Herbie Hancock Teams With Industry Vets To Form New Label

04/20/2000 3:00 PM, Yahoo! Music
Craig Rosen

(4/20/00, 3 p.m. ET) - Keyboardist Herbie Hancock has joined forces with two respected music industry professionals to form a new label called Transparent Music. Along with Hancock, the label principals are Chuck Mitchell, former president of Verve Records, and producer/manager Robert Passick, who has worked with top artists such as Hancock and bassist Marcus Miller. Mitchell told LAUNCH that the new label, which was established last fall, "will be eclectic in its musical reach and very focused in its demographic targets." It will seek to appeal to the sophisticated adult market. In addition, Mitchell says, the label plans to become involved with television, video and the Internet "as a means of creating opportunities for projects that are multimedia in nature."

The first release for the new label will be a self-titled album from Soul Conversation, a band formed by guitarists JK and Mark Whitfield. The album, which will incorporate jazz and R&B elements, will be out on June 6.

Also in June, Transparent will release an album by a superband called Beckley-Lamm-Wilson, which is composed of Jerry Beckley of the classic rock band America, Robert Lamm of Chicago, and the late Carl Wilson of the Beach Boys. The album is said to be Wilson's last recording before his death last year. Most of the songs will be Wilson compositions, although the group did record covers of songs by John Waite and Nilsson. The album will be out on June 20.

Next month, Hancock will begin recording his first album for the label, which will reunite him with producer Bill Laswell, with whom he worked on his album Future Shock -- the album that includes Hancock's funky, hip-hop-flavored hit, "Rockit." Hancock and Laswell, who have not worked together in several years, are planning an album that will tip its hat to techno and drum-and-bass music. As Mitchell says, it will be "very future-oriented." The album will be out in the fall.

-- Lucy Tauss, New York