On various trips to Tijuana, Carlos would pick up and play Reed and Howlin' Wolf tunes, along with some R&B. He returned to San Francisco for good in 1966. The streets were swarming with hippies. "I found myself wanting to be part of this new wave," says Carlos. "People turning on and the old Fillmore and Paul Butterfield and Mike Bloomfield and Elvin Bishop-they had a jam one time. I think Butterfield didn't show up...so they just had a jam, and this brother heard me play, so he introduced me to Michael Bloomfield. Michael Bloomfield was kind enough to let me sit in for this jam, and this cat in the audience saw us playing, and he tried to track me down. This was the time I was working in a funky restaurant. I had that job as a dishwasher."
At this point, Carlos was in his junior year at Mission High School, where he had been doing poorly in all courses except art-he got As in drawing, a B in design class, a B in Spanish. He took no music courses.
Carlos hooked up with the kid in the audience, a guitar player named Tom Frazier, and added Danny and Gus as drummer and bass. Tom brought in Gregg Rolie. Also, Carlos knew Mike Carabello, who went to Poly High, where "this hip art teacher" brought in conga players to liven up classes. He would name his new group the Santana Blues Band when they gained an audition spot from Bill Graham in January 1967, on a bill with Butterfield and Charles Lloyd.
"We were playing songs like `Mary Ann' by Ray Charles and `Misty' and `Taste of Honey,' only with Latin percussion," said Carlos. "To me it still wasn't music. It was just a process of learning, you know."
"We lost Carabello for awhile," said Carlos. Said Mike: "I was just playing 'cause I enjoyed playing. I wasn't really serious. Carlos had TB or something and he went into the hospital, and we were all waiting for him to get out of the hospital, so I didn't want to go to practice or anything, so I got kicked out of the band."
Carlos had been taken out of Mission High and put into General Hospital after a TB test showed positive on his arm. After two and a half months, Carlos got restless, diagnosed himself OK, and escaped.
"People were dying left and right from TB, and my case wasn't really serious, I know. And I was getting paranoid that I was gonna go, too. A couple of friends came over and brought me some clothes, we visited, and I said `See you later, you guys.' And I walked them to the elevator, and I just went inside the elevator, changed clothes, and walked out. But I called them the next day and told the doctor that I didn't feel sick at all. And he told me I had to take some medication-every day shots for two and a half years, and I actually-some sort of miracle, or the power of my believing what I believe now, it has gotten away from my system. I went to take an Xray and it's gone."
Hospitalization cost Santana a job at the Fillmore, but, he said, "Bill gave us another chance. I remember we played with the Who and the Loading Zone (June 19 6 7). And we were late and Bill Graham was screaming at me and he asked me what kind of fuckin' band we had and this and that, 'cause these other cats were late, just blowing it, putting cologne on themselves and all this shit. Delivering tortillas, so it wasn't music that was really happening, just like a trip for them......
Carlos got himself a new band, keeping only Gregg Rolie with him. David Brown, who'd gone to public and private school in San Francisco and played bass at night with Latin jazz bands and at clubs behind touring groups like the Four Tops, was walking up Grant Ave., in North Beach, when he heard some music from a small club. He stepped in, sat in, and was approached by Stan Marcum, who would become Santana's manager. Stan also found a Memphis-born conga player named Marcus Malone, and a drummer, Bob "Doc" Livingston, completed the group.
V. THE FIRST LICKS OF EVIL WAYS
BOTH DAV[n BROWN AND CARLOS SANTANA credit Malone as a major influence in the band's sound. "We didn't like the music too repetitious, the way Butterfield or other blues bands were playing," Brown said, "so we got into improvisation and we'd find the drums in there more of the time. Eventually, we just sat back and said let them do their thing. Malone was an influence on `Jingo,' those Afro songs."
"In North Beach," said Carlos, "almost every day I used to go drink wine, smoke some grass and listen to the conga players and watch the sea and stuff. Seven conga players trying to get off at the same time. And Stan found Marcus in there. Marcus had pure sound. You could distinguish Marcus from a lot of people."
Santana-they'd cut the name short by now-began to live together and played up and down the California coast and all over the city. Offers began streaming in from record companies, and, after five months of negotiating, with help from attorney Brian Rohan, Santana signed a Columbia contract.
In mid-'68, Santana also began playing regularly at the Fillmore; then, at the new Fillmore West, they moved their way up to a topbilling on the December 19th-22nd weekend, a full nine months before their first album would even be released.
Bill Graham is a Latin music aficionado from `way back, back past New York, to when he visited Havana and heard the Orchestra Riverside, then up to New York and Celia Cruz and Machito. In San Francisco he finds time to go to clubs in North BeachAndre's on Broadway, Caesar's Latin Club on Green.
For Graham, this ragtag bunch of street kids copping Olatunji was no musical revelation: "What impressed me is that it was an attempt at fusing rock and Afro and Latino and getting a rhythmic, sensuous sound into rock, which I've always thought it lacked in many cases."
Graham continued to hire Santana and soon began to book them elsewhere, through his Shady Management. He gave them a rehearsal hall, convinced them to take on this simple, earth-music Willie Bobo tune called "Evil Ways." Later, he would personally account for Santana being onstage at Woodstock.
But shortly before Woodstock, Santana went through just a few more changes. Marcus Malone was involved, to put it delicately, in manslaughter. Caught in bed, it was alleged; self-defense, he maintained. Nonetheless, he was off to jail, and so it was that Mike Carabello would reenter, in time for the album and first swell of success. Also, early on in the studios, after a frustrating attempt to record live in L.A., it was decided that new percussion was needed; Mike Shrieve was found by David Brown at the Fillmore, in another jam, and invited. Carabello remembered a tiny Nicaraguan highly praised for his jazz work throughout South and Central America who migrated to New York, then moved to San Francisco, where he joined a band called the Aliens. Now, Jose Areas would add a precise timbale sound, plus supplemental conga work and Santana's first brass.
Now it is the summer of 1969, and Santana plays Fillmore West four times in two months, headlining twice; they are booked to tour with Crosby, Stills & Nash. This, said David Rubinson, who tried his hand at producing the first Santana album in early ' 69, "broke them in the Midwest. There's a tremendous pocket of Latin-American descendants in L.A. and San Francisco, in Miami, in Dallas, and in New York. They were happening in those markets. Nothing in the middle. What's in the middle? Seventy percent of your record buyers." The tour and Woodstock broke that first album, said Rubinson. Released in September 1969, it was gold by the end of the year.
"I mean, when it came out you could not turn on the radio for six weeks without hearing the damn record. In the middle of all that vapid bullshit that going on with psychedelia and mandala that was happening in '69, here was the essence, boiled down to drums and percussion and pulse. It was just balls-out music, and that's what people wanted to hear."
"Guitar was unknown," he said, "voiced the way it was on Santana. The way they use the keyboard was completely different, almost like a Latin horn section. And there was no brass."
Santana, said Rubinson, opened the door for a Latin sound. More important, he said, were "the revolutions they caused" in pop music. "Every Motown band had a conga drum on every single record they put out for a year. Sly Stone started adding Latin percussion. Every jazz group started adding Latin percussion, and all kinds of rock bands were adding conga drums."
VI. 'WE CAN'T ALL BE MARTIN LUTHER KINGS'
THE MONEY POURED I N, and the stories began to leak, sometimes gush out. Here
are some of them:
Stan Marcum: There were some negative forces that entered Santana's life in the musical aspects.. .that had negative points of view about myself and other people in the band-for their own intents and purposes. There were some people involved in Santana that I feel were just looking to be involved to make some money.
Mike Carabello: In the very end of it, there was cliques goin' on, with Coke Escovedo and Carlos. Coke started kissin' his ass and tellin' him, "Well, your name is Carlos Santana, you shouldn't listen to anyone else. You should be the leader..." It went to Carlos' head.
Neal Schon: That's when we was havin' all the trouble in New York, man, when Coke was on the road with us.
Carabello: This was about the time that Chepito got sick, and we didn't know what was gonna happen, if he was gonna die or whatever, so all of us were waiting around. We had a meeting, because Carlos was getting restless just sitting around waiting. He wanted a gig. And I said, "I don't think we should gig, because Chepito's just as much a part of the band as anyone else. I don't think that we should get another person to fill his place and go before an audience and say this is Santana, because we're not."
Coke Escovedo: I was called by Rico Reyes. Chepito had this hemorrhage. They had tried Willie Bobo in Ghana [for the Soul to Soul show] and they said he couldn't cut it. I was recording for Cal Tjader at the time, and I joined them for a tour to Europe. Otherwise they would have to cancel. This is at the beginning of 1971. There was an understanding that I was temporary, and I told Stan Marcum there was no hassle with Chepito coming back.
David Rubinson: So Chepito was in the hospital. David Brown had left a while before. He was not physically able to play at that time. He was really smacked out, from what I could tell. Coke was hired and given a large amount of money: Well, man, he got ten grand cash to start. I mean, they took care of him good. So they went on the road. And a lot of political shit went on, and all this bullshit started with Carlos and Coke being bosom buddies against somebody else, and then this one against that one, and then finally they all had a meeting and Coke wanted to get rid of Marcum and then he got a couple of the guys on his side and.. .Coke made too much trouble. I think he could have done whatever he wanted and taken over the band because he was a very strong force. But he pushed and pushed, and ultimately it came down to a choice and I think they chose against him.
Coke: I knew there was a tightening of the family when I joined. But I'm a professional, so I thought I'd do the best I can. My effect was with everybody. They were used to playing just the way they liked. On the third album it was my idea to have the Tower of Power horns. I got [trumpet player] Luis Gasca on there. Some of them objected to this change. "It should always be the same six cats." I wanted to teach them all I could, and from that, people thought I was speaking into Carlos' ear. Carlos and I got alongwe got into a groove, but at no time was I kissing anybody's ass for it. When it got to the point I was unhappy, I left.
Marcum lost his control when I came into the band. We started finding out things he could have told us. [Escovedo was alluding to the band's severe financial problems.] It got to the point where no one knew what was happening.
In a way I was responsible. But I'm glad. If I brought two good musicians out of a band of six bad ones, I'm glad.
Carlos Santana: Just last year, Peru opened my eyes toward reality. That was really like a slap. I used to get a lot of slaps from acid and mescaline and drugs. But when reality itself is slapping your face with what your goal really is this time around, you think more towards keeping that pace of being constant toward what you're striving for.
How did Peru slap you?
Carlos: Well, I got a clear view of what we were as far as drugs, as far as personalities, as far as the mind, the mind deceiving us, robbing us of time, which is one of the most precious things that we have. I saw that this band needed to go through some changes, and I saw that I wasn't really putting out 100 percent of what I can put out.
Rubinson: I've always been fascinated with Carlos' desire to be a really bitchin' player. He's always been very anxious to be a very good player.
Carlos: It didn't take long for me to find out music is more eternal. When I first started, I really wanted the same things-to be able to communicate and make everybody that was around, bring them together as one body. At that time, I understand that the pulse was happening. But then again there's melodies. Melodies are more universal than anything, you know. Michael [Shrieve, drummer] and I used to go through a lot of types of music. But there's one that has more feeling every time you listen to it; it seems juicier and like fruit. And some music after a while, it's just bone dry, you know.
Gregg Rolie: The reason I quit was that the music was going where I didn't want to go. It would get into religious aspects. Then things got personal.
Mike Carabello: He like had this thing about me, I don't know, all the time, about what I did; the people I hung around with, how I ran my life...
Carlos: Carabello wasn't fired, really. I still don't know deep inside me why I felt so strong about him being out of the band, although in a lot of ways I do. I don't like to feel the particular feeling of somebody feeling like they have to kiss my ass. It was our personality clashes, so I told the band-the band was going on the road [Chepito was recovered and back by now]-and I said I'm not going unless he's out. The band chose to leave without me for two weeks of concerts.
Stan Marcum: We were all in New York, and Barry Imhoff [of FM Productions; he travels with Santana] had talked Ron Estrada [road manager, now managing the new Santana] into getting Carlos, because Carabello said, "Well, look, if everybody is fucked up because Carlos won't play because I'm here, I'll just leave." Well, half the band left. Chepito, myself, David Brown, Carabello.
Mike Shrieve: By the time we got to New York, Carlos came back. Stan and Carabello and Chepito-well, all the percussion section except for myself-left New York when we had a whole weekend of concerts to do at the [Felt] Forum. So we went onstage and played without the percussion section. Three gigs before that, the whole band was there except for Carlos. The reason I went was because we had commitments.
(At this point, Carlos was left with Rolie, Shrieve and Neal Schon. In the audience, a young conga player approached Santana's production manager, Herbie, about jamming. He knew Santana's repertoire, he said. Herbie gave the kid $4 to take a taxi home and fetch his congas. He returned, auditioned, and joined the Santana survivors on stage, even blitzing through a well-deserved solo. That's "Mingo" Lewis. Escovedo was also on hand in New York. Later, Carlos would replace Brown with Doug Rauch, from the Voices of East Harlem, on bass, add Rich Kermode [from Malo] and Tom Koster [from Gabor Szabo] on keyboards, and hire veteran Latin musician Armando Peraza on congas.)
Stan Marcum: That was all really vague about what Carlos was gonna do, other than, "Well, you know, you're fired, and you're fired, and you're fired." And all of a sudden somebody's firing us that's not the boss, because nobody's the boss and nobody quite understood what was going on.
Luis Gasca told me Carlos was getting into music, but the others were still mostly interested in dope and balling.
Marcum: Well, I myself feel he took that a little too far. If there's any one God or if there's any one Jesus, we all are. And I don't believe one man can claim that he is.
Did he claim he is?
Marcum: Well, his actions seemed to claim that he would be more so than anyone else. And everybody likes chicks, and everybody likes to have a good time, and everybody likes music. And they all go together. And we're not good all the time. We can't be. Because if we were, I think we'd all be dead like Martin Luther King and John Kennedy.
Carlos: I was really straightforward with the band about how I felt about moving on, that I wanted to be for real, not to be cool, and I didn't particularly appreciate it when my brother's coming on to me and trying to show me a song when they couldn't even speak because they were so down, you know. I started to feel weak and resentful towards
the band, because I was demanding more, because my soul was demanding more.
I found out just this year why I was so hard to work with sometimes. When I ate meat, I had no patience at all with anybody showing up late. I was just screaming like I was Nixon or something. I would really demand, expect-I didn't have the tolerance and the understanding to know that, man, not everybody's like me, you know. You have to have patience to let time take its course, you know. But I feel that even if I had the patience and the understanding that I have now, the band would have eventually dissolved...
I know to this day, they think I'm crazy because I used to contradict myself so much. I would demand this, I would say this, and the next time I would just likeworse than them. Hypocrite, because I wasn't really balanced with consistency tountil I started finding out about meditation. I was strolling through Sausalito in this bookstore at the time, and I saw this book on Paramahansa Yogananda and that's what-it was like a magnet. I just picked it up and took it home and I started reading it and I started understanding.
Carlos Santana is by nature a soft-spoken person, and here he was, at the peak of stardom in a strange country, finding out, through a book, then through new music, that he was just another student. And, surrounded by "brothers" from the streets who were at once forceful, emotional, and simple, he was an ineffective teacher. And Santana had no other guiding force. Another commune collapses.
And on its way to the ground, there were the busts: Chepito, hustled away by the authorities at the airport after he screamed, "Explosives!" at a box while boarding a plane. He said he was talking about a carton of Abraxas albums. His attorney showed the court a clipping from Newsweek. It called the album "explosive." Case dismissed.
Also, David Brown, the bass player, was arrested early one morning after smashing up his Porsche in the rain. The cops found some reds, according to Carabello.
Not Fade Away: A Backstage Pass to 20 Years of Rock & Roll Page 17