ guitar solos reaching amazing kevels of dexterity– and actually even better is the one-minute instrumental at the end of it. It’s actually a separate track called “Gypsy Queen” but both have always been played as one song by the DJs. I didn’t know the difference till many years later.

And then in 1999, 30 years after their debut, Santana spun some amazing black magic again. He brought together some friends, new and old – from Eric Clapton to Lauren Hill – and came back with the album Supernatural. It was the no.1 album on Billboard for 12-weeks consecutively and won a number of Grammys including Album of the Year. I’m going to sneak in the video for Smooth from this album! It may not be from the 70s or 80s -but it’s too classy to miss out!

Oye Como Va

Smooth