This isn’t jazz history — it’s a working blueprint for how to swing, think, and lead at 22.
Takin’ Off is Herbie Hancock’s 1962 debut solo album for Blue Note Records. It features six original compositions performed by Hancock (piano), Dexter Gordon (tenor saxophone), Butch Warren (bass), and Billy Higgins (drums). Recorded in Rudy Van Gelder’s studio in Englewood Cliffs. ‘Watermelon Man’ appears in Tuner (2025) over the opening credits and in The Watermelon Woman (1996), whose title references Melvin Van Peebles’s 1970 film. ‘Driftin’’ appears in Border Buckaroos (1943) and Nothing but the Blues (1995). ‘Alone and I’ appears in Mighty Aphrodite (1995). The album brought Hancock to the attention of Miles Davis, who assembled a new band shortly after hearing it. It predates Hancock’s work with the Miles Davis Quintet, which began in May 1963.
Film placements are the ones described in each film's own entry, so the list is partial rather than complete.
Worth your time?
Yes. Hear the whole thing.
4.5/ 5
What works
‘Watermelon Man’ lands: a catchy, syncopated riff over a walking bassline, repeated with subtle rhythmic shifts and solo variations.
Its groove is immediate and self-contained.
What does not
It does not experiment with form or texture beyond the conventions of early-1960s Blue Note sessions.
There are no electronic effects, no extended techniques, no spoken word, no quotation or collage.
Hear it if
People who want to hear how a pianist thinks in real time — not as a stylist, but as a composer-performer building ideas from the ground up.
Not for listeners who need polish, narrative, or sonic novelty.
Skip it if
Listeners who need polish, narrative, or sonic novelty
The written brief1 min read
What the record is and where it came from
Herbie Hancock’s 1962 debut solo album for Blue Note Records. His first recording as a leader.
How it sounds, and how it was made
Recorded in Rudy Van Gelder’s studio in Englewood Cliffs. Piano, tenor saxophone, bass and drums. No overdubs. Dry room sound. Hancock’s piano is upfront, unvarnished, with space around each note.
What lands
‘Watermelon Man’ lands: a catchy, syncopated riff over a walking bassline, repeated with subtle rhythmic shifts and solo variations. Its groove is immediate and self-contained.
What does not
It does not experiment with form or texture beyond the conventions of early-1960s Blue Note sessions. There are no electronic effects, no extended techniques, no spoken word, no quotation or collage.
The ideas inside it
A hard bop record built on blues forms and modal frameworks. It treats melody as a launchpad for rhythmic variation and harmonic displacement. It assumes fluency in swing and bebop language but pushes phrasing into asymmetrical shapes.
Who should hear it, and who should not
People who want to hear how a pianist thinks in real time — not as a stylist, but as a composer-performer building ideas from the ground up. Not for listeners who need polish, narrative, or sonic novelty.
Is it worth your time
Yes. It is the first full statement of a major voice — clear, urgent, and technically assured — before any myth attached to it.