Recording

Maiden Voyage
Herbie Hancock

Independently chosen for2 of our lists. Here is what each of them said.

Released

1965

Label

Blue Note

On

Jazz and Twice Over

Updated

2026-08-30

1. 10

   Ranked No. 10 in Jazz

   Suspended chords that never resolve and a rhythm section that floats rather than drives. The record that made harmonic ambiguity feel like weather rather than like theory.

2. ·

   Picked by Twice Over

   Twenty-five years old and already writing the kind of tune other people would build careers on. This is the entry that makes the other two astonishing rather than merely eclectic: he was not a dabbler crossing over, he was a jazz composer at the top of the form.