Isaac Hayes
Hot Buttered Soul

When I encounter albums from the past, it becomes spontaneous, every time, to ask myself how "that" album must have sounded to the ears of someone who lived in that era. Musically, if it's the recent past, I can say I've experienced something of it myself, but in this case, speaking of the distant past, I have to assume that very few have tapped into these grooves firsthand. Then there are albums that, willing or not, are born with their fate already sealed, if not precisely as milestones, at least as works destined to last and be passed on to posterity. Others, however, acquire this aura of sacredness in the field since, at the time of their release, it wasn't possible to establish the scope and historical significance of the project.

Isaac Hayes arrived in 1969 to record "Hot Buttered Soul" with only the eponymous debut from just a year earlier behind him, but already boasting several collaborations in the soul scene with figures like David Porter, Booker T. Jones, and Sam & Dave (for whom he composed the famous "Soul Man"). A decent pianist and saxophonist, he reshuffles the soul deck by hybridizing the genre with marked insertions of funk and jazz, delivering an album composed of only four tracks expanded beyond measure, almost forming mini suites, when at the time, soul music primarily thrived on 45 singles.

To know the initial "Walk On By" in the canonical version by Dionne Warwick, the muse of authors Bacharach-David, it's hard to believe it's the evolution, in a symphonic key, of the harmless pop tune stretched to twelve minutes with so much acid-plated guitar, clearly of Hendrixian origin, paired with female backing vocals of Stax origin.

Backing vocalists who repeat in the next track solely to cite the tongue-twister "Hyperbolicsyllabsesquedalymistic" which titles the track, where the refrain is entrusted to the warm semi-baritone voice, between singing and spoken-word of the great Black Moses, before the long instrumental break characterized by a distinct piano line duly supported by the rhythm section entrusted to the Bar-Kays.

"One Woman," the only song tout-court of the batch, contained in just (!) 5'08", presents Isaac Hayes as a grand master of ceremonies dressed in a tuxedo that harks back to a soul-tinged Frank Sinatra.

The eighteen hypnotic final minutes of "By The Time I Get To Phoenix" catapult us into a smoky and enveloping night, made of stealthy steps that drip metropolitan pathos. Practically divided into two parts, where the long spoken introduction dissolves and flows into the majestic crescendo of the final closure, frescoed by cascades of strings and winds to give it a tone of sinuous epicity.

I cannot know how this album sounded almost forty years ago or what sensations it evoked. Surely, it hasn't lost any of its initial luster; rather, over time, it has grown to become a reference point of the genre from which there is no escape.

Finally, a hope that someone will take care of remastering this CD, updating it to current technologies, as the available support, still from the first generations, doesn't do justice to the sound dynamic, despite those content with the low profile of an iPod or worse (abomination), the cellphone. Years ago, a friend of mine, a hi-fi enthusiast, laconically stated: "If you want to listen to music well, you have to spend." Wise words. Likewise balanced by adequate support, I add.