You may want to curse, recoil or roll eyes when I tell you how I first
came to Isaac Hayes. But I suspect it was like so many of my
generation, drunk on Chuck D's new left escapism
and the Bomb Squad's sample of"Hyperbolicsyllabicseequedalymystic." I
spoke some the other day about how that song hit me, but there was
another angle which I didn't really get into. In those days, older cats hated
hip-hop, mostly because they felt it butchered the classics, and
reduced the complexity of cats like Hayes to repetitive loops. You
can't listen to Jay-Z's "Can I Live"--lovely as it is--and then listen
to Hayes's reconstitution of "The Look Of Love" without sort of seeing
their point.
Still, when I think of hip-hop and the art of sampling I think of that great Rakim line, "It'll answer your questions, if you understand the message." Those who understand the message know that hip-hop, at its Bomb Squad best, is a history of music. Whenever, I heard a great hip-hop track, my next question--always--was what was the sample. And then after tracking the sample and hearing it in its full context, I usually wanted to hear the whole album. And then, if I was truly taken, I'd move to the artist and his entire catalog.
That was how I came to love James Brown, to love Stax, and consequently, Isaac Hayes. There's something to be said for coming to an artist in that fashion, like falling for a beautiful woman you've only seen as a photo, and then falling again when you see her in the three-dimensional pulsing flesh. You get the initial, head-nod inducing thrill of the sample, and then you come back, hear the sample in context as it originally existed, and you get something deeper. Finally--if its actually a classic--you just take it all in as a great song.
I came to Isaac Hayes from at least three angles. Hip-hop took me to
his 70s joints which I kept on repeat during my early college years.
Then hip-hop sent me to Stax (Marle Marl's "Symphony" to Otis Redding's
"Hard to Handle"; Salt and Pepa's "Tramp" to Otis Redding and Carla
Thomas's original.) I was down with that for awhile (Sam and Dave
covering "Soothe Me", The Barkays "Holy Ghost" etc.) and then I found
out that Issac Hayes had basically built Stax as a composer, years
before he became a solo act. I count that as Hayes basically living
three times. Once as a composer and producer, once as a solo act in his
own right, and then again through hip-hop.
Anybody who reads
this blog knows I love hip-hop, but I don't think there's any doubt
that for all the greatness of Pete Rock, Rza, Premier, Kanye and Dre,
we haven't produced anything like an Issac Hayes. That's not a
completely fair comparison. The industry, in the latter part of the
20th century, was just vicious. So much so that I don't think an Issac
Hayes was even possible. Maybe that's changing with stuff
decentralizing. Outkast is about the only exception, I think.
Still the saddest thing, to me artistically, about Issac Hayes' death
is that it's a reminder that a certain class of black artists--I'm
talking James Brown, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, George Clinton and
maybe ending with Prince--is starting to depart the scene. It's not
that these guys are somehow superior to the folks I came up on. They
just had so much more leeway. My one hope about music business having
to cope with online, is that maybe that sort of broad individualism and
experimentalism can make a return.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
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1
Aren't you conceding the point that for people who were there in the late 60s (Aretha, Stevie Wonder coming of age, What's Going On, James Brown inventing funk, etc.) hip-hop has precious little to offer?
2
My personal escapism from the dire state of American music is listening to African music. There's so much to discover. Just the country of Mali has Ali Farka Toure, Salif Keita, Amadou et Mariam... For some of the stuff you have to put on some naif glasses, but when it hits you, it's real.
My one hope about music business having to cope with online, is that maybe that sort of broad individualism and experimentalism can make a return.
I saw Gnarls Barkley at 930 last week, and there really is hope there. They're as much of a genre-blender as, say, Sly ever was. And they'd probably not be around if it wasn't for the internets and Danger Mouse's original success with the Grey Album, which would have otherwise died a quiet death in the post-conglomeration world.
Isaac Hayes' "(They Long to Be) Close to You" is one of my very favorite records. Especially the bridge ("On the day that you were born (on the day that you were born)"). Rest in peace.
"Aren't you conceding the point that for people who were there in the late 60s (Aretha, Stevie Wonder coming of age, What's Going On, James Brown inventing funk, etc.) hip-hop has precious little to offer?"
No, no, no. Not in a million years. Hip-hop taught me how to write and how to think. Acknowledging that we don't have an Issac Hayes doesn't mean that we have nothing.
Two blows in one weekend. Too much.
I highly recommend a trip to the Stax Records Museum in Memphis. Great place. They have Hayes's blue and gold Cadillac on display, plus a lot of other great Stax-related artists materials.
BTW, I saw Shaft 7 year old in 1971. My parents were so eager to see it that they completely didn't realize that it was a bit violent for a 7 year old. Being from Detroit, I didn't notice the violence, but the noise of the guns bothered me. Anyway, my dad owned a bar called the Moonglow in Detroit and Hayes was a staple on the jukebox, as were so many other great and wonderful musicians.
Two blows in one weekend. Too much.
I highly recommend a trip to the Stax Records Museum in Memphis. Great place. They have Hayes's blue and gold Cadillac on display, plus a lot of other great Stax-related artists materials.
BTW, I saw Shaft 7 year old in 1971. My parents were so eager to see it that they completely didn't realize that it was a bit violent for a 7 year old. Being from Detroit, I didn't notice the violence, but the noise of the guns bothered me. Anyway, my dad owned a bar called the Moonglow in Detroit and Hayes was a staple on the jukebox, as were so many other great and wonderful musicians.
Whoops, didn't mean to post that twice...
Im not sure that's entirely fair. I love Ike, but surely you can't discount 'I can't go to sleep' because it may or may not simplify an incredibly complex and epic song (walk on by)
choosing to experiment and push genre boundaries is just that, a choice. just because pete rock is making good ol' boom bap doesnt mean it's any less valid artistically
Blueberry-black night. Dorm room stinking of burnt coffee. Clack of typewriter banging out term paper on "Don Quixote." Whisper of "Hot Buttered Soul" in background.
It was the only thing that keep me sane that sophomore year. RIP big bald dude.
I love hip-hop. I grew up in Brooklyn, and can remember the days of DJ's jacking street lamp power for block parties in the summertime. I remember when Rapper's Delight came on the radio and everyone went crazy because the sound (if not the actual artists) that we heard in the neighborhood had finally gone "big-time". I've probably spent the equivalent of an entire college education for my kids on music of all stripes, because of my perverse internal logic that if I didn't support artists that I liked, then I deserved the steady doses of Brittney Spears I was being force-fed. This despite the fact that I could get most of what I wanted for free. So I'll hold my music lover credentials up against anyone's.
What has saddened me most of all though, is that the emergence of the internet and other modes of communicating with each other has ironically, reduced the aspect of music which I loved the most. The social aspect. I realize now that while I still love music, it's now a solitary pursuit. The conversations with people working at record stores, the music on in the background at social functions and the gem played on the radio that you then had to go get, have all seemed to have disappeared from the public consciousness. I've been reduced to muttering "That verse that Pharaoahe just dropped was sick!" to myself as I rewind it on my iPod.
What changed it? In my opinion, once record companies, radio stations (and artists) to some extent began to treat music as solely a commodity to be bought and sold, the consumer began to lose it's emotional attachment to music and did the same. To most people, music is now disposable. And I don't know how that will change.
Paradoxically, the internet has made available more music from more source much more easily available, but it still hasn't been able to successfully recreate the relationship between me and my favorite record store clerk (yeah I said record) who'd shout "you need to hear this new joint I got in!" when I walked into the store every Tuesday afternoon.
Isaac Hayes was a throwback to those old days when artists didn't just play music, but seemed to give you small piece of themselves with their music. That's not to say that there wasn't a lot of crap music, because there was. But, to piggyback your point, at least there the space existed for artists to create both crap music and future masterpieces. That space no longer exists or maybe it does and I just can't find it.
Isaac Hayes used the hell out of that space and he'll be sorely missed.
I have been loving this blog since my girlfriend told me about it. Politics, D&D and now Isaac's sample from Hyperbolicsyllabicseequedalymystic - what's not to love? So yeah...Isaac Hayes. It's a shame. Loved those albums, thought he was great on South Park but the scientology thing always freaked me out. I had always hoped that he was doing it to get some hot, alien infested scientology babes like some smooth soul singing Captain Kirk. The look, of love, it's in, your pseudopods...
Great songwriter and musician though.
Rock on and RIP Captain Isaac
What's with this "ISSAC" stuff, not once but time and again in the post? Versus "Isaac," as the rest of the world calls him.
I'll always remember the way the killed off Isaac Hayes's character on South Park after Hayes objected to their episode on Cruise and Scientology. That was classic.
I always thought sampling was the ultimate appreciation. I mean, if you can take just 3 seconds of someone's music and build an entire song around it, then doesn't that just point out the greatness of the original?
And doesn't taking that 3 seconds and putting it on a pedestal like that deepen our appreciation?
"Hip-hop taught me how to write and how to think."
T-N, why do you suppose it had that positive effect on you that it apparently doesn't have on the vast majority of its listeners?
Pulsing?
Gotta Ask Why.
Great comment. I agree 100%. The commoditization of music by stations, companies, artists and the public itself has been the latest and most intense death blow to music. I just want to add a bit to internet/tech angle you started. I think it also has to do with how we interact with time and how it has made us lazy.
There used to be time to listen to music. Bands would have to time to absorb what other musicians were doing. They had time to develop their styles and there was a place for them to have their own voice. They were even expected to!!! And consumers had time to absorb the music as well before being bludgeoned by 100 million copycat songs or being told what the "new thing" was. We were supposed to respect the music and sit down with it like you would a friend. Remember buying a new album? Sitting down and checking out the album art while you played through the whole thing a few times in a row? Listening to the music, the words, the whole concept? Doing only that and not throwing it on while you talked on the phone/read email/played a game/exercised/etc...? I really wonder what people get out of music today.
But how can I blame people growing up today where everything is expendable and anything can be bought, when they don't create meaningful and lasting music that speaks of a time and of a place.
So much more to say....
Sorry about the spelling Captain. Fixing it now. You know I googled this last night and I swear I came up with Issac. Oh well, I should have dug through the crates. No disrespect intended.
"T-N, why do you suppose it had that positive effect on you that it apparently doesn't have on the vast majority of its listeners?"
On what, exactly, are you basing this value judgment, Juan? I'd say that a lot of listeners of hip-hop find it has a positive effect on them; that's probably why they listen to it. If you're falling into the crypto-racist stereotype of rap as the source of the Black community's woes, please look again.
Funny enough, while I had never seen Isaac Hayes before, and I had also never been to Portland, OR, this July, I was visiting Portland for the 1st time, and there was a blues festival, and Isaac Hayes was the headliner. So I got to see him before he passed on.
Actually though, it wasn't a great performance, he seemed a bit out of it - understandly so, it appears.
May he rest in peace.
Juan, what are you even talking about? I hope this isn't based upon some stereotype of its listeners or a radio definition of hiphop. Have you conducted a survey of the vast majority of hiphop listeners to know if they can write and think?
Whenever, I heard a great hip-hop track, my next question--always--was what was the sample. And then after tracking the sample and hearing it in its full context, I usually wanted to hear the whole album. And then, if I was truly taken, I'd move to the artist and his entire catalog.There's something to be said for coming to an artist in that fashion
Hip Hop was basically the internet before the internet. To wit:
Whenever, I read a great blog post, my next question--always--was what was the link. And then after tracking the link and reading it in its full context, I usually wanted to read the whole blog roll. And then, if I was truly taken, I'd move to the blogger and subscribe to his RSS. There's something to be said for coming to an writer in that fashion
Gotta Ask Why, have you found a favorite music blogger? Blogs like Soul Sides, Ear Fuzz, and Souled On aren't exactly record stores, but they do give you something social and plenty of "you need to hear this!"
Andrew that is a great point. No haven't found a good music blog yet. I use e-music to buy, and that has some social functions. But your right--it may be a good idea to get down with a blog.
Whew!
Bernie Mac was a year younger in the HS just a 1/2 mile from our school. We grew up listening to the Sounds of Stax & Shaft was the big song of our freshman year. Feeling very old today.
Marc P. - Your post is spot on. It's a vicious cycle. On the one hand people don't take the time to appreciate a true artist's life work. On the other hand the music that's being delivered is often not worth investing the time. I have to think that the latter has always been true for a good portion of music, but I remember there being more room for good music to shine.
Part of me thinks it's me getting older and starting to sound like my parents, but I don't think so. I've heard some Hip-Hop, Rock and Pop, from today's up and coming artists that has brought me to my feet and not because they sounded 'old school', but because they brought energy and creativity to the table. Or, at the least, they sounded like they really liked to make music, which I can't say about a lot of the "artists" of today.
As for your other suggestion, that's a good idea. I typically engage in the public policy arena but for some weird reason haven't really looked for a music blogger that I like. I have found a couple of sites that give music reviews and recommendations that I like, but I've found it's still not the same.
Isaac Hayes was an American original. No one will ever replicate what he did, because he was the first one to do it. I wasn't alive, but I bet you could hear the minds being blown across suburbia the first time the Shaft theme hit the airwaves.
Also, nice shout out to Outkast- they are also an original. I would agree that they stand alone creatively among modern hip-hop, but I'm also clearly biased.
I'd like to think there's still a lot of room out there for improvement- every generation likes to say that the good old days are over, but somehow every generation produces its own great music. At different times the Clash, the Beatles, Louis Armstong etc. all represented the end of good music. The only thing that doesn't change is the loathing of critics for anything that challenges their conventional ideas of what makes great music.
Marc P. - Your post is spot on. It's a vicious cycle. On the one hand people don't take the time to appreciate a true artist's life work. On the other hand the music that's being delivered is often not worth investing the time. I have to think that the latter has always been true for a good portion of music, but I remember there being more room for good music to shine.
Part of me thinks it's me getting older and starting to sound like my parents, but I don't think so. I've heard some Hip-Hop, Rock and Pop, from today's up and coming artists that has brought me to my feet and not because they sounded 'old school', but because they brought energy and creativity to the table. Or, at the least, they sounded like they really liked to make music, which I can't say about a lot of the "artists" of today.
As for your other suggestion, that's a good idea. I typically engage in the public policy arena but for some weird reason haven't really looked for a music blogger that I like. I have found a couple of sites that give music reviews and recommendations that I like, but I've found it's still not the same.
1.) Sorry for the double send
2.) Sorry Jake, for mixing up that it was you that asked about the music blogger.
I didn't say that hip-hop is the cause of problems in the black community. This is just the first I've heard of someone claiming that it helped them learn to write and think. I can see some skills one could pick up from traditional music, e.g., the discipline of learning an instrument, mathematical sense of the notes in learning music, etc.
What has saddened me most of all though, is that the emergence of the internet and other modes of communicating with each other has ironically, reduced the aspect of music which I loved the most. The social aspect. I realize now that while I still love music, it's now a solitary pursuit.
I can see what you're saying, but here's another approach. I think the Internet has saved me as much as is possible from being a stodgy old man. I'm coming at this whole music thing from punk, and, back then (which, for me, means late 80s to mid 90s), that meant going to to 2-3 shows a week, going on tour, talking music all the time, &c &c &c. It was a huge time commitment, and not one I could indulge now that, you know, I'm pushing 40 and actually have a 'real' job that I like. Now, I can get info on music a lot more efficiently: via eMusic recommendations, via Last.fm (and last.fm rec's via Amarok), conversations online, and phone calls with my old music buddies ("what are you listening to now?"), all of which meld commercialization and socialization, but in a way that doesn't require that I be 24 and drunk and always hanging out in record stores to be in the game. I'd say I've gotten into more music in the last 5 years than I have in the rest of my life put together.
I gotta say that there's no other song the length of Hyperbolicsyllabicseequedalymystic that I've listened to more. Whatever Hayes' religious weirdness, that track makes him an immortal.
If only sampling turned more people on to the original songs and artists, maybe we'd have some decent radio stations in DC playing the original tunes. I'd love to hear some of the more obscure but fantastic old soul artists get sampled in order to give them more exposure - Darrell Banks, Bobby Patterson, George Jackson, James Carr, etc...
Juan:
There are a lot of people who would feel you stepped over the line with the implications of your comment:
"T-N, why do you suppose it had that positive effect on you that it apparently doesn't have on the vast majority of its listeners?"
I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and not infer an intent that may not be there. So to engage your question:
Why something has a positive effect is a matter of relativity and context.
Relativity - because it is highly subjective in regards to what a positive effect is. Learning an instrument and a mathematical sense of the notes is positive when your aspirations are to be an architect, but not so useful when you have very valid concerns for your safety on the way to school every morning.
Context - because whether something is positive depends upon the context in which it is absorbed. As a Black man, growing up first in Brooklyn and then in the suburbs of Philly, hip-hop gave voice, and comfort to the issues that I had fitting into an environment in which that I didn't understand, coming from an environment that no one else understood. Furthermore, for all of the negative portrayals of the communities in which I grew up, sandwiched in between were also reminders the comforting and familiar aspects of a life that was left behind.
Now to be fair as TNC has so aptly stated, the imagery that Hip-Hop often puts forward in no way describes the entirety of the African-American experience, but know this, there are a lot of people who got a lot more in the way of life lessons from listening to Public Enemy's "It takes a Nation..." album than they got from their 8th grade history textbooks. I don't know whether that says good things about PE or bad things about history textbooks but that doesn't make it any less true.
Nice post, and nice to hear someone else's first reaction with hiphop is always digging back to the samples.
If you like Carla and Otis's version of "Tramp," be sure to check out Lowell Fulson's. The guitar riff has been sampled to death in tons of hiphop -- De La Soul, among others -- but the song itself is amazing.
I don't think there's any doubt that for all the greatness of Pete Rock, Rza, Premier, Kanye and Dre, we haven't produced anything like an Issac Hayes.
This is madness. I won't even touch on the momentous contributions of the other four, but RZA's composing now, for Pete's sake. It's only a matter of time before he picks up his little gold statue.
[another excellent post, btw. please don't mistake my snark for lack of appreciation.]
To add to GAW, I would plainly say that I don't listen to garbage and there are mountains of songs that are not only positive but are full of lyrical precision and music that is transcendental. Sure you can start with PE and work your way down a list.
Re: hearing the sample, then tracking down the artist: if you by any chance got into Jay Dilla's "Donuts" 1/10th as much as I did, "Recipe for Tasty Donuts" will blow your mind! Among the deeper hip hop 1-2 punches of recent years.
When Issac Hayes came on network TV on the Oscars, and played 'Shaft' with those gold chains on, the world changed for me. And then he said later that the chains represent the struggle of black people. That says it all. That changed me right there. That guy stood up for black people. No black artists is able to do that today really. He saw the moment and he grabbed it. He was the best of the soul artists, to me; he defined it, and made it about being black in America. Soul music, that is.
Gotta Ask Why,
Thanks for engaging, but from your comment I still don't understand how Hip Hop helped T-N learn to think and write. Perhaps he will explain in later post.
TNC can speak for himself, I would hazard to guess that it's same way any other music or literature influences the way one thinks or writes.
The story or lyrics themselves may peak the interest, but within each story (or verse in Hip-Hop) is a writing style, a storytelling style, a cadence, a sense of humor and a wit that is unique to the author. Because no one learns to read or write in a vacuum, exposure to various styles can't help but impact the way one thinks and writes, if only subconsciously. What people could choose to be offended by; is your failure to acknowledge Hip-Hop and it's various sub-cultures as a possible contributor to a writer's personal style.
It wouldn't raise an eyebrow if a poet or author credited a part of his or her writing style to the influences Edgar Allen Poe, Emily Bronte or Richard Wright or the poetry influences of Joni Mitchell, Neil Simon or any other acclaimed songwriters. Why is it not possible for TNC to have absorbed some of the techniques and styles from Ice Cube, Rakim, KRS-One or Run D.M.C. in addition to those others?
But since we're on that topic I perceive TNC as more of a mash-up of Dick Gregory, with a dash of Joseph Heller and a bit of Chuck D. garnish (light on the S1W's)
But that's just my opinion. Hope this helps.
Isaac Hayes is the soundtrack of my first romance -- me a small town white girl, he a small town black boy -- during my freshman year in college. We saw him live in 1972 in Austin, and I'm telling you, the 90% white crowd went crazy. I heard him on NPR this morning talking about how he would start softly and build up gradually to the big crescendo. And that's how he started his show. The band played that opening from Shaft over and over again; smoke billowed, and finally, Black Moses walked on covered in a robe and hood. He shrugged off the robe off and there was that vest of gold chains. He was a treasure.
Don't put Stevie on your list of soul heroes who might be passing soon--remember, he's way younger than he ought to be for having been a part of our lives for so long. I think "Fingertips, Part One" was recorded live from the womb.