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Man, this guy's been around.
From the SF Chronicle.
Who knew 'South Park' would take off? Not Isaac Hayes
Richard Harrington, Washington Post
Friday, January 6, 2006
For years, soul icon Isaac Hayes badgered his agent to get him voice-over work in animation. The first black superstar of the '70s (think "Hot Buttered Soul," "Shaft," "Black Moses") had long ago carved out a side career in film (from "Truck Turner" and "Three Tough Guys" in the '70s to last year's "Hustle & Flow") and television (including "The Rockford Files" and "Stargate SG-1").
But Hayes wanted to try something new. When he finally got the call in 1997, he expected it to be from Disney.
It wasn't.
"It was kinda nebulous -- my agent wouldn't tell me what it was," Hayes recalls. "He just said it was ... 'different.' "
Hayes didn't really want to meet the show's creators but was persuaded to check them out at a meeting in New York, where he was hosting a popular radio show.
"I showed up with attitude, too," Hayes points out. "They were polite. I said, 'What's the part, man?' They just said, 'You're perfect for it!' 'What kinda part?'
" 'It's this cook in this little town in South Park, Colorado, and you'll cook for and mentor these little foul-mouthed kids.' "
Matt Stone and Trey Parker then offered Hayes a script. He took one look at it, and at them, and said, "Hey, man, who put you guys up to this? Somebody playing a joke on me or something?"
" 'It's legit,' they said. 'We're serious about it.'
"I said, 'You all some crazy white boys!' "
Then Hayes asked whether they had insurance, "because you're going to get sued, man."
"They said they were covered."
Hayes remembers thinking: "It's some quick money. I'll knock this off, it'll last about six weeks and I'll be on my merry way. As the airdate approached, that's when it set in on me, the reality of it: What can I say to my friends about this show? I'm going to have to sneak out of town like a flasher."
But what was supposed to be a one-time shot -- as school cafeteria cook Jerome "Chef" McElroy -- proved so popular that Hayes became a featured performer, dispensing burgers, fries and life lessons to "his little crackers" Kenny, Kyle, Stan and Cartman, "South Park's" potty-mouthed pre-teens. As the Comedy Central show approaches its 10th season (it has been renewed through 2008), the round, bearded cafeteria kingpin still breaks into inappropriate, racy R&B songs that extol the virtues of "making sweet love."
Rather than ruining Hayes' career, "South Park" revived it and widened his fan base: These days, youngsters with Chef dolls stand in autograph lines next to fans with copies of his classic Stax albums. And the platinum "Chef Aid: The South Park Album" gave Hayes a surprise hit (his first in 30 years, including a No. 1 in England) with "Chocolate Salty Balls (P.S. I Love You)," his hilariously salacious, double-entendre-laden ode to that particular confection. The "South Park" video and a recipe are included on a DVD in the new "Ultimate Isaac Hayes: Can You Dig It?," the only new and non-Stax element in the two-CD retrospective.
Hayes' success was built on apprenticeships in such Memphis acts as Sir Isaac & the Doo-Dads, the doo-wop Teen Tones and gospel Morning Stars, and early '60s seasoning at Stax' Soulsville studio, Memphis' gritty response to Detroit and Motown's Hitsville USA. When keyboardist Booker T. Jones went off to college, Hayes replaced him in the Stax house band. His first sessions were with Otis Redding: That's Hayes' organ and arrangement in Redding's "Try a Little Tenderness."
Major success came when Hayes teamed up with lyricist David Porter. In the '60s, the dynamic duo scored major hits for Carla Thomas ("B-A-B-Y"), Mable John ("Your Good Thing (Is About to End)") and Johnnie Taylor ("I Got to Love Somebody's Baby"), but their crowning achievement was a string of hits crafted for another dynamic duo, Sam & Dave. It included "Soul Man," "I Thank You," "When Something Is Wrong With My Baby," "You Don't Know Like I Know" and "Hold On! I'm Comin'," inspired by Porter's response to Hayes yelling at him to hurry back from the bathroom during a recording session. In June, Hayes and Porter were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hayes' own ascendancy into the spotlight began with 1969's "Hot Buttered Soul" record, which eschewed traditional three-minute singles in favor of extended reinventions of pop standards (an 18-minute "By the Time I Get to Phoenix," a 12-minute "Walk on By") with spoken-message stories and romantic rhapsodies (precursors to both Barry White and rap), and a throbbing meld of classical strings, ebbing horns, funk guitar and propulsive rhythms predating disco. His butterscotch-rich baritone and symphonic soul serenades quickly became a staple of late-night FM radio.
Then came "Shaft."
Before being asked to create a soundtrack for Gordon Parks' story of a black private eye battling drug lords, Hayes had never scored a film. For what would become his signature song, "Theme From Shaft," Hayes dug into his vaults for a bristling high-hat cymbal riff that Al Jackson had played on the break in "Try a Little Tenderness," pairing it with an old "wah-wah" guitar vamp played by Charles "Skip" Pitts. The result was one of the most memorable intros of all time.
The soundtrack stayed on the charts 60 weeks, kicking off the blaxploitation film era and setting the table for Curtis Mayfield's "Superfly" and Marvin Gaye's "Trouble Man" soundtracks. At the 1972 Academy Awards ceremony in Hollywood, a bare-chested, gold chain-draped Hayes burst through the floor performing "Theme From Shaft." When he returned to the podium soon after -- as the first black composer to win the Oscar for best original song for a picture (and at the time, only the third black to win an Oscar, the others being actors Hattie McDaniel and Sidney Poitier), Hayes sported a powder-blue, ermine-trimmed tuxedo.
"Hot Buttered Soul," "Shaft" and "Black Moses" (whose tour featured a 50-strong cast of musicians, singers and dancers) turned Hayes into a music superstar, and his shaved head became a symbol of fame, power, money and cool long before a guy named Michael Jordan.
Hayes is touring in support of "Can You Dig It?," the new career chronicle from Concord Records, which bought the Stax catalog last year.
Of course, hosting a show is one way for a veteran artist to get on the radio these days, and Hayes continues to do so in Memphis, with an evening oldies show on WRBO called "Hot Blooded Love Songs and Sheet Music." Even without singing a note, he's got the voice for it, and the attitude.
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Old's cool.
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