After two albums for Warner Bros.—Mwandishi and Crossings—with his important but short-lived sextet, Herbie Hancock made the move to Columbia in 1973 with Sextant. It would be the final studio outing by the sextet, aka the Mwandishi band. But it marked the beginning of a Columbia stint that lasted all the way up to Perfect Machine in 1988. The three extended tunes on Sextant also mark Hancock’s first documented foray on Moog and ARP synthesisers, which are heavily in use from the start of the opening track, “Rain Dance”. Synth pioneer Patrick Gleeson, who had appeared on Crossings as well, is credited on the same gizmos as Hancock, making it hard to know who‘s doing what. But we can certainly pick out Hancock’s magical sound on Fender Rhodes, as well as acoustic piano, which he utterly dominates in a virtuosic solo on “Hidden Shadows”. The band members all took Swahili names for the Mwandishi project, and those remain in play on Sextant, which is credited to Mwandishi Herbie Hancock: trumpeter Mganga Eddie Henderson; soprano saxophonist, bass clarinetist and flutist Mwile Bennie Maupin; bass/tenor/alto trombonist Pepo Julian Priester; bassist Mchezaji Buster Williams; and drummer Jabali Billy Hart. Together, they create a glorious fabric of sound from raw, percolating vamps, modernist harmony and sonic abstraction. The aesthetic is close at times to early Weather Report, though the clavinet, half-closed hi-hat cymbal groove and electric bass distortion of “Hornets” would sound at home on a Stevie Wonder album from this period. And the acoustic piano element found on Sextant serves as a reminder that no one could touch Hancock on the instrument, and that acoustic jazz would remain at the core of his artistry for years to come, even as he delved further and further into beats and electronics—journeys that would eventually take him to the pop charts, not to mention the Grammys.