Angel of Sunlight, Illuminations, 1974

The year was 1974. Political turmoil, free-thinking, Eastern philosophy, and hallucinogens had virtually destroyed the boundaries between jazz and rock, latin- or otherwise. United by their devotion to Guru Chinmoy (who they would later discover was only exploiting their celebrity status to build his own following), Carlos Santana and Alice Coltrane found common musical ground on this far-out collaboration entitled Illuminations, much to the dismay of Columbia Records (this was the first of Santana’s nine albums to not go gold, after all).

The result, despite the kitchy post-Beatles insertion of tabla and tamboura (”yeah, man, dig it”), does have some pretty nice moments. Remember that Santana, despite his plunge into Eastern-thought and then subsequent re-surfacing as a pop icon, is actually where he is today because he’s a great guitar player. Here he stays true to his own sound, not trying to cop licks from McGlaughlin or Coltrane (John, I mean) or anything like that. It just so happens that in this context, the free-flowing, rollicking boil-over, his soaring guitar lines fit in just right.

Alice holds her own as well - check out her solo on the Wurlitzer near the last 5 minutes or so. And of course the rhythm section was making it easy to sound good. Rule of thumb for jazz-rock crossover projects: steal Miles Davis’ band. I mean, with the way Dave Holland and Jack DeJohnette were playing together in those days, Santana could have played the ukulele and he would have sounded like a bad m.f.

All in all I have to say I’m pleasantly surprised by this track. If you’ve got the record, pull it out and skip to the B-side. Otherwise, buy the CD. Wanna find out more about it? Here’s the complete personnel, over on Alice Coltrane’s discography.