1. Shape Shifter
2. Dom
3. Nomad
4. Metatron
5. Angelica Faith
6. Never The Same Again
7. In The Light Of A New Day
8. Spark Of The Divine
9. Macumba In Budapest
10. Mr. Szabo
11. Eres La Luz
12. Canela
13. Ah, Sweet Dancer

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007MJ9LA2/?tag=imwan-20

From Billboard.com:

Carlos Santana will release a new solo instrumental album two weeks after he begins a two-year residency at the House of Blues in Las Vegas. It's the first of three albums he has planned for the near future.

"Shape Shifter' is the personal album," he says of the disc that will be released May 15 on his Starfaith label through RED Distribution. "One album will be a Santana band album. The other one is for my family, my new wife (Cindy Blackman) my brother Jorge. I'll bring together my whole family, my new family, to do music in honor of the sacredness of the family. We can start in March, April and since we're only working at night we can do sessions during the day (at Odds On Studio). It's just a balance -- recording and being onstage. We can do three, four, seven albums."

House of Blues, which has never presented a residency, will put about 45 shows in 2012 on sale on March 3. Opening night is May 2 with shows planned for May, June and September. The venue is being reconfigured with seating and tables to replace the open space, taking capacity down to 1,200 from about 1,600.

"I like to do at least 50 percent" of the new album during the shows, he says before rattling off song titles from the new album -- "Shape Shifter," "Nomad," "Dom," "Never the Same Again." "It's for people who love 'Caravanseri,' 'Europa,' 'Samba Pa Ti' -- the instrumentals. A lot of people miss hearing the Mexican just playing his guitar. That's a language that's better than Swahili or English or Spanish. I haven't done one in a long time."

"Shape Shifter" is being billed as the 36th album in his career that began in the Bay Area and erupted with a performance at Woodstock in 1969. Santana and the Rolling Stones are the only acts to have landed an album in the top 10 of the Billboard 200 in every decade since the 1960s.

Santana's first Las Vegas residency ran from May 2009 to May 2011 at the Hard Rock's the Joint. He played 72 shows during that stint, which was billed as "Supernatural Santana: A Trip Through the Hits." Santana is leaving the concept for his House of Blues run more fluid -- he expects to welcome special guests and alter the middle of the show nightly. He has only prepared the opening and closing of the show, but he won't give out song titles.

"I like to assault the senses so I have created three different kinds of intros -- there's a lot of power," Santana said in the Foundation Room of the Los Angeles House of Blues before addressing members of the media. "There's a lot to hit the ear. I call (the opening and closing segments) the doors -- there's the front door and the back door and the middle are the rooms. We can take it to rooms that we haven't been in, we can discover spiritual romance inside the sheets so to speak.

"I think I learned from Miles Davis and (John) Coltrane and Wayne Shorter and Herbie (Hancock). They call it alchemy. You're creating, transforming. … You can create brilliance from misery, victory from being a victim through musical notes."

This could be good. At least he's stopped trying to appeal to modern Top 40 consumers.

When I saw Santana doing "Back In Black" on a late night show with some rapper, I remember thinking that Carlos had hit bottom artistically.

Here's hoping that this album marks Santana's musical resurrection.

That is pretty frightening.

One caveat: I do have a 1988 Carlos instrumental live at Montreux with a band featuring Weather Report's Wayne Shorter. Only played it once a couple months ago, but at the time I didn't think it was all that good.

This sounds like the return of the Carlos Santana I've been waiting for!!

My thoughts exactly. For years I bought anything new by Santana without needing to hear it first, and I love albums like Milagro and Santana Brothers nearly as much as his classics. So when Supernatural came out in 1999, I bought it like any others and couldn't have hated it more. I mean, good for him getting that kind of commercial success, but there was nothing on there for me. Even the non-commercial-pop songs were mediocre retreads of things he had done in the past. Here's hoping this upcoming Shape Shifter will be a return to form, and the first album I'll buy from him in nearly 13 years, but I will remain skeptical until I hear it.

Bump: Added cover image and pre-order link to the first post.

So this is a Santana album and not a solo record after all?

It's being solicited as Santana the band.

From Antimusic.com:

Carlos Santana has set a May 15th release date for his 36th album, Shape Shifter, his debut release for his new label, Starfaith Records. His camp sent out these details:
The 13-song set is an instrumental tour de force featuring tracks spanning from the late 1990's to the present. It's powered throughout by Carlos' instantly recognizable virtuoso lead guitar and the Santana Band's world-class musicianship (only one song features vocals from Santana's lead vocalists Andy Vargas and Tony Lindsay).

Collaborations include "Never the Same Again," which Carlos wrote with producer Eric Bazilian, and "In the Light of a New Day," which began as a demo that Narada Michael Walden shared with Carlos. "Spark of the Divine"—often played on tour to introduce songs including "Black Magic Woman"—leads in to "Macumba in Budapest," the first of two songs Carlos co-wrote and produced with Walter Afanasieff—the song vamps into a classic Santana Latin jam featuring Raul Rekow on congas and Karl Perazzo on percussion. The second, "Eres La Luz," the only track featuring vocals, highlights the irresistible Latin groove that embodies the world music essence of Santana.

Shape Shifter closes with two songs that are collaborations between Carlos and his son, musician Salvador Santana—who plays piano on both—including the rousing "Canela." The final track, "Ah, Sweet Dancer," is a song Carlos first heard in a taxicab in Germany—he tracked it down in a local record store and began performing it regularly on tour. The recording features only soulful solos from father and son, offering elegant closure to Shape Shifter.

Shape Shifter comprises mostly original compositions that Carlos has been stashing away for such an instrumental project—long awaited by fans—and he conceived the album's sequence as thoughtfully as its track selection.

i'm in on this one.

I definitely want to hear this one.

This sounds like the first Santana album worth listening to in years.

Finishing up 1st listen. My initial reaction: not great, not awful. For most of it think various Santana periods filtered through a smooth Latin Jazz filter. I don't mean there's no rock; in fact straight smooth jazz fans won't like it; but there is very much a smooth Latin jazz flavor running through it.

on first listen, 2 tracks stood out:
Canola (sounds a lot like Europa)
& Metatron (reminds me a bit of Focus' Sylvia).

For instrumental jazzy Carlos, I'd recommend Illuminations with Alice Coltrane over this:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000006ZUV/?tag=imwan-20

While import only, it starts new at $5.50 on Amazon.

Carlos absolutely tore it up on Leno just now. However, I have read some very negative things about this one being uninspired, tired and at times like lounge music. Most of what Geff said seems to be the general feeling. I'll pick it up used for $5 or so and probably be able to soon and see for myself how it is. The song tonight was great though, despite some sloppy playing.
At least it wasn't a collaborations album!

"Uninspired" would be a good description of what I got from the one listen.

I thought so too. Then I listened to the samples....

On last weekend's "Jimbo Lunch," I picked up a used copy of Carlos's album Oneness. Some nice fusion playing on there, but the only downside was that there were no liner notes, so I couldn't tell who played on what.

Shape Shifter was $6.99 this morning at my Target store.
...and even less if you pay with the RED CARD!

For what its worth...
Gary/NYC

Finally gave "Shape Shifter" a listen today. It's nice to hear the Santana band without all those guest artists for a change, and the playing throughout is solid, but there's nothing transcendent or breathtaking on the album. It certainly doesn't hold a candle to any of their acknowledged classics, and wouldn't even compare to the last Santana album I loved: "Milagro." That being said, since "Supernatural" I completely lost interest, and I'm happy to finally have a new Santana record I can enjoy listening to, even if it doesn't blow me away.