WCSX Classic Cuts
Santana: “Evil Ways”
The Hook: Even a jam band needs songs and manager Bill Graham found a good one.
Album: Santana
Year: 1969
Writer: Clarence “Sonny” Henry
Stats: The band’s first Top 10 hit, it peaked at number-nine on the Billboard Hot 100.
The Background: “Evil Ways” was the title track of a 1968 album by Afro-Cuban jazz percussionist Willie Bobo. Carlos Santana explains how the song came to his attention not long after it was released.
Carlos Santana on who brought the song “Evil Ways” into Santana. OC:…evil ways. :19
“Bill Graham. He’s the one that brought it in. He brought a lot of songs for us to do. We were just like a jam band, we didn’t have no endings, no beginnings, no middles [laughs]. We didn’t know anything about choruses or bridge. Y’know, we just jammed. And he said, ‘Well, you know, that’s pretty good, but you guys need some songs.’ So he brought ‘Evil Ways’ in.”