Every shadow disbelieves me

Continuing my trip back in time through the album charts

07/01/73 : Caravanserai - Santana


We've just had the one visit with Santana so far - I was so overwhelmed with feeling I referred to it as "perfectly listenable".  I can only hope I manage to keep my emotions somewhat more under control this time around.

Hmmm - it's a lot jazzier than I was expecting.  It also really struggles to get going - the third track is at least more upbeat but it's not exactly interesting.  All the songs sound like they're about to do something and then they just change their mind, except maybe "All The Love In The Universe" which goes on too long.  It's not terrible and there's certainly some skilful playing on there but it just doesn't really hang together for me.

We're at #13 on the charts this week on its eighth week of a ten week run, having peaked at #6.  The top five this week are Slade, Fantastic Hits Vol. 2, Gilbert, 25 Rockin' And Rollin' Greats and 22 Dynamic Hits Vol. 2 - that's really not a great top 5 now, is it?  Michael Jackson is the highest new entry at #17 with Ben - not one of his more famous albums.  Bizarrely, the chart this week only has 24 albums in it, but that's still no excuse for the fact that there are NO women in the charts.  NOT A SINGLE ONE (except for all the women on the compilations, obviously) which is not a great way to leave the year.

Wikipedia doesn't have a lot on the album - it was well regarded critically and did well commercially, but it was the beginning of quite a big slump in their popularity, so it probably wasn't listened to too many times after it had been bought.  It sold a MILLION copies in the US though so it probably kept Santana in tea and biscuits for a bit.

"Customers also listened to" - well, we don't know because for some strange reason it's not available on Amazon (but was on Spotify which is unusual).  Stuff that's Santana like, I guess.  But, with my limited knowledge on the subject, this doesn't really sound like a Santana album - it has nice enough noises but it's all just a bit pointless.

And that's it for 1973!

14/01/73 - His fans must REALLY love him

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