FunkFreak75 Herbie is back with two of his cohorts from Miles Davis' "Second Great Quintet": drummer extraordinaire Tony Williams and bass legend Ron Carter--plus long-time collaborator and Miles replacement, Freddie Hubbard.

A1. "One Finger Snap" (7:21) Freddie Hubbard can sure get inspired by a spirited swing! He's on fire--prompted, to be sure, by the play of Tony Williams and Ron Carter. Only Herbie feels a little out of place (which may have something to do with his one minute of silence beneath Freddie's solo). But then he shows that he's certainly improved and matured with his own great high-speed solo in the fourth and fifth minutes. He definitely has a gift for cleverly and subtly varying the melody with each pass through the phrases. Tony's amazingly entertaining solo in the seventh minute is so cleanly recorded, top to bottom, that it feels as if the sound of a full drum has never been captured so well. So cool! (14/15)

A2. "Oliloqui Valley" (8:30) here's an interesting song whose opening sounds so much like the clip from THE DRIFT's 2008 song "Uncanny Valley" that is used as the main theme song for The Moth Radio Hour podcast! Herbie is the front man from the very start and, I must say that his gift for pleasing melodies (despite his penchant [and talent] for varying them with each and every recapitulation) is quite remarkable. At the end of the fourth minute Herbie finally relinquishes the spotlight in lieu of Freddie's cornet. Freddie's great--quite dynamic and exciting--but he still can't prevent me from gravitating to the extraordinary play of both Herbie and Tony. At 5:40 all but Tony's cymbal play and the odd piano chord step aside to allow Ron Carter to be heard in solo. Ron chooses to take the melody and rhythm off into an mind-bending psychedelia of pitch distortion and pace warp. Never expected that! When Herbie and the others return and push Freddie back to the front the song is about over and I'm sad! That was one of the fastest 8:30's I've ever experienced! (18.75/20)

B1. "Cantaloupe Island" (5:33) We are here once again (like "Watermelon Man") exposed to Herbie's genius for pop-friendly melodies and earworm "hooks." It sounds to me like a bit of a combination of variations on the main melodies of the famous samba-inspired songs, "Mas que nada" by Jorge Ben (released in 1963; later, in 1966, made famous by Sergio Mendes & Brasil '66) and Billy and Gene Page's "The 'In' Crowd" (which was, coincidentally being recorded for the very first time by and for Doby Gray just before Empyrean Isles was released). Nice cornet soloing over the two-part Brasilian-influenced song. (9/10)

B2. "The Egg" (14:01) built over one of the strangest rhythm motifs I've come across: there is a third-world (African) tribal ecstatic dance feel to this--a tense environment that Herbie's piano play is only encouraged and --until 5:15 when things "break" for another creative Ron Carter solo--this time with his bow on his double bass--while Tony (or someone) adds percussive accents and support to the odd "Aquatic Astronaut" sounds Ron is playing. Around the seven minute mark Herbie re-enters and steps up front to play some very angular, mathematical 20th Century "classical" piano stylings before turning it into jazz in the ninth minute as Ron and brush-handed Tony return to jazz-like support. The tneth minute sees a run in which Herbie parades a cascade of more unconventional "classical"-sounding chord progressions before heading off into a mouse/bug-like scurrying mode of play runs on the right handed keys. In the 12th minute Ron and Herbie (mostly) cut out to allow Tony to channel some of his own "weird hee-bee-gee-bee" ideas/inspirations. By the arrival of the 13-minute mark, Freddie is returning and the band is recongealing into a variation of the opening motif for the song's close. Interesting! Fun for a live performance or an internal band exercise, but not so much for the gentle listener. Of the musicians' performances I can say that only Herbie's really wowed me; the rest of the improvised expositions felt a little forced, faked, or soulless. (25.75/30)

Total time: 35:25

Though the growth of all four musicians is on keen display, I find myself a bit let down and turned off by the final piece, "The Egg."

A-/4.5 stars; a near-masterpiece of melodic and yet sophisticated and often experimental jazz. Highly recommended for its first three songs.

FunkFreak75 22-year old Chicago native, now sleeping on Donald Byrd's couch, is willingly pushed out of the nest to record his first album of original compositions as his own bandleader! What an honor!

A1. "Watermelon Man" (7:09) the iconic hit that made Herbie the hot ticket in clubs and radio (as well as a LOT of money from all of the covers people have done over the years). Definitely a song that appropriate to the "in-crowd" of the new Kennedy era. What I love about it is that I love Freddie Hubbard, and I love Dexter Gordon, and Billy Higgins is no slouch. Enjoyable and definitely an earworm. (13.75/15)

A2. "Three Bags Full" (5:27) a little more complex and sophisticated with rapid-rising quick key changes in the intro. Butch Warren's almost-simple bass keeps us down on Earth while Herbie and Billy seem to want to lift us up and make us blow with the wind. Freddie is light and Dexter is kind of heavy--like Lenny and Shorty. Herbie is very lyrical and verbose for such a youngin'--playing quite nice lilting keyboard runs and fusillades. I like it! (9/10)

A3. "Empty Pockets" (6:12) opens with quite a little "Take Five" energy before the call of Freddie and Dexter opposite to the response of Herbie's full two-handed chords take us onto a different (more "So What"-like) road. I like the shorter, more staccato soloing of Freddie and Dexter but also the two-way conversation Herbie has with himself in his own solo. The choruses still revert back to that opening "Take Five" energy, while the body of the verses veer back to the "So What" motif--more when Herbie is accompanying, less when he's the soloist. (9/10)

B1. "The Maze" (6:48) an okay jazz tune that has some amazing whole-band (minus Freddie) interplay while Dexter is soloing in the fourth and fifth minutes. (Dexter and Herbie are especially amazing!) And the finish is ultra-smooth. (13.5/15)

B2. "Driftin'" (6:59) more excellent whole-band on what feels and sounds like an attempt at another "hip" pop-jazz tune. Freddie gets to shine a little in the opening minute but then Dexter is handed the first solo in the second. Not my favorite D solo, it's still pretty smooth, but Freddie's follow-up is so cool, so smooth, so masterfully controlled. At 3:18 Herbie starts his turn: smooth runs, standard chords, until at 3:45 he starts to reach for the stars. At the end of the fourth minute he kind of starts over before his horn men join him as an accent bank while Herbie continues to flow. No big crescendo, just a lot of full-stop accents. (13.333/15)

B3. "Alone And I" (6:30) late night piano with brushes and spacious bass notes open this before Dexter enters to take the first solo with his plaintive tone. I love this guy! He phrases things with such sincerity, presence, and feeling. Freddie takes over at the end of the second minute. He does pretty well, stumbling a bit a couple of times, before fairly quickly passing off to Herbie. It's songs like these--with all of the space and deliberation--that you can really tell the mature, seasoned pros: and Dexter definitely has it over the others (15+ years over both Freddie and Herbie). On Freddie's second go round he's a bit more composed, while Herbie is very eloquent in his support. A beautiful little window into their souls. (9.125/10)

Total time: 38:05

This is all jazz, no elements of Jazz-Rock Fusion in it (that I can tell) but I wanted to review it see where the young prodigy was when it all started.

A-/five stars; a minor masterpiece of accessible jazz. This would be an awesome introductory tool for one's self-education into the world of Jazz Music.

FunkFreak75 1. "Hang Up Your Hang Ups" (7:27) a song some proclaim the greatest funk jam of all-time, Herbie's clavinet, Louis Johnson's bass, the solid drums and amazing horn arrangements really are amazing but it's the incredible rhythm guitar of Melvin "Wah Wah" Watson and the other guitarists that always get me. Great housecleaning music. Excellent, if slightly incongruous. piano solo in the final 90 seconds. I am hard pressed to imagine how won could make this a better song. (15/15)

2. "Sun Touch" (5:09) a sound palette that could serve as a late-nite "Pillow Talk" radio theme song is actually quite complex with some very intricate performances. The rhythm section seem to almost want to pause or delay the song but Herbie's Fender Rhodes keeps pushing it along. Brilliant! Then you get the addition of Wah Wah's guitar riffs and the horns the further you travel into it. (9.5/10)

3. "The Traitor" (9:36) now that's some funky bass, with excellent response from the drummer. Herbie's clavinet accents are so dextrous and never over done. The bass, guitar, and horns frisky additions in the second minute are so awesome! It's like we're listening to PARLIAMENT! Then you put Herbie's snarky synth soloing over the top and it's like Bernie Worrell or George Clinton himself were sittin' in! Wow! Never knew Herbie let himself go this funky! I love it! Seems like a preview of every funky hip hop act of the next twenty years--as well as a reflection of early Kool & The Gang, Ohio Players, and Brothers Johnson, and the new Isley Brothers sound. And the sound engineering is so incredible: every instrument is easily followable while the fullness of the collective weave is never tampered with. The instrumental choice I think I'd leave off would be that occasionally sustained Oberheim strings chord: the funk doesn't need it. Toward the end of the song, the bass solo beneath Wah Wah's "distant" talk box guitar play is awesome. (19.25/20)

4. "Bubbles" (8:59) a fairly simple and minimalist construction of basically five instruments: the melodic bass, the more-percussive drums, a single lead guitar, a horn player injecting a variety intermittent sounds, and Herbie with a wide barrage of subtly delivered keys (clavinet, Fender Rhodes, Oberheim strings, other synth flourishes). Amazing how little front man action there is: just little attention grabbers from a wide assortment of contributors, all pretty much delivered in flourishes and sudden outbursts. Cool! Highly entertaining to listen to just to try to catch all of the tremendous number of sounds injected into it. (17.75/20)

5. "Steppin' in It" (8:36) more funk coming from the bass and bass-synth departments with spacious drum-and-bass funk while accented by an active and unpredictable horn section and team of several rhythm guitarists. This reminds me of the theme song from Sanford and Son. In the fourth minute Herbie's Fender Rhodes steps into the forefront to give us some uninspired and unobtrusive soloing. Then, just as I was thinking for the third or fourth time how "Stevie Wonder"-like this all was, who should step into the spotlight but Stevie Wonder with his harmonica! This feels like something from Stevie's upcoming Songs in the Key of Life. And yet the song is given full compositional credit to Herbie! The two must have run into each other in 1974 or 1975 while recording their own musics at the same music studio on the West Coast (most likely Crystal Studios in Hollywood: where Stevie recorded most of SinKoL--including the song "As" which features Herbie on Fender Rhodes). As a matter of fact, I'll go so far as to guess that Stevie's harmonica part was added towards the end of the song's processing as I can still hear the "shadow" of Herbie's Fender Rhodes solo beneath Stevie's harmonica--indicating to me that originally Herbie's solo that was started around the three minute mark actually went fully through the song but then was later muted (or attempted to have been removed from the song) from the 4:10 mark onwards in lieu of Stevie's solo. Regardless of the accuracy of my deductions, neither performances do enough to lift this song up: the performances here are just not as energetic or spirited as those on the other songs on the album, thus, this is not my favorite: it's a little too BOB JAMES-thin for my preferences. (17.5/20)

6. "Heartbeat" (5:17) stomping bass and bass drums open this while guitars, keys and horns introduce their sound package for about 30 seconds before the train starts rolling. It's another soul-funky song that reminds one of earlier classic 1970s Soul/R&B music like that of Motown's The Temptations ("I Can't Get Next to You") or Four Tops (Ain't No Woman [Like the One I Got]). The performers are totally engaged and synched up for this one! Love to hear it when everybody's on board like this! Great drumming, great bass play, GREAT Herbie play, and great contributions from Bill Summers and the rhythm guitarists. (9.25/10)

Total Time 44:47

An amazingly creative foray into the deepest funk territory I've ever heard a jazz artist ever go, and yet, at the same time, the jazzy core of improvisational interweaving of many instruments never suffers or is sacrificed--again, something that I've rarely (maybe never) heard to this level of perfection. I am truly shocked to have only discovered this album and hereby recognize it as one of the greatest testaments to the peak accomplishments of Jazz-Rock Fusion.

A/five stars; a masterpiece of funked-up Jazz-Rock Fusion; a true example of nearly perfect blending of Jazz-Rock and Jazz-Funk trends as they occurred in the mid-1970s. Though many people consider Herbie as a leader and innovator, I choose to think of him and his musical outpourings as an excellent barometer of the latest trends in J-R Fusion: he was always in the first wave of expressionists to come after the stones of innovation had been thrown by other artists and engineers--maybe he was (consistently) that first wave.

FunkFreak75 The music is good, though the only recordings I've been able to find are set in, around, and within the dialogue and sounds of the actual movie, nothing much separate from it. As other reviewers note, the music here feels much closer to the Head Hunters funk-infused music than the drawn out experimental explorations done by the Mwandishi lineup. There are definitely still a lot of sound/noise experimentations going on here, suggesting that Patrick Gleeson was probably still on board as a collaborator (even producer). I enjoy the music--and the film scene details have me intrigued. (I enjoy the historical perspectives I can reference when watching these old "Blaxploitation" films.) Listening to any of Herbie's funk is a real treat. The soundtrack is short, and the sound engineering and mastering is not great, but it's a soundtrack! The music is still great.

FunkFreak75 The band is loose and funked up, maybe having more fun now that they're all so comfortable with each other, and with Herbie really going out there with his experimentations into electronic keyboards and sounds but, on the other end, there seems to be less attention to quality sound engineering on this album than on Mwandishi and Crossings.

Line-up / Musicians: - Herbie Hancock / Steinway piano, Fender Rhodes, Mellotron, Hohner D6 clavinet, handclaps With: - Bennie Maupin / soprano sax, bass clarinet, piccolo, cabasa, kazoo - Eddie Henderson / trumpet, flugelhorn - Julian Priester / bass, tenor & alto trombones, cowbell - Patrick Gleeson / ARP 2600 & Soloist synths - Buster Williams / electric (with wah-wah & fuzz) & acoustic basses - Billy Hart / drums - Buck Clarke / congas, bongos - Billy Bonner / Fx

1. "Rain Dance" (9:18) lots of experimental sounds here (mostly synthesizer generated). Drums and bass are probably the two most prominent and loyal to their acoustic origins than any other instrument here. As a matter of fact, there is very little input from the horn players on this one. Interesting for the fact that it previews the later world of computer sounds and sequencers but not really a song that I enjoy or wish to hear repeatedly. On the outlying edges of what I'd call music. (17/20)

2. "Hidden Shadows" (10:12) funky with quite a variety of keyboards under Herbie's hand (including Mellotron!), there is quite a bit more dynamic range in this sonic presentation of this song than that of the previous Mwandishi albums. (18/20)

3. Hornets (19:31) I wouldn't doubt that this song was the inspiration for the famous SNL "Killer Bees" sketches a year or two later, as trumpet, clavinet, kazoo, ARP, percussion, and other crazed sounds coming from Bennie Maupin all contribute to a serious attempt to reproduce the chaotic busy-ness of the eusocial wasps known as "hornets." Crazy yet brilliant, chaotic yet so disciplined and focused. Just like hornets. Though Herbie and Billy Hart make a strong play for the title, Bennie Maupin, however, is by far the craziest hornet of them all. Entertaining and fun/funny, historically important, but not really a song that draws me back. (I wonder if the band were able to replicate this song live, in concert.) (34.5/40)

Total Time 39:02

B/four stars; a solid piece of progressive rock music from the domain of experimental jazz-rock fusion--where it may be deserving of more acclaim and accolades.