Comments on: Carlos Santana - Europa - Live

Carlos Santana - Europa - Live

persona non grata — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 18:29:28 -0800

Europa (Earth's Cry, Heaven's Smile, YouTube...)

By: es_de_bah

es_de_bah — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 18:42:25 -0800

nothing against santana, but come on...

By: doctor_negative

doctor_negative — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 18:44:56 -0800

One of the most over-rated guitarists of all time. See "Variations On The Carlos Santana Chord Progression" by Frank Zappa for more detail. Oh yeah, crappy one link you tube etc..

By: HuronBob

HuronBob — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 18:48:28 -0800

Good lord.... my momma used to say "if you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all!"... methinks that someone ought to climb back under their rock... Nice link, made me boot up itunes and listen to a little more Santana..

By: parmanparman

parmanparman — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 18:57:02 -0800

when did this website become Crooks and Liars? This is piffle.

By: milnak

milnak — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 19:01:21 -0800

Could someone tell me what this "YouTube" thing is? It sounds fascinating.

By: whozyerdaddy

whozyerdaddy — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 19:28:26 -0800

80's fluff at its worst (sorry, Tom Coster).

By: blue_beetle

blue_beetle — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 19:36:44 -0800

All these videos are yours, but leave Europa alone.

By: arto

arto — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 19:41:23 -0800

Wow, tough crowd today. Santana's never had the technical "wow factor" of Yngwie/McLaughlin/Gatton/Kottke or dozens of others I could name, nor the stylistic breadth of a Zappa. That doesn't diminish his mastery over the kind of slow-burn, bluesy melodic stuff he specialises in, though. I mean, he managed to make Journey sound like mystical psychedelic shamans and Rob Thomas sound like a Latin sex god, that definitely takes talent.

By: koeselitz

koeselitz — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 19:50:49 -0800

doctor_negative: "One of the most over-rated guitarists of all time. See "Variations On The Carlos Santana Chord Progression" by Frank Zappa for more detail." You're confusing things a bit. Carlos Santana had better tone and sense than any other guitarist of his generation, and I'm including Hendrix in there. Plenty of people could play faster, but none could play better. Zappa's point was that Santana couldn't write songs for shit, and consistently used the same chords. His quality was shown in the fact that he made his songs sound interesting anyhow. Frank Zappa, on the other hand, was about the opposite. Interesting chords (some of the time, although he's overrated), but shitty, shitty, shitty guitarist. What a fucking noodler. Stripped-down blues scales that are played as fast as possible, without any sort of harmonic enrichment whatsoever. Ugh.

By: riotgrrl69

riotgrrl69 — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 20:04:30 -0800

so...angry...right now...

By: riotgrrl69

riotgrrl69 — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 20:05:58 -0800

Frank Zappa's IMDb page - the nexus of all koeselitz considers shitty

By: koeselitz

koeselitz — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 20:18:32 -0800

Geez, calm down. I *like* Frank Zappa. 'Hot Rats' is one of my favorite things. But people get irrational about him. Besides, I was just trying to turn things around; Santana is not bad, even if it's cool to hate him for being 'weird.' Good fucking god. I don't know anybody who listens to Zappa for his guitar playing. When was the last time you listened to 'Shut up and play yer guitar' all the way through?

By: koeselitz

koeselitz — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 20:21:11 -0800

...and besides, I'm just a stupid fucking guy on the web anyway. If you let people like me get you down, you're probably making a big mistake. No?

By: doctor_negative

doctor_negative — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 21:07:20 -0800

koeselitz, I'll grant you Santana has good tone but wanking the same riff over and over again for the duration of what is frequently a 20 minute song, is not good guitar playing. The strength of Santana is his back up band who are all generally much better musicians than he is. As for Zappa being a shitty guitarist, saying it three times doesn't make it true.

By: Ynoxas

Ynoxas — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 21:45:17 -0800

The fact that Zappa is a great musician doesn't necessarily imply that he is a great guitarist. koeselitz is more right than wrong IMO.

By: euphorb

euphorb — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 21:54:30 -0800

What this thread needs.... is more GUITAR. Roy Buchanan and Albert Collins - Further On Down The Road Roy Buchanan - When A Guitar Plays The Blues Stevie Ray Vaughan - Voodoo Chile (Slight Return) Stevie Ray Vaughan - Texas Flood Cream - Crossroads Eric Clapton - Badge Prince et al. - While My Guitar Gently Weeps The Allman Brothers Band - Jessica Kyuss - 50 Million Year Trip (Downside Up) Kyuss - Freedom Run Jethro Tull - Aqualung Isley Brothers - That Lady Jimi Hendrix - Machine Gun Led Zeppelin - Achilles Last Stand Funkadelic - Red Hot Mama

By: ZachsMind

ZachsMind — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 22:05:07 -0800

Rhett Butler playing two guitars at the same time. Santana can blow me.

By: paulsc

paulsc — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 22:11:41 -0800

Tuck Andress does it much, much better, all by himself.

By: paulsc

paulsc — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 22:26:40 -0800

Oh, and I saw Tito Puente a few times, crack an audience up, bitching about how Carlos Santana got famous on Oye Como Va, and how people always chided him (Tito) for trying to "cash in" on "that Santana song." Only Tito could really make that story a belly laugh, but hey, you gotta have something to take one of Tito's own tunes to the top, so bad nobody even remembers Tito wrote it! So I gotta agree that Santana has something.

By: Samizdata

Samizdata — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 01:00:26 -0800

But Tuck Andress makes scary faces...

By: wendell

wendell — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 01:04:26 -0800

Wrong Europa.

By: asok

asok — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 01:34:04 -0800

So I gotta agree that Santana has something. I think in that case that it was a guitar and a rock sensibility that was accessible the main stream.

By: antifuse

antifuse — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 03:08:07 -0800

I listened to the first couple minutes of this and got bored. What, exactly, is notable about this link? Other than Santana looking young and skinny? Is this a famous Santana song? Does he really start rocking out after the first 3 minutes? It seemed like he was just repeating the same riff over and over, so I closed it. Somebody fill me in here on what exactly I'm looking at?

By: peterkins

peterkins — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 05:25:45 -0800

hmmm. i liked it. i'm kinda with koeselitz here - santana's tone and his melodic sense are what made him stand out. just listen (if you can) to him with john mclaughlin on 'love, devotion and surrender'. while mclaughlin is obviously the more 'technically' gifted (ie he can move his fingers faster) it's santana's ability to emote with the guitar that makes him the better player. as for fz - ever noticed how all his solos are over one or two chords?

By: persona non grata

persona non grata — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 13:47:03 -0800

Thanks a bunch, euphorb!

By: Sparx

Sparx — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 13:51:30 -0800

The strength of Santana is his back up band who are all generally much better musicians than he is. Ah - "guitarist hijacking band" syndrome. See also recent Pink Floyd.

By: persona non grata

persona non grata — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 14:00:19 -0800

Wendell, that just made my head explode. In a good way. My critique: Carslos Santana loves music and he is a religious man. It is a good combination.

By: tizzie

tizzie — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 18:56:35 -0800

Wrong Europa. (don't look, just listen.)

By: LordSludge

LordSludge — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 21:08:21 -0800

Here'sa Europa covera banda.