Shaft by Isaac Hayes (1971)

This soundtrack album’s title track is a bit of pop camp now, but it remains a fabulous funk track with its wah guitar (provided by the legendary soul guitarist at Stax Records, Michael Toles) and growling vocal.

But once beyond the title track, this is a rich, diverse album that stands up quite well on its own, apart from the movie. This is a true soundtrack, not the song collections that get released today. That is, watching the movie you can hear bits of “Bumpy’s Lament” or “Ellie’s Love Theme” in the background. But on the record these fragments are full melodies, uninterrupted by dialogue or gunfire, and while they sometimes have the feel of elevator music I find that when I’m beginning to take a tune for granted there will be a little flourish from Hayes on vibes or James Alexander’s bass, and I realize that even on the most mundane of the tracks there’s something interesting going on.

Aside from the soul instrumentals there are two vocal tracks apart from the “Theme from Shaft.” “Soulsville” is a lilting tune backing a depiction of early 1970s ghetto life, something like Marvin Gaye’s “Makes Me Wanna Holler.” Hayes’ voice here is a bit more mellow than on the title track. The other vocal track, “Do Your Thing,” is a 19-minute classic bit of Isaac Hayes jam. The lyrics are straight out of the late 1960s, but the extended solo performances by the Bar-Kays are the true highlight. I own this record on vinyl, and the end of this song is an alarming reproduction of the sound of a phonograph needle being violently scratched across a record. Even after hearing that a dozen times when I first got the record it scared me every time. On a CD it’s just an odd sound.

One of my favorites among the instrumental tracks is “Café Regios,” mostly for the stinging guitar work by Toles and Charles Pitts. I’d love to be able to play that jazz/soul fusion on a hollow-body Gibson, with that ringing, Wes Montgomeryish tone.

Isaac Hayes was the perfect choice to score Shaft. He added a level of artistry to the production that elevated the movie significantly, exactly as Curtis Mayfield did for Superfly the following year. Hayes won an Oscar for this soundtrack—the first Black man to win for scoring a film. It was a much-deserved award—the soundtrack holds up after 30 years better than the movie.