Santana

Santana have featured numerous different musicians in an ever-fluid big band line-up, but the one constant in their four decades at the top is the innovative, visionary Mexican guitarist Carlos Santana. The last major band to emerge from the San Francisco psychedelic era of the late 1960s, they achieved huge success with their jazz-rock-Latin fusions, forged on Carlos's thrilling guitar and incessant dance rhythms. Carlos had moved to San Francisco from Mexico in the early 1960s, initially making his mark with Santana Blues Band, before developing the trademark Santana conga rhythms, which made them the explosive live band who achieved international fame with a brilliant performance at the famous Woodstock festival in 1969. They struck gold on record, too, in 1971 with the chart-topping Santana III album, which produced two Top 20 singles, Everybody's Everything and No One To Depend On. New members came and went but Carlos Santana's reputation continued to soar, particularly after a duo album with John McLaughlin. The band's popularity finally faded through the 1990s, but they had an unexpected revival with the chart-topping Supernatural in 1999, featuring superstar guests like Wyclef Jean, Eric Clapton, Lauryn Hill and Dave Matthews.