People sometimes ask where my fascination with Santana began.
For me, it wasn’t Black Magic Woman, Samba Pa Ti or Smooth.
It was She’s Not There.
I can still remember hearing it on the radio one autumn afternoon in 1977, when I was a teenager, and thinking, “Wow… who is that?”
It sounded unlike anything else I was listening to at the time. There was that unmistakable guitar sound, the Hammond organ, the Latin groove and an energy that seemed to leap out of the speakers.
I had to know more.
That search led me to the Moonflower album, which remains one of my favourite records to this day. It was a wonderful mixture of live recordings, including stunning versions of Europa and Black Magic Woman, alongside new studio tracks such as that incredible cover of She’s Not There.
At the time I was taking my own first tentative steps as a guitarist. Like so many young players, I found myself trying to copy Carlos’s note choices, phrasing and his sustain – the way he could make a single note sing.
Looking back, I realise those early hours spent listening to Moonflower shaped the way I still think about the guitar today. If there’s a little of Carlos in my own playing, that’s where it began.
Nearly fifty years later, that same fascination is still with me—and, in many ways, it’s the reason Corazon exists.
If you’ve never listened to She’s Not There or Moonflower, I’d thoroughly recommend them. If you already know them… perhaps it’s time to put them on again.