There are some very fine songs on this album. Unfortunately, they are mixed in with some of the weaker songs Sanatana has ever released. The album starts out with the classic Dance Sister Dance, which has a great melody, good vocal, and fantastic guitar solo. The band is very hot on this tune, and it delivers on the promise of making you want to stand up and dance. The second song, an instrumental, is also very fine, particular near the end when the band cools down a few notches and moves into a skating jazz groove that creates a kind of euphoric high in this listener. The third song, Let Me, starts out with a 5 star rating performance from the rhythm section. The guitar comes in, and the quality drops to a 4, which is still very good. The rest of the band joins and the tune finds its cliche groove, which is about a 3 quality. Then the vocals start and the song drops to a 2. The vocals sound to me like a cliche ridden attempt to imitate James Brown or Sly Stone. Or maybe to imitate their imitators. It ends up being a clunker. Gitano starts with a pretentious and poorly executed flaminco guitar solor including lots of buzzing guitar strings. But the tune itself is hot and contains some great vocals, great melody, and a great beat. It's very interesting to hear how Carlos' guitar playing improves the moment the song finds its groove. The guy is fantastic when he has a good groove, which is what Santana is all about. Tell Me Are You Tired is so bad I can no longer listened to it all the way through. Europa is fantastic, a classic Santana soaring guitar melody and solo. Tom Costers' organ is not up to Carlos's guitar solo, but all in all it is a classic cut, among his best. I don't think I've ever made it all the way through the...melody of Let It Shine... It might work live if you were in a really, really good mood, but overall it is just too silly even for this lover of Santana's euphoric, good groove songs.
... If you want to put the album on and listen to it all the way through, you might have some serious regrets about buying it. This is not one of the albums where Carlos falls apart altogether. It has some of his best music on it. It's just that the good is mixed in with some of his worst.
There are some very fine songs on this album. Unfortunately, they are mixed in with some of the weaker songs Sanatana has ever released. The album starts out with the classic Dance Sister Dance, which has a great melody, good vocal, and fantastic guitar solo. The band is very hot on this tune, and it delivers on the promise of making you want to stand up and dance. The second song, an instrumental, is also very fine, particular near the end when the band cools down a few notches and moves into a skating jazz groove that creates a kind of euphoric high in this listener. The third song, Let Me, starts out with a 5 star rating performance from the rhythm section. The guitar comes in, and the quality drops to a 4, which is still very good. The rest of the band joins and the tune finds its cliche groove, which is about a 3 quality. Then the vocals start and the song drops to a 2. The vocals sound to me like a cliche ridden attempt to imitate James Brown or Sly Stone. Or maybe to imitate their imitators. It ends up being a clunker. Gitano starts with a pretentious and poorly executed flaminco guitar solor including lots of buzzing guitar strings. But the tune itself is hot and contains some great vocals, great melody, and a great beat. It's very interesting to hear how Carlos' guitar playing improves the moment the song finds its groove. The guy is fantastic when he has a good groove, which is what Santana is all about. Tell Me Are You Tired is so bad I can no longer listened to it all the way through. Europa is fantastic, a classic Santana soaring guitar melody and solo. Tom Costers' organ is not up to Carlos's guitar solo, but all in all it is a classic cut, among his best. I don't think I've ever made it all the way through the... melody of Let It Shine... It might work live if you were in a really, really good mood, but overall it is just too silly even for this lover of Santana's euphoric, good groove songs. ... If you want to put the album on and listen to it all the way through, you might have some serious regrets about buying it. This is not one of the albums where Carlos falls apart altogether. It has some of his best music on it. It's just that the good is mixed in with some of his worst.