Santana
Olympia Stadium
Detroit, Michigan
July 1, 1975
Carlos Santana - guitar, percussion, vocals
Tom Coster - keyboards, vocals
Armando Peraza - percussion, vocals
Leon Patillo - keyboards, vocals
David Brown - bass
"Ndugu" Leon Chancler - drums
Orestes Vilatos - timbales
(etree has this date listed as Rynearson Stadium in Ypsilanti, Mich.
but this is unlikely as Ypsilanti is not part of Detroit and this source tape of mine is a 1st gen. directly from the taper)
performance quality: B+
recording quality: C+ to B-
source: 1st generation audience tape, but not a real great sounding one
runtime: 72:38
setlist:
1: tuning / stage introduction / incident at Neshabur
2: black magic woman / gypsy queen
3: oye como va
4: treat > time waits for no one
5: europa > savor > encore break
6: band introductions and happy birthday Ndugu
7: encore soul sacrifice
comments:
A pretty hot show from Santana (is there any other kind?) in the "Motor City" the recording itself is not bad, but the one problem of greatest concern with this is the sound is muddy. This is a big place. There are a couple of interruptions, one for a tape flip about 41 minutes into the show (just as Europa goes into Savor, apparently) and a brief recorder shutoff in the Soul Sacrifice.
It's not too jarring after splicing. I would put this a bit above the "for completists only" level, but not very far above it. Even for the lofty standards of Carlos Santana I would say this is a better than average show, BMW/GQ and OCV are typically rather short length average versions, the others are a bit stretched out and jammy. Carlos seems to like the patriotic mood of the 4th of July spirit (as in his national broadcast from 7/4/81, that was a high energy concert too). I don't know what kind of recorder was used for this, probably auto levelling Sony mono, there is some evidence of the
cheesiness of the microphone, and there is a little (slight) speed fluctuation in the later part of Soul Sacrifice. Not enough to really annoy, but it is noticable.
I can only guess the new album at this time was "Welcome", but the only 2 songs I know from that are not in this show. It's not quite complete, but close to, the beginning and end are both included here. I tried to splice it sounding as complete as possible but I think a segment is missing in the tape flip (not very long, maybe just a few
seconds, possibly as much as a minute or 2.) The sound gets noticably less clear after the tape flip (this rather common problem with tapes of this era is usually either because the recorder's heads have become dirty during the concert, or the tape doesn't sit quite flush in the deck after being flipped. Those who have had to flip
cassettes in the dark or under low concert light know what I mean there). I did not record or see this show. This may be muddy from being too far from the stage, so this is a you're kinda/sorta there production. The crowd noise is moderate (espec. applause) but mostly between songs. If you're not familiar with Leon "Ndugu" Chancellor, you should be, like most who play percussion at any time with Carlos Santana, he's very good at it.
I really do think that was not this concert, rather one a few days (or more) earlier in a place called Ypsilanti Michigan at Rynearson Stadium. the taper of this concert marked it Olympic Stadium, and he is a Michigan resident, who taped this, so he ought to know.
do not sell this recording.
This thing's lost plenty enough already.
http://rapidshare.com/files/137016549/Santana750701FLAC_01.zip
http://rapidshare.com/files/137068836/Santana750701FLAC_02.zip
http://rapidshare.com/files/137092241/Santana750701FLAC_03.zip
