Isaac Hayes, 1942-2008

Isaac Hayes was Black Moses.
He was Truck Turner.
Gandolph Fitch
The Duke of New York
Chef.

Isaac Hayes was my hero.

On Saturday, August 10, 2008 Isaac Hayes was found unconscious in his home and taken to Baptist Memorial Hospital where he was pronounced dead at 2:08pm, just ten days shy of his 66th birthday.

Music & Movies

Isaac Hayes will always be known for “The Theme From Shaft” from his Oscar-winning soundtrack to the movie Shaft. It gave him the first Academy Award received by an African-American in a non-acting category and two Grammy Awards. He received a third Grammy for the album Black Moses and even though Shaft changed soundtracks forever after, Black Moses has always been on my short list of Top 10 Albums to be Shipwrecked With.

It’s no irony-laden joke that TRUCK TURNER is on my list of favorite movies. Of all blaxploitation movies, it’s one of the few that you’ll laugh AT and then realize how good it is. Yaphet Kotto delivers one of the best death scenes ever filmed.

…AND it’s got a kick-ass soundtrack that’s even better than Shaft’s
Way better.



Brushes with greatness

I blew it on my first chance to see him. At the Million Man March and I was so busy staring at M.C.Hammer that I didn’t know that Isaac Hayes was standing less than 50ft. behind me until my friends came up and told me later.

In 2001 I drove to Dallas and paid the $5 entry fee for the Nokia-sponsored ‘New Age Festival’ to watch him perform outdoors in front of a full crowd of hipster 20-somethings that only knew him as “Chef” from South Park and probably got most of his songs confused with Barry White’s. It was still a great show even with having the Nokia Employee Band (which I heckled) as opening act.

I drove back later that summer with friends, paid $72 to watch him perform at a real concert hall in Forth Worth and it’s still one of the best live shows I’ve ever seen in my life. This time the audience was mostly older, black people who knew the words to all the songs…except South Park. You could feel that they had no appreciation for Isaac Hayes inviting them to”suck on his chocolate salty balls”. Even he offered a nervous apology/explanation for the song afterward.
For the first time in my life I hung around the stage after the show on the slim hope he would come back out. After 45 minutes we were told that “Mr. Hayes had just done that show wit the flu and was probably gonna go straight back to his hotel”. So we walked out of the auditorium…right around to the backdoor of the theater (yes, like high school girls). After nearly an hour he finally came out and as easy as it would’ve been for him to give us a wave while stepping into his limo, he instead signed autographs and talked to us like old friends.

The last time I saw him was in 2004 when he put on a live concert at the Dallas Museum of Art for the opening of an exhibit showcasing the photography Shaft director, Gordon Parks.


Scientology (so Guy Fawkes won’t blow a gasket)
One of the things I bonded with Mike Judge over was our mutual man-crush on Isaac Hayes. It was he that introduced Hayes to Trey Parker and Matt Stone after having him sing the theme to Beavis & Butthead Do America. Over the years Mike has told me plenty of anecdotes about “Ike”, but never one that involved him even talking about Scientologist outside of admitting that he was one. It was heart-breaking to read about his public split with South Park, yet it seemed so… ‘WTF?’- especially from the way it was reported- I couldn’t help but feel there was more to the story. For one, at the age of 63, he was week away from having a new baby with his new (and young) wife.

And there were other things I’d heard which are summed up on Wikipedia:

On March 13, 2006, a statement was issued in Hayes' name, indicating that he was asking to be released from his contract with Comedy Central, citing recent episodes which satirized religious beliefs as being intolerant. "There is a place in this world for satire, but there is a time when satire ends and intolerance and bigotry towards religious beliefs of others begins," he was quoted in a press statement. The statement, however, did not directly mention Scientology. A response from Stone said that Hayes' complaints stemmed from the show's criticism of Scientology and that he "has no problem – and he’s cashed plenty of checks – with our show making fun of Christians, Muslims, Mormons or Jews."[16][17] Stone adds, "[We] never heard a peep out of Isaac in any way until we did Scientology. He wants a different standard for religions other than his own, and to me, that is where intolerance and bigotry begin." Stone and Parker agreed to release Hayes from his contract per his request.

On March 20, 2006, Roger Friedman of Fox News reported having been told that the statement was made in Hayes's name, but not by Hayes himself, as he suffered a stroke in January. He wrote: "Isaac Hayes did not quit South Park. My sources say that someone quit it for him. ... Friends in Memphis tell me that Hayes did not issue any statements on his own about South Park. They are mystified." Hayes spokeswoman Amy Harnell denied that Hayes had had a stroke, but on October 26, 2006 Hayes himself confirmed that he did.


Issac Hayes, 1942-2008 R.I.P.