CAN YOU DIG IT?

SHAFT by Isaac Hayes (Enterprise, 1971)

As a 19 year old, I didn’t realize that history was being made, but when I saw Isaac Hayes on the Oscars, bedecked in chain-mail, at the keyboard, being wheeled onstage in a cloud of dry ice to sing The Theme From Shaft, I knew something was up. The chicka-chicka of the wah-wah guitar riff had already surgically implanted in my head by AM radio, along with Haye’s chilled delivery of “That Shaft is a baaaad Mutha…” Together, these elements excited the entire country in new and electric ways. 

Richard Roundtree said years later that he had an instinct that John Shaft would certainly be the best role of his career -  (Hayes was considered, but Gordon Parks wisely persuaded The Black Moses to create the indelible ambience instead) - but, he couldn’t have prepared for the seismic impact that this film would deliver. Director Parks wanted to make a “fun” picture with a Black Action Hero, but Shaft transcended all that. All the creatives and many of the crew were also black; it was filmed largely in Harlem, and tapped into the prevailing Black Power aesthetic zeitgeist, and the film changed the “Blaxploitation” genre forever. Before Shaft, MGM had been struggling, but the studio was rescued by the film, which made 13 million from a half a mil budget. 

The soundtrack, with it’s laid back, jazz infused arrangements by Johnny Allen, and bolstered by Haye’s compatriots at Stax, The Bar-Kays, went platinum. In 2014 it was entered into The Library of Congress list of essential recordings. 

I coveted a black leather coat like the one that Shaft wore - but the closest I could get was a brown bomber jacket. Nobody was as cool as Shaft or Isaac Hayes - nobody could be. “Damn Straight!”