Stax of Memphis was a record company which kept making good soul music with their own musicians and songwriters during 1960s. With the words 'Soulsville U.S.A.' on its signboard, in contrast with Motown's 'Hitsville U.S.A.', Stax showed its character in the way of "the name telling its style". But in 1968, the next year when Otis Redding passed away by a plane accident, Stax finished its distribution contract with Atlantic Records, and then the music Stax produced began to be obviously different from what it used to have been. It had been in the taste of the owner Jim Stewart and the rather loose performance of Booker T & The MG's and Memphis Horns had been just the sound of Stax. When Al Bell, a man of action, held the operation as a co-owner, however, Stax came to produce more popular songs to which other sounds like strings added, to record at other studios including Muscle Shoals and to distribute songs which were completed without Stax production ; those things led the peculiar 'Memphis Sound' to be lost. But it meant that the identities of the artists easily became reflected to their own songs. Among them Isaac Hayes is an idiosyncratic person who cut his own way through.
While he had already released a single or an album before his heyday, he was chiefly an assistant who co-wrote many fine tunes with David Porter. One day he got a chance to release his own record in the direction of the company wanting to make a catalogue of albums equal to those of which Stax lost its rights by the previous contract with Atlantic. Contrary to those obscure albums which were over-produced in low grades, "Hot Buttered Soul" not only succeeded commercially and saved Stax from being driven into a corner, but also had been an epoch-making thing which gave great influences to black artists. The album of R&B or soul used to have been only a compilation of hits and covers, and it had been generally considered that record companies got thier means by selling singles with two songs of from 2 to 3 minutes. Isaac Hayes' album, however, contained four songs of from 5 to nearly 20 minutes, and he covered pop songs out of his line (Dionne Warwick's Walk on By and Glen Campbell's By the Time I Get to Phoenix) with his own low sexy voice, sometimes with his long-time rap on the prelude, in the style of slow rhythms brought by Bar-Kays mixed with distorted guitars or strings or horns. Just in the period when FM radios came to be heard by black audiences, I guess it had been cool for decent DJs to play such long jazzy tunes. While in 1970s Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye or Curtis Mayfield released concept albums containing some long tunes on his own production, Isaac Hayes was their predecessor. And then he won the Academy award for the soundtrack "Shaft" , which was a movie directed by a black and had black stars, and he was also appreciated in pioneering 'Blaxploitation' films and soundtracks.
Allured by the sleeve of a zoomed-in shaved head, I bought and listen to "Hot Buttered Soul". It was the stuff you feel the loose groove and mood rather than enjoy concentrating on each song, and I felt bored at first. But I cannnot missed the cool distorted-guitar funk Hyperbolicsyllabicsesquedalymistic. And when I hear Theme from Shaft on the radio, I was urged to listen to it on CD. This tune started with 16-beat high-hat rhythms and a wah-wah guitar, a bass, horns and strings followed it, and after the long introduction Hayes rapped and crooned the lyrics (?) sort of 'I am Shaft. I am strong for women and troubles' ; its composition and idea were outstanding and you might catch it in your ear at first listening. Except it, the album "Shaft" contained several instrumentals and they didn't appeal so much to me without looking at its motion picture. In spite of their vividly loose groove and mood, his original albums "Movement" or "... To Be Continued" were, it seemed to me, the second or third brew of "Hot Buttered Soul". Now I think that, in the meantime Stevie or Marvin were allowed to produce songs freely in the stable Motown, Isaac Hayes, the main man of Stax which expanded beyond its ability and slightly managed to be operated, might have no time to seek for any new directions, in spite of taking the initiative in producing at first. While Al Bell was absorbed in political activities and Isaac Hayes assisted him, his songs themselves were oriented only to entertainments rather than messages, which is very interesting to me as compared with Stevie or Marvin, who were likely to be highly appreciated by their sheer messages of songs. In his two-disc album "Black Moses" he sang not only covers but his own Good Love, having almost grooves of today's rap, and sometimes sang in unexpectedly beautiful falsetto appeared in a reading of the Jackson 5's Never Can Say Goodbye, for example. And in "Joy" and "Chocolate Chip" and "Groove-a-Thon" he approached disco-oriented cheerfulness but still held his thick uniqueness on these title tunes and so on. His recently released live album "At Wattstax" has its highlight on the medley of Bill Withers' Ain't No Sunshine and Ray Charles' Lonely Avenue featuring his own sax. In front of over one hundred thousand of audience, Isaac Hayes, the headliner among artists of Stax, may have felt as if he had been lifted to the heaven.
I dare say the talent of Isaac Hayes is laid on building his own world view by combining ordinary sounds in his taste, rather than taking first of all new instruments, technology or rhythms. This sense leads to the later rap or hip-hop. After Stax's bankruptcy and moving to the corporate Polydor, he tended to float himself with the crazes including disco rather than creating something. In "The Best of The Polydor Years", his sexy crooning is still well. While his Zeke the Freak reminds me of Chic's Le Freak, there is Don't Let Go, the rendition of Roy Hamilton's rockabilly-style tune in '58, and when I listen by speakers of good sound seperation, I find Hayes' low voice snaking out from below between female choruses and so it makes me think that this is the music of adults who knows the distiction of things and matters and say "he did damn great!". Isaac Hayes, who insisted on earthy entertainment, is somewhat self-confident but he "knows how things go". So I like it. (2004/09/13)(2006/01/08)