At Age 67, Herbie Hancock Has A Musical Revelation

[JSngry]

He's finally noticed that many songs have lyrics, and that, yes, wow, gollygee, sometimes they're actually worth paying attention to!

Who knew?

[7/4]

One would think he knew that already!

[JSngry]

Indeed. But apparently not.

[DukeCity]

Is there a link for this, or did your copy arrive in the mail today?

[JSngry]

I bought it at the newstand last week and just got to it today.

It's in conjunction w/the Joni Mitchell thing he did. They interviewed him & Joni both.

Maybe it's a bit of hype, I dunno. Really hard for me to think that somebody of Herbie's musicality would be lyric-deaf for this long.

But then I look around at many many jazz musicians & see the disdain of singers (often earned, but still...) & anything "popular" in general, and yeah, I guess I can see that. Lyrics are usually a more direct "reach out" than purely instrumental music, and we do place a premium on our... "apartness", don't we now...

But there's gotta be some hype here too, to play up the Joni angle. Herbie did a bunch of late-70s albums chock full of lyrics & vocals.

But then (and "but") again, maybe he was just a cog in his own machine & didn't really care/notice/whatever.

[DukeCity]

Not too surprising, then, that HH's Top 40 hit was an instrumental.

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

jeez i jumped when i saw the chopped header on the board contents menu, i thought it was At age 67, Herbie is dead. thank god its just a post about his stupid music with words. In the jazz dialect, lets not start any jazz related sentances w/ numbers unless it is because of the worst. i get too frightened

[Rooster_Ties]

These all done had lyrics, FWIW...

1 New York Minute - Henley, Kortchmar, Winding 8:33

2 Mercy Street - Gabriel 8:36

3 Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) - Lennon, McCartney 8:04

4 When Can I See You - Edmonds 6:15

5 You've Got It Bad Girl - Wonder, Wright 7:13

6 Love Is Stronger Than Pride - Adu, Hale, Matthewman 7:57

7 Scarborough Fair - Garfunkel, Simon 8:25

8 Thieves in the Temple - Prince 7:30

9 All Apologies - Cobain 5:04

10 Manhattan (Island of Lights and Love) - Hancock 4:05

Edited December 20, 2007 by Rooster_Ties

[JSngry]

These all done had lyrics, FWIW...

1 New York Minute - Henley, Kortchmar, Winding 8:33

2 Mercy Street - Gabriel 8:36

3 Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) - Lennon, McCartney 8:04

4 When Can I See You - Edmonds 6:15

5 You've Got It Bad Girl - Wonder, Wright 7:13

6 Love Is Stronger Than Pride - Adu, Hale, Matthewman 7:57

7 Scarborough Fair - Garfunkel, Simon 8:25

8 Thieves in the Temple - Prince 7:30

9 All Apologies - Cobain 5:04

10 Manhattan (Island of Lights and Love) - Hancock 4:05

Yeah, but "according to Herbie", he totally ignored the lyrics to all those songs. His interest in them was entirely non-lyrical.

Which, with most of those, yeah, ok, I can see the point. But not necessarily.

[JSngry]

jeez i jumped when i saw the chopped header on the board contents menu, i thought it was At age 67, Herbie is dead. thank god its just a post about his stupid music with words. In the jazz dialect, lets not start any jazz related sentances w/ numbers unless it is because of the worst. i get too frightened

Sorry dude, didn't mean to cause undue consternation.

[gmonahan]

jeez i jumped when i saw the chopped header on the board contents menu, i thought it was At age 67, Herbie is dead. thank god its just a post about his stupid music with words. In the jazz dialect, lets not start any jazz related sentances w/ numbers unless it is because of the worst. i get too frightened

Sorry dude, didn't mean to cause undue consternation.

*I* am still trying to recover from the fact that he's 67. I guess I should really try and figure out who that old guy is who stares at me in the mirror each morning!

[Jim Alfredson]

jeez i jumped when i saw the chopped header on the board contents menu, i thought it was At age 67, Herbie is dead. thank god its just a post about his stupid music with words. In the jazz dialect, lets not start any jazz related sentances w/ numbers unless it is because of the worst. i get too frightened

Sorry dude, didn't mean to cause undue consternation.

*I* am still trying to recover from the fact that he's 67. I guess I should really try and figure out who that old guy is who stares at me in the mirror each morning!

Batman?

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

jeez i jumped when i saw the chopped header on the board contents menu, i thought it was At age 67, Herbie is dead. thank god its just a post about his stupid music with words. In the jazz dialect, lets not start any jazz related sentances w/ numbers unless it is because of the worst. i get too frightened

Sorry dude, didn't mean to cause undue consternation.

*I* am still trying to recover from the fact that he's 67. I guess I should really try and figure out who that old guy is who stares at me in the mirror each morning!

Batman?

Wish I had a batman - then I wouldn't have to look at myself when I'm shaving.

MG

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Hey look, that geezer had Dex on his first LP. Didn't he learn from Dex that the words are important?

MG

[jazzbo]

Apparently he wasn't paying attention to Joni lyrics when he recorded with her previously ("Mingus," etc.(?))

[JSngry]

Apparently not. And apparently Joni dug having people dig her stuff for something besides the lyrics.

I can see that on her end. But hey...

[mikeweil]

There are plenty instrumentalists ignoring the lyrics, just going for melody and changes.

If they knew the words they'd notice how weird some of their treatments are in relation to the lyrics' content ...

I'm with Pres here, who knew all the words!

[paul secor]

There are plenty instrumentalists ignoring the lyrics, just going for melody and changes.

If they knew the words they'd notice how weird some of their treatments are in relation to the lyrics' content ...

I'm with Pres here, who knew all the words!

Agree with you completely. The other side of it is that there are plenty of singers who ignore the meaning of lyrics, even though they may sing them.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

There are plenty instrumentalists ignoring the lyrics, just going for melody and changes.

If they knew the words they'd notice how weird some of their treatments are in relation to the lyrics' content ...

I'm with Pres here, who knew all the words!

And Dex, who used to recite the words when performing live. (Well, he might have done it in the studio, too...)

MG

[Rosco]

And Dex, who used to recite the words when performing live. (Well, he might have done it in the studio, too...)

MG

The boxed set of Dexter's Steeplechase (studio) recordings has him doing just that on- if memory serves- Polkadots & Moonbeams

Edited December 20, 2007 by Rosco

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

And Dex, who used to recite the words when performing live. (Well, he might have done it in the studio, too...)

MG

The boxed set of Dexter's Steeplechase (studio) recordings has him doing just that on- if memory serves- Polkadots & Moonbeams

(Nods) So there!

MG

[ValerieB]

you should all know by now that herbie most definitely "marches to his own drummer" and is pretty "quirky" but he sure has given us lots to be grateful for!

[BruceH]

I've never been all that impressed with Hancock.

[ValerieB]

I've never been all that impressed with Hancock.

curious as to who does impress you. do you not think that herbie has written a lot of incredible music, even if it is a long time ago? his tunes from the '60s absolutely knock me out. just gorgeous. each to his own though.

[Teasing the Korean]

Anyone hear Herbie on "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me?"

Edited December 24, 2007 by Teasing the Korean