Santana's Super Supernatural Year - Carlos Santana - Brief Article

Maybe the fact that Carlos Santana's discography of the last fifteen years overflowed with references to angels and miracles was a prophetic sign of sorts. No one, however, could have predicted that 1999 would see the Chicano guitarist starring in one of the most extravagant and exhilarating comebacks in the history of pop music.

And yet Santana didn't do anything new on Supernatural, the record that made him hip again. He continued to play his red guitar and surrounded himself with a few friends who came along to party. It was a distinguished guest list, from Lauryn Hill to Eric Clapton, Dave Matthews to rock en espanol group Mana, Everlast to Wyclef Jean. The album has so far sold over six million copies.

It's not a coincidence that Santana rose out of his own ashes in 1999, a year that saw Ricky Martin become a bona fide superstar and the veteran players of the Buena Vista Social Club enjoy the kind of reception usually reserved for cool rock icons. Latin music was embraced by mainstream America with unseen warmth.

But Santana's current state of grace is not only the result of a kaleidoscopic guest list or a Latin cultural explosion. The guitarist never stopped being a major concert attraction (in Los Angeles alone, he routinely sells out three to four nights a year at the 6,000-seat Greek Theatre). And Supernatural ended up being a delicious happenstance in the cutthroat business of selling music: a clear case of the right album appearing in the right place at the right time.

Before the astounding eleven Grammy nominations and countless cover stories in magazines around the world, Arista president and CEO Clive Davis, the man who originally signed Santana to Columbia Records and plotted his comeback thirty years later, didn't seem to care if his lifelong friend climbed back to the top. "I never approach music that way," he said at the time, slightly bothered by the sheer impertinence of the question. "When you sign an artist, you just have to be impressed with their virtuosity and let the public take care of the rest. Santana is as relevant today as he was before."

COPYRIGHT 2000 Brant Publications, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2000 Gale Group