Reflecting on Jorge Santana, The Malo Man

Monday's death of guitarist and band leader Jorge Santana of the group Malo sent me digging into my vinyl record collection in the basement. Malo had been a great favorite of mine in high school and I wanted to get my hands on the platter and relive what the music meant to me almost 50 years ago when I was growing up in Mission, Texas.

I found my copy of Malo's second album, Dos, and also my triple-album set Fillmore: The Last Days, about the final performances at the legendary San Francisco music hall that closed in 1971. The two albums are closely related in my mind. Here's the story about how that happened.

Malo must have first come to my attention when I bought The Last Days on August 16, 1972 (obsessive-compulsive that I am, I write the date I buy records and books on the packaging). I was 14 years old and had a thing for multi-album sets with all the extras thrown in. This package had a poster, a ticket and an illustrated booklet. Plus, the music greatly appealed to me with the Grateful Dead, Santana (led by Carlos Santana, Jorge's brother), the New Riders of the Purple Sage and other groovy groups.

I might have heard Malo's first album before, the one with eye-catching Aztec cover, the explosive opening track "Pana" and their huge hit "Suavacito" on it, but I definitely heard the group on The Last Days, playing "Pana." Santana's group must have made a big impression on me, because I bought Dos on November 17, 1972.  With songs like "I'm For Real" and "Latin Bugaloo," I became a confirmed fan of Jorge Santana's Malo. Lacking a way to play vinyl these days, I turn to YouTube to get my annual booster shot of Malo, early Santana, and the other Chicano group that caught my attention in the early 1970s, El Chicano.

My interest in Latin music remained at a low simmer, defined by teen listening habits, until the early 2000s, when a trip to Brazil turbocharged a fascination with bossa nova and MPB (música popular brasileira) that continues unabated 15 years later. Cuban, Puerto Rican and Tex-Mex music followed and I still listen to more Latin music these days than any other genre. I just like the sounds. It takes me back to those roots on the border.

The great flowering of interest in Latin music really does trace its way back to Jorge Santana and Malo in 1972, perhaps even more than Santana. Santana the group was easy to hear in the 1960s and 1970s, with hits in heavy rotation on the big Top 40 station in McAllen, Texas, KRIO-AM. Malo, however, had a lower profile in the era where you had to hunt around record stores and find "underground" radio shows to hear music off the mainstream. Jorge Santana's music was a small act of teen rebellion on my part, when gringos like me didn't pay much attention to Latin music.

Thanks for all the memories and sounds, Jorge Santana. The music will always be with us. Any day, like today, that starts with "Pana" is going to be a good day.