Live Santana...

I have Lotus pressed in Holland. The quality of Holland mastering and vinyl is very good, not sure how it compares to Japanese pressing. The recording is pretty good although a little bass shy. Mix is very heavy/up front on Carlo's guitar, unfortunately keys are recessed a bit too much and overall sound is a little flat in terms of sense of space and stage.
I've had Moonflower on U.S. pressing, and Holland pressing. Holland Vinyl MUCH better; cleaner, clearer, more detail, less distortion... better recording quality than Lotus... drums hotter and with greater dynamics. Not all of Lotus is live, there were some studio cuts, some cuts are, like all Santana, so-so artistically speaking, others are great. If you sit down and listen to Moonflower all the way through you'll probably end up with a headache! I love Carlos but after an hour or so you want to get off the ride.
The Buddy Miles thing has never been recommended and I don't have it.

Correction to above.. "Not all Lotus is live" meant to say "Not all of Moonflower is live"

they are out of print now, so hard to find, but all are on limited edition japanese mini lp cd's.

I have a copy of the Lotus album that was origianlly done in SQ quad and has been transferred to DVD-Audio. It sounds terrific. I also have Caravanserai done this way as well as Santana III. If you ever get the chance to hear these in surround sound, you will never again be satisifed with plain old stereo renditions.

Caravanserai sounds especially good and is my favorite Santana album. BTW, Abraxas is also available in surround sound but it sounds *awful*. The best version of that album is the SACD closely follwed by the Sony MasterSound Super Bit Map (2 channel) version. The SBM sounds excellent, a very good use of that technology.

-RW-

Lotus is available as a regular CD at amazon. They also refer to a "DSD mastered" Japanese version. Not sure which that is, but might be worth looking for.

BTW, the Columbia CD remaster of 'Caravanserai' is a revelation, both musically and sonically; the 1/2 speed Mastersound 'Abraxas' lp is excellent, especially compared to the remastered CD, which sounds strangely dull.