Secrets (Herbie Hancock album)

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Secrets
Secrets cover
Studio album by Herbie Hancock
Released 1976
Recorded San Francisco, CA
Genre Jazz Fusion, Jazz Funk
Length 47:57
Label Columbia Records
Producer David Rubinson and Herbie Hancock
Professional reviews
Herbie Hancock chronology
Flood
(1976)		 Secrets
(1976)		 V.S.O.P.
(1976)

Secrets is a 1976 jazz-funk fusion album by keyboard player Herbie Hancock.

The album clearly followed from its predecessor Man-Child. As ever, Paul Jackson's basslines were critical, and the other regular member Bennie Maupin continued to provide most of the solos alongside Hancock. Man-Child had seen the addition of electric guitar to Hancock's sound, and Secrets saw the guitar's place in the arrangements rise to crucial importance throughout. The flamboyant rhythm guitar contributions of top Motown session musician Wah Wah Watson are a particularly notable feature of the album.

Where Man-Child was evenly divided between up-tempo and laid-back tracks, Secrets emphasised the more mellow, softly rounded mood. Even the more up-tempo tracks, "Doin' It" and "Cantelope Island", are suffused with a relaxed Caribbean influence, and overall the album tends towards restrained, rolling grooves rather than overtly high-energy funk. Appropriately, Hancock spent much of his time using the mellow tones of the Rhodes piano, and took advantage of the new polyphonic synthesizers to contribute thick pads, foreshadowing ambient music.

Although summery and mellow, the album was far from lounge music, with some extremely abstract and intense sections, particular in the latter half; it is also entirely instrumental beside the "Jus' keep on doin' it" chants of the opening track. Subsequent Hancock albums saw the addition of more vocoded lead vocals and disco influences.

The Secrets line-up performed "Spider" (from this LP) and "Hang Up Your Hang-Ups" (from Man-Child) at the V.S.O.P. concert in the summer of 1976.


[edit] Track listing

  1. "Doin' It" (Melvin Ragin/Ray Parker, Jr.) - 8:03
  2. "People Music" (Herbie Hancock/Melvin Ragin/Paul Jackson) - 7:11
  3. "Cantaloupe Island" (Herbie Hancock) - 7:06
  4. "Spider" (Melvin Ragin/Herbie Hancock/Paul Jackson) - 7:21
  5. "Gentle Thoughts" (Herbie Hancock/Melvin Ragin) - 7:05
  6. "Swamp Rat" (Paul Jackson/Herbie Hancock/Melvin Ragin) - 6:26
  7. "Sansho Shima" (Bennie Maupin) - 4:50


[edit] Personnel