Not that super (Supernatural - Santana)

Member Name: cswann

Product:	Supernatural - Santana
Date:	02/10/00 (8 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: It has "Smooth" on it

Disadvantages: Has been hyped up - not as good as people say

I know it won loads of Grammy awards, and everyone seems to love this album, but I'm afraid I'm not one of them. There's really only a couple of tracks on it that I can stand to listen to for very long.

When you first see all the collaborators (Eric Clapton, Eagle Eye Cherry, Lauryn Hill and others) it smacks of someone trying to revive an ailing career. Don't know whether that's true, but it certainly has meant that it's a more varied album that a lot of Santana's earlier ones. At times it reminds me of Sting's music, for some reason.

Opening track "(Da le) Yaleo" and "El Farol", a slow number, sound like Santana of old.
As you might expect, Carlos Santana being a guitarist, there are many guitar solos, but I just found most of them tedious. (e.g. "Love of my life")
"Africa Bamba" is okay - sounds like the kind of thing they're always playing in my local Italian restaurant.
Then there's "Smooth", which I do think is a brilliant song, a kind shuffle with its Robert Palmer style vocal, I love it. I also like "Migra", probably because it s very like "I want candy", and you can sing it along to the beat.
The Lauryn Hill track (Do you like the way") is just out of place, and like many of the tracks on here, too long.
On the "The calling" we get even more tedious guitar solos (well, it is the track with Clapton).
Some of it just sounds too much like Sting.

Summary: