Customer Reviews
Caution required - By: Dude, 18 Jan 2008 
If you are not much into jazz, art, inovation, genius or music
AVOID this album.
Saw this album reviewedin a mag, bought it! BIG BIG mistake
I am now a smooth jazz Funk junky, I know nothing of jazz, smooth sounds but lovein it.
It will change your take on music. So if your safein your bubble stay there, if you want to start a musical journey, start here.
It melts my veins - By: molondas, 29 Nov 2006 Anyone who has heard this album & doesn't give it 5 stars needs the doctor. This is the biggest selling jazz album of all time, & rightly so. Its only other near rival is Kind Of Blue (Miles Davis). But this album cannot be compared to any standard jazz output - it is a masterpiece of innovation, a fantastic combination of Sly Stone-inspired US black funk & straight-ahead trio jazz.
It's sensational. Heavy funk riffs, floating electric piano, an unbelievable rhythm section & superb saxophone playing from bennie maupin. This album encapsulates all that was great about 70s fusion, the desire to find new routes through soul, disco, funk, jazz etc. Hancock has proved an absolute master at this - totally at easein any genre, here he presents the pinnacle of two of the most important american genres: jazz & funk.
There's no point trying to describe the album. Just buy it. If you don't like it, see a doctor.
The coolest album....ever. - By: The Fish, 12 Oct 2006 If there was ever an introduction that embodied the complete essence of its album, it must be the famous bass line that begins Chameleon. From the opening note, a sense of cool is established that never lets up but for the furious solos on Sly.
Where do you start with Chameleon? It is a staple of funk music, a tune that is known to people who have never listened to jazzin their life, arguably the most famous genre crossover piecein history. BUT, bizarrely, it's perhaps the weakest track on Head Hunters, simply because of the quality of the tunes that follow.
Watermelon Man, funked up from Hancock's Takin' Off (Blue Note, 1963) standard, is given a lazy, half time feel, & easily eclipses the original. Sly, is where the cool feel of the album is briefly broken for insanely energetic solos by Bennie Maupin & then Herbie. The album is finished off with Vein Melter- a deeply chilled out effort that recalls Crossings' (Warner Bros, 1971) Water Torture, & returns the album's tone back into the blue.
Head Hunters is not a perfect album(witness the drums & the bass disagreeing over tempo after the electric piano solo on Chameleon, or Vein Melter's dodgy synth strings), but I like to think that no other jazz-funk album, Hancock's or anyone elses, has ever surpassed it. It remains one of my favourite albums, & a great introduction to Herbie Hancock's funk music.
er..yes it is - By: Mark J. Lewis, 07 Aug 2006 Just checked on my iPod, & my version of Chameleon definatly is Bbm to Eb7.
Oh by the way, great album!
Seminal - By: , 07 Dec 2004 This is indeed a seminal jazz album... may I correct "Top 500 reviewer" going by the name of "ian17577" - 'Chameleon' is not Bb minor to Eb 7 it is A minor to D7. A mistake that no doubt has annoyed more than a few passing musicians. Thanks.
