Carlos Santana: ‘I need my guitar to sound like a girl’

By Associated Press

NEW YORK: “Take no prisoners — peacefully,” Carlos Santana generally tells his bandmates earlier than taking the stage.

“I don’t like to coast. I don’t like to rope-a-dope,” Santana says. “I want to get in the middle of the ring and knock the sucker out. That way the referee can’t steal the fight from me.”

Santana, 75, can nonetheless whip a crowd right into a frenzy like few others. He’s been doing it since he stormed onto the San Francisco scene within the late ’60s. He left the Woodstock viewers dazed and surprised earlier than the primary Santana file got here out.

The new documentary by Rudy Valdez, “Carlos,” which is premiering on the Tribeca Film Festival and can be launched this fall in theaters by Sony Pictures Classics, chronicles the meteoric rise of some of the singular guitar gamers in rock historical past. The critic Robert Christgau as soon as wrote: “He is less a man of style than of sound, a clear, loud, fluent sound that cleanses with the same motion no matter how often that motion is repeated.”

Santana, who launches the nationwide 1001 Rainbows Tour in Newark, New Jersey, on June 21, lately spoke by Zoom from his Bay Area residence in California. He’s been in San Francisco since his household (his father performed the violin in a mariachi band) moved from Mexico within the Nineteen Sixties.

“The Bay Area definitely attracts characters, you know?” mentioned Santana. “Like Minnesota Fats or Les Paul. Rascals. I call them Divine Rascals.”

Santana, talking with a panoramic {photograph} of the Woodstock efficiency hanging on the wall behind him, mirrored on his journey, his sound and a few of the demons he’s confronted alongside the best way.

“I have nothing but good memories,” mentioned Santana. “I have developed selective celestial amnesia.”

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AP: How is it to observe a film of your life?

SANTANA: It’s unusual. It’s attention-grabbing to observe this particular person continuously try and consider that he belongs. Ha ha! That he belongs on stage with these unimaginable musicians. Who would have thunk it that one minute I’m washing dishes at Tic Tock (Drive-In) and the following I’m on stage with Jerry Garcia and Eric Clapton and so they’re me like I positively received one thing they need to study from? They’d all go, “Where did you get that?” And I’d say, “Well, when you were listening to this, I was listening to a Hungarian gypsy musician named Gábor Szabó.” And additionally drummers. I realized quite a bit from African drummers. So I realized the right way to scramble the eggs in a different way. The guys from Creedence Clearwater used to say: “What is it you call that music you’re playing?” And I’m going, “African rhythms with blues guitar.”

AP: What was San Francisco like while you first arrived there within the ’60s?

SANTANA: It was a shock coming from Tijuana. In Tijuana, the folks that I hung up hung round with have been taking part in John Lee Hooker and Jimmy Reed and Lightnin Hopkins. We thought that B.B. King was subtle. Down and soiled, murky, easy however lethal, I believe they name it minimize and shoot crowd. Because in the event that they didn’t such as you, they’d minimize and shoot you. They didn’t need you to get all intelligent or subtle. They wished you to simply play the heart. So after I received right here, it was a problem. I mainly thought that everyone knew John Lee Hooker. And then I received right here and so they have been like, “Who?” I needed to begin over again. Fortunately, after I received right here, the Rolling Stones have been popping out and so they have been listening to the identical issues I used to be listening to. Little Walter and Howlin’ Wolf and Muddy Waters. That’s what saved me from getting annoyed and going again to Tijuana.

AP: Still, you have been simply 19 while you first carried out on the Fillmore West.

SANTANA: Since I used to be a toddler, I received a status in Tijuana for taking part in the violin and profitable many of the radio contests. When I got here to the United States, I began profitable a radio contest with a thousand bands. We have been within the prime three. Everything that I’ve finished by grace, it gave me confidence that I may be on stage with Jerry Garcia or Michael Bloomfield or Peter Green, and afterward Tito Puente and afterward Miles Davis.

AP: Was there a non secular component to music for you early on?

SANTANA: Everybody on this world wants a heartfelt hug to be reassured that we’re not going to be doomed hitting a brick wall, that we are going to go to the wall and we’ll succeed at turning into architects creating heaven on Earth. From Bob Marley to Bob Dylan, Marvin Gaye, Sam Cooke, all of them discuss the identical factor. “One Love.” “All You Need is Love.” “What a Wonderful World.” I make it a degree to hearken to sure songs which can be like the brand new anthems of no church, however the brand new anthems of a galactic cathedral that transcends corrupt companies and governments. If you and I get an opportunity to hitchhike a experience with Bezos or Elon Musk, and we take the area shuttle and go up there exterior of the stratosphere and also you have a look at the planet, there’s no flags up there. There’s no partitions up there. There’s no time up there. When you say, “What time is it?” you simply say, “It’s now.” And in order that’s how I attempt to play my music: Outside of time and outdoors of gravity. Maya Angelou mentioned, “The only thing people are going to remember is how you make them feel.” And I used to be like, “Oh. So why don’t why don’t I make them feel their totality, their absoluteness?” I’m making someone really feel like they’re from Kansas and so they simply put their toe within the Pacific Ocean in Hawaii for the primary time. Bam! In one word.

AP: There are many enduring relationships you have got in “Carlos” however how would you characterize your relationship to the guitar?

SANTANA: My guitar is my greatest lover, ever. Lovers come and go, however your relationship with the guitar — any model or something — stays. But it’s your relationship with that sound. When you set your fingers on that word, you get chills. That’s one of the best lover. You uncover the feeling of getting the primary French kiss. I’ll cease there as a result of this ought to be PG. But all of it offers with the identical factor. It all offers with “Oh my God.” The massive G-spot, which is God. When you hit that, all of them go, “Oh my God.” When you play music like that, it’s extra than simply intelligent notes. It turns into emotion, emotions, ardour. That’s music to me. Music with out emotion, ardour or emotions is simply intelligent noise. This is what’s lacking from the planet proper now. People forgot the right way to really feel. Stop, take a deep breathe and really feel what your feeling.

AP: You have at all times had a definite, immediately recognizable guitar sound, like a voice. Where did your tone come from?

SANTANA: I received it from my dad and I received it from my mother. I received it from my dad as a result of he taught me the right way to play the violin and make one word with the bow, you recognize? And my mother, her tenacity and conviction. Her braveness spilled on me. I used to lock myself in a closet at the hours of darkness and attempt to play like B.B. or Otis Rush, all of the folks that I really like. And it used to frustrate me that I couldn’t sound like that. Then someday I awakened and I’m going, “Hey, stupid. You’re not supposed to sound like them. They sound like them. You’re supposed to sound like you.” Then you realized: “How do I play like me?” Just shut up and play. It’s an actual blessing and a present that in a single word you may be acknowledged out of 1000’s and 1000’s of guitar gamers all over the world. It’s like that with the individuals I really like. John McLaughlin. T-Bone Walker. In one word, I can let you know who they’re. There’s a distinction between Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell and Grant Green. But the one I hearken to probably the most continues to be Otis Rush. There’s one thing very uncooked and sincere about the best way he performs. Right now, I’m solely listening to 3 issues: Nina Simone, Etta James and Tina Turner. I need that sound that these girls get in my guitar. I need my guitar to sound like a girl.

AP: In the movie, you recount how Jerry Garcia gave you mescaline shortly earlier than you took the stage at Woodstock, pondering you had hours earlier than you carried out. In arguably probably the most celebrated set of Woodstock, you have been tripping and praying…

SANTANA: “God, please let me stay on tune and in time.” I may have laid an enormous egg in entrance of all people. It was scary to take a look at the viewers. But what got here via was my mom’s confidence: God is by your aspect. How are you able to go mistaken?

AP: Were you accustomed to reaching totally different psychological planes via the music, with or with out medicine?

SANTANA: Outside of your thoughts is one of the best half is. There’s not gravity there. There’s no time. There’s no criticizing. There’s simply pure manifestation. It goes from God via you to them. So I’m in a position to adapt myself, like with “Supernatural,” whether or not I’m taking part in with Lauren Hill, Rob Thomas or Eric Clapton. Whoever will get in entrance of me, you should pay attention and complement. I stay up for doing extra issues with Willie Nelson. I need to learn to complement and simplify music with honesty.

AP: You mentioned that your guitar neck then appeared like a snake to you. Did that ever occur to you once more?

SANTANA: Eric Clapton and I discuss that as a result of he used to try this as effectively. You may inform who visited that dimension. The Doors. The Beatles with “Sgt. Pepper’s.” You may inform who went there as a result of you possibly can’t play that music except you go there. There’s an element that’s exterior the realm of do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do. I suppose you grow to be like a mothership that may go anyplace within the universe and be related. Check out what I’m saying, man. To be 75 years previous and to be related — as a result of lots of people invite me to play on their albums — is one thing to be grateful about. I really feel that that is one of the best a part of my life as a result of it looks like now I do know what I’m doing and why I’m doing it and for who I’m doing it. I’m an architect of the very best order by Coltrane and Bob Marley. And with the present of music, I’m in a position to create one thing that faith individuals can not do and the United Nations can not do and the United States authorities can not do. Which is to deliver to unity, concord, oneness on Earth. Sound, resonance, vibration, frequency — these are my instruments.

AP: In the movie you discuss about being molested from the ages of 10 to 12. Did music deliver some measure of therapeutic from that have?

SANTANA: All I can say with certainty and readability is: I’m not what occurred to me. I nonetheless am, as God created me, with purity and innocence. I’ve a behavior of sending individuals to the sunshine as a substitute of the hell. I used to say, “Eat s—- and die.” But I don’t say that anymore. Now I’m going: You know what? I’m going to take a look at you such as you’re 7 years previous. And I’m going to ship you into the sunshine that’s behind you. If I ship you to hell, then I’m going to go there with you. And I don’t need to go to hell. By doing that, I’m in a position to not be caught with the sufferer mentality. “I’m Santana and I was a victim of child molestation” — I don’t need to do this. I don’t need to suppose like that. I’m Carlos Santana and by grace I can create blessings and miracles.

AP: Which, for a lot of, you’ve finished.

SANTANA: I like to supply individuals a method into your individual divinity. That is the key. The extra we hearken to “Sesame Street” or “Mister Rogers,” the extra we usher in that frequency that you’re on divine. The reverse of that’s that you simply’re a wretched sinner. I inform individuals: Don’t sing that tune after I die. Don’t sing “Amazing Grace.” Sing “La Cucaracha” or “La Bamba” or “Tequila” or “Who Let the Dogs Out.” Sing any f——ing factor however don’t sing “Amazing Grace” at my funeral as a result of there’s nothing wretched about me.