Woodstock

In 1999, Carlos Santana did something that almost never happens in popular music.

Thirty years after appearing at Woodstock, and nearly three decades after albums like Abraxas and Santana III made him one of the biggest guitar players in the world, Santana suddenly found himself back at the very top of the charts.

And he didn't just have a successful comeback album.

He released one of the biggest selling albums of all time.

To understand how surprising Supernatural was, you have to remember where Carlos Santana's career stood during the early to mid-90s.

Santana was already a legend.

The band's appearance at Woodstock in 1969 had introduced millions of people to this incredible mixture of rock, blues, Latin, percussion, and improvisation.

Albums like Santana, Abraxas, and Santana III became classics, producing songs like Evil Ways, Black Magic Woman, Oya Como Va, and No One to Depend On.

and this one was their 11th studio album it went more psychedelic soul this time around peaked at number five on the billboard pop albums chart spent 15 weeks at number one on the r b chart and it had the hit song i can't get next to you in 1970 santana released abracus This was their sophomore studio album, and it was a masterpiece of Latin rock and psychedelic fusion.

It came off of their performance at the Woodstock Festival the year before.

Santana and his band, of course, blended their rock, blues, jazz, and Afro-Cuban rhythms.

This was a huge success.

What a, what a week.

Um, eh, I've heard about Woodstock quite a few times in my life.

Obviously, I wasn't there.

Um, but just the gravity of this concert and the acts that performed there, and just what a big deal culturally this was.

Uh, it's a concert.

It's a festival.

And the reason that this one kinda stands as a testament of why just, you can just say Woodstock, and this is what it's associated with, is that it took place at a time where there...

I mean, everything kinda had to fall into place.

Mm.

I was in my ear- early 30s, and I saw Green Day on MTV at Woodstock.

Wow, okay.

[laughs]

I loved that.

They already cut the whole gravitas of the event down to nothing, and they made it a club.

And then they proceeded to rip into songs, and halfway through talking about, "I wish Abbie Hoffman was here so I could hit him with a guitar," which showed me that Billie Joe knew about the original Woodstock where Pete Townshend hit Abbie Hoffman with a guitar, 'cause he got on his stage.

And then he started to, you know, yell out things like, "You say rock and roll, you say shut the fuck up"-

see.

I can't remember one that didn't happen, but I will tell you that if any festival didn't happen in the early 70s, it was because the municipal authorities were scared to death of having another Woodstock.

And so they would often cancel permits or try to close down bluegrass festivals.

And I was certainly part of Jim Clark's festivals, Otis Woody's festivals in Pennsylvania and Virginia, where the municipal authorities were trying to close them down.

Then I drew portraits for two years and stayed up all night listening to folk music in the clubs.

It took a while before I thought of picking up a guitar myself." But during the '60s, he developed a reputation as a powerful and soulful folk singer, and his performance in the opening slot at Woodstock in 1969 made him a star, especially after the release of the movie of that iconic concert.

He continued performing throughout the following decades right up until 2010, when he retired as a result of ill health.

When he died in 2013, Groove Armada's Tom Findlay wrote a moving account of their work with him, uh, for The Guardian.

So Tommy happens.

So they get invited to Woodstock, and... townsend's already pretty disillusioned with hippie culture and he is he did i guess doesn't like acid doesn't like uh...

i think even more they didn't like his personal experience on acid he was pretty uh...

I would say like existentially disappointed and maybe heartbroken at the idea of masses of, you know, these so-called revolutionaries that are all just drugged out.

Just real quick, I want to interject, though.

This was, to your point, and I think you were getting to it a few minutes back.

Woodstock was a big inspiration for him seeing this, like, mass...

I mean, at least in part, like, mass idiots.