I think it's an RBAC issue. It seems that helm isn't ready for 1.6.1's RBAC.
There is a issue open for this on Helm's Github.
https://github.com/kubernetes/helm/issues/2224
"When installing a cluster for the first time using kubeadm v1.6.1, the initialization defaults to setting up RBAC controlled access, which messes with permissions needed by Tiller to do installations, scan for installed components, and so on. helm init works without issue, but helm list, helm install, and so on all do not work, citing some missing permission or another."
A temporary work around has been suggest:
"We "disable" RBAC using the command kubectl create clusterrolebinding permissive-binding --clusterrole=cluster-admin --user=admin --user=kubelet --group=system:serviceaccounts;"
But I can not speak for it's validity. The good news is that this is a known issue and work is being done to fix it. Hope this helps.