The Headhunters

After a two-decade long hiatus, Herbie Hancock's Headhunters returned to action in 1998 with their funk groove pretty much intact, allowing for some technological and stylistic updating. The core of the band - the too-long-neglected Bennie Maupin (saxes, bass clarinet), Paul Jackson (bass), Bill Summers (percussion), and the group's second drummer Mike Clark - still has the complex funk telepathic interplay down pat, though occasionally the rhythms are simplified for contemporary audiences. Hancock himself only appears on four tracks, where he tries to comp and stomp out on latter-day digital instruments (alas, he doesn't quite generate the same super funky feeling that he once could on analog clavinets, Fender Rhodes pianos, and ARP synths)…

After their initial solo album without Herbie Hancock the Headhunters did two more albums with him on 1975's Man-Child and 1976's Secrets. Both of these records found the band and Herbie branching out into a more arranged,cinematic and gradually more melodically pop type approach to their funk. The jazz element still remained. Gradually different members would splinter of. And on this album,recorded a year after Herbie's last release it would be the final time the Headhunters would record together until the mid 1990's. Featuring the same lineup as before,only minus Baba Duru and plus side members Paul Poyten and Derrick Youman,they made this at a time when music all over the spectrum was different. Their was a very dance oriented musical ethic in the air. The disco scene was part of it. But it had a strong impact even on jazz funk as well.