Funky Friday – Episode 80: Soulsville
- Noah McDonough
- Aug 11
- 13 min read
Updated: Aug 14
🎧 Quick Links:
🎧 Listen live on KDOG 9 AM Pacific Time→ Here
🎧 Listen live on KCSM HD2 9 PM Pacific Time→ Here
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• 9 AM KDOG
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• 9 PM KCSM HD2
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🎶 Catch the Replay → Here
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Airdate: 8.14.26 - 9 AM Pacific Time on KDOG & 9 PM Pacific Time on KCSM HD2
Funky Friday – Episode 80: Soulsville
Happy Friday and welcome to Funky Friday Episode 80: Soulsville
Before the bass line.
Before the horns.
Before the wah-wah guitar cut through movie theaters around the world.
There was an old neighborhood cinema at 926 East McLemore Avenue in Memphis, Tennessee.
The sloping floor was never completely leveled.
The former concession stand became a record shop.
Inside, musicians, singers, songwriters, and producers began creating a sound that could not have come from anywhere else.
Stax Records was built on Southern soul.
But inside those same walls, something harder was taking shape.
The drums moved forward.
The bass grew heavier.
The guitar became more percussive.
The space between the notes became part of the rhythm.
Soul was getting funky.
This week, Funky Friday travels to Soulsville, U.S.A., for a journey through the raw grooves, deep soul, and cinematic funk of Stax Records.
The story begins with Isaac Hayes.
Hayes had already helped shape the Stax sound as a songwriter, arranger, and producer. Working with David Porter, he co-wrote a remarkable run of records for artists including Sam & Dave.
But by the beginning of the 1970s, Hayes had stepped out from behind the scenes.
Then came Shaft.
“Theme from Shaft” carried the Stax sound far beyond Memphis. Its relentless hi-hat, orchestral sweep, and unmistakable wah-wah guitar turned a movie theme into a cultural event.
The song won the Academy Award for Best Original Song, making Hayes the first Black artist to win an Oscar in a music category.
It also provides the doorway into this week’s episode.
From there, we return to the original Bar-Kays and the youthful blast of “Soul Finger.”
We move through Rufus Thomas turning dance instructions into stripped-down funk, Johnnie Taylor bringing grit and attitude to “Hijackin’ Love,” and Jean Knight and Linda Lyndell delivering two of the sharpest declarations ever released through the Stax family.
The Staple Singers bring gospel harmony into the pocket.
The Soul Children turn relationship drama into rhythmic tension.
Booker T. & the M.G.’s stretch the Stax vocabulary across the long, hypnotic groove of “Melting Pot.”
Then the songs begin getting stranger.
Roy Lee Johnson and the Villagers take us into the raw, churning rhythm of “The Dryer.”
Black Nasty brings Detroit muscle into the Stax universe with “Getting Funky Round Here.”
And 24-Carat Black transforms funk into something dark, cinematic, and socially observant with “Foodstamps.”
Different artists.
Different studios.
Different branches of the Stax family.
But running through them is the same fundamental idea:
The groove is not decoration.
The groove is the message.
This is not simply the story of a soul label that occasionally released funk records.
It is the story of how the machinery of Southern soul helped construct one of the roads into funk.
Booker T. & the M.G.’s established the economy of the Memphis groove.
Rufus Thomas pushed it toward the dance floor.
Isaac Hayes expanded it into widescreen orchestral funk.
The Bar-Kays made it heavier, louder, and more aggressive.
By the early 1970s, the sound developed at Stax was no longer confined to the converted theater on East McLemore.
It was moving through radio, film, dance floors, and popular culture around the world.
And then, just as funk was becoming commercially enormous, Stax began to collapse.
The label that had survived the death of Otis Redding, the loss of its Atlantic distribution arrangement, and the near disappearance of its original catalog entered a period of ambitious expansion under Al Bell.
The music remained vital.
The business beneath it did not.
Distribution problems, mounting debt, and financial pressure pushed Stax into involuntary bankruptcy in 1975.
The building closed.
The company disappeared.
But the signal kept moving.
It survived through the musicians, producers, songwriters, records, and rhythms that Stax had sent into the world.
This week’s journey ends where it began.
With Shaft.
But the final word belongs to the Bar-Kays.
Isaac Hayes opens the hour with “Theme from Shaft.”
The Bar-Kays answer with “Son of Shaft.”
Between those two recordings lies the sound of Stax moving from Southern soul into deep, uncompromising funk.
Welcome to Episode 80.
Welcome to 926 East McLemore Avenue.
Welcome to Soulsville.
Signal Discovery
The Bar-Kays were still teenagers when they fought their way into Stax Records.
The original group had auditioned repeatedly for the label before a playful instrumental built around a children’s melody finally opened the door.
“Soul Finger” became a hit in 1967.
It reached the Top 20 on the Billboard Hot 100 and climbed to No. 3 on the R&B chart.
The record also caught the attention of Otis Redding.
Redding hired the young musicians as his touring band and made arrangements that allowed them to continue their education while performing with one of the biggest stars in soul music.
Their future appeared limitless.
Then, on December 10, 1967, the plane carrying Redding and most of the Bar-Kays crashed into Lake Monona near Madison, Wisconsin.
Trumpeter Ben Cauley survived the crash.
Bassist James Alexander had taken a commercial flight and was not aboard.
The other four members of the Bar-Kays were killed.
Cauley and Alexander were left with an almost impossible decision.
Let the name end with their friends.
Or rebuild.
They chose to rebuild.
The new Bar-Kays returned with different musicians, a different chemistry, and eventually a different sound.
They resumed work at Stax and became an important backing band for Isaac Hayes, contributing to the musical world surrounding albums including Hot Buttered Soul, Black Moses, and the soundtrack to Shaft.
But they were not content to remain behind another artist.
As soul music moved into the 1970s, the Bar-Kays grew heavier.
They added vocals.
They absorbed psychedelic rock.
They pushed their rhythm section toward the emerging sound of funk.
In 1972, they released “Son of Shaft.”
The title acknowledged Isaac Hayes’s landmark recording, but the music announced that the Bar-Kays had become a force of their own.
That same year, Stax brought many of its artists to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum for Wattstax, a massive concert celebrating Black music, culture, and community.
Five years after the plane crash, the rebuilt Bar-Kays stood before an audience of more than 100,000 people and tore into “Son of Shaft.”
It was more than a performance.
It was evidence of survival.
The band had gone from Memphis teenagers chasing a chance to play inside Stax, to Otis Redding’s touring musicians, to the center of an unimaginable tragedy.
Then they built themselves again.
This week, the studio recording of “Son of Shaft” closes Episode 80.
In the featured video below, watch the Bar-Kays perform “Son of Shaft / Feel It” live at Wattstax.
The original group can be heard near the beginning of the show in “Soul Finger.”
The rebuilt band gets the final word.
Two incarnations.
One extraordinary story of tragedy, survival, reinvention, and funk.
Funky Friday – Episode 80: Soulsville
🔥 SETLIST + RENEGADE NOTES
ISAAC HAYES — Theme from Shaft (1971)
Personnel: Isaac Hayes (lead vocals, keyboards), Charles “Skip” Pitts (wah-wah guitar), Michael Toles and Marc “Dr. Love” Davis (guitars), James Alexander (bass), Willie Hall (drums), Gary Jones (congas), Lester Snell (electric piano), Pat Lewis, Rose Williams, Telma Hopkins, and Mitchell Butler (backing vocals), with orchestration arranged by Isaac Hayes and Johnny Allen.
Renegade Note: Opening Episode 80, “Theme from Shaft” transformed a detective-film assignment into one of Stax Records’ greatest worldwide triumphs. Hayes’s orchestral sweep, Willie Hall’s relentless hi-hat, and Skip Pitts’s wah-wah guitar carried Memphis funk into cinemas around the world and earned Hayes the Academy Award for Best Original Song.
THE BAR-KAYS — Soul Finger (1967)
Personnel: Ben Cauley (trumpet), Phalon Jones (tenor saxophone), Jimmy King (guitar), Ronnie Caldwell (organ), James Alexander (bass), Carl Cunningham (drums), with neighborhood children providing the shouted vocals.
Renegade Note: The original Bar-Kays built “Soul Finger” around Ben Cauley’s reworking of “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” Stax songwriter David Porter supplied the title and recruited children outside the studio to shout it on the record, reportedly rewarding them with Coca-Cola. The playful session became a major hit and brought the teenage band to the attention of Otis Redding.
RUFUS THOMAS — (Do the) Push and Pull, Part 1 (1970)
Personnel: Rufus Thomas (lead vocals), Michael Toles (guitar), James Alexander (bass), Willie Hall (drums), Carl Hampton (keyboards, arrangement). Produced by Al Bell and Tom Nixon.
Renegade Note: Rufus Thomas often entered the studio without finished lyrics, waited for the musicians to establish a groove, and invented his dance instructions around it. “Push and Pull” turned that spontaneous process into his only No. 1 R&B hit, proving that a singer already in his fifties could still command the emerging funk dance floor.
JOHNNIE TAYLOR — Hijackin’ Love (1971)
Personnel: Johnnie Taylor (lead vocals), backed by Stax studio musicians. Written by Raymond Jackson and Homer Banks; produced by Don Davis.
Renegade Note: “Hijackin’ Love” catches Johnnie Taylor at the point where his gospel-trained voice, blues instincts, and Stax soul foundation began pressing into funk. Its language turns romantic betrayal into an armed robbery, while the clipped guitar and churning rhythm give Taylor the perfect machinery for his accusation.
JEAN KNIGHT — Mr. Big Stuff (1971)
Personnel: Jean Knight (lead vocals), Dorothy Moore and others (backing vocals), Jerry Puckett (guitar), Vernie Robbins (bass), James Stroud (drums), Paul Davis (keyboards, horn arrangement), Wardell Quezergue (organ, arrangement), Jimmy Honeycutt (saxophone), with trumpet credited in session accounts to either Bob Cheesman or Peary Lomax. Produced by Wardell Quezergue.
Renegade Note: Recorded at Malaco Studios in Jackson, Mississippi, “Mr. Big Stuff” initially struggled to find a label before Stax agreed to release it. The record became a double-platinum crossover smash and Billboard’s No. 1 soul single of 1971, expanding the Stax universe far beyond the company’s Memphis studio.
LINDA LYNDELL — What a Man (1968)
Personnel: Linda Lyndell (lead vocals), backed by Stax studio musicians. Written, arranged, and produced by Dave Crawford.
Renegade Note: Recommended to Stax by Otis Redding, Linda Lyndell improvised much of “What a Man” in the studio with producer Dave Crawford and the house musicians. Threats from white supremacists over her association with Black musicians drove her away from recording, but the song found an enormous second life when Salt-N-Pepa and En Vogue reimagined it as “Whatta Man” in 1993.
THE STAPLE SINGERS — Heavy Makes You Happy (Sha-Na-Boom-Boom) (1970)
Personnel: Mavis Staples (lead vocals), Roebuck “Pops” Staples, Cleotha Staples, and Yvonne Staples (vocals), backed by the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. Produced by Al Bell; rhythm track recorded at Muscle Shoals Sound Studios.
Renegade Note: “Heavy Makes You Happy” helped establish the approach that would carry the Staple Singers to their greatest commercial success. Al Bell placed the family’s gospel voices over the compact, earthy pocket of the Muscle Shoals musicians, creating a bridge between sacred harmony, Southern soul, and the increasingly funky sound of Stax.
THE SOUL CHILDREN — Hearsay (1972)
Personnel: John “J. Blackfoot” Colbert, Norman West, Anita Louis, and Shelbra Bennett (vocals), with instrumentation arranged by Dale Warren. Produced by Jim Stewart and Al Jackson Jr.
Renegade Note: Created by Isaac Hayes and David Porter after Sam & Dave left the Stax roster, the Soul Children were designed around four singers capable of trading lead vocals and perspectives. Written by Norman West and J. Blackfoot, “Hearsay” turns neighborhood gossip into a tense ensemble performance that reached No. 5 on the R&B chart.
BOOKER T. & THE M.G.’S — Melting Pot (1971)
Personnel: Booker T. Jones (keyboards), Steve Cropper (guitar), Donald “Duck” Dunn (bass), Al Jackson Jr. (drums). Written and produced by Booker T. & the M.G.’s.
Renegade Note: “Melting Pot” was the final album-length statement from the classic M.G.’s lineup. Stretching beyond the compact instrumentals that made them famous, the title track gives each player room to develop an eight-minute conversation while preserving the economy, discipline, and deep pocket that defined the Stax rhythm section.
ROY LEE JOHNSON & THE VILLAGERS — The Dryer (1973)
Personnel: Roy Lee Johnson (vocals, guitar, arrangement) with the Villagers, including Michael James (bass). Written by Hosea Burch; produced by Jimmy Johnson.
Renegade Note: Roy Lee Johnson had already recorded with Piano Red and played guitar with artists including Bobby “Blue” Bland before assembling the Villagers. “The Dryer” reduces funk to its working parts: a repeated vocal command, a grinding guitar figure, and a rhythm that churns with the mechanical persistence promised by its title.
BLACK NASTY — Getting Funky ’Round Here (1973)
Personnel: Audrey Matthews and Terrance Ellis (vocals), Johnnie Mae Matthews (vocals, production), Mark Patterson (bass), Thomas Carter (keyboards), Artwell Matthews (drums), with guitars credited across the album sessions to Jackie Cosper and James “Blood” Ulmer.
Renegade Note: Black Nasty came from Detroit rather than Memphis, but Stax’s Enterprise imprint gave the family-centered group a home for its lone album, Talking to the People. Led here by Audrey Matthews, “Getting Funky ’Round Here” brings Motor City muscle into the Stax catalog without sanding down the band’s raw edges.
THE STAPLE SINGERS — I’ll Take You There (1972)
Personnel: Mavis Staples (lead vocals), Roebuck “Pops” Staples, Cleotha Staples, and Yvonne Staples (vocals), Jimmy Johnson, Eddie Hinton, Raymond Banks, and Terry Manning (guitars), David Hood (bass), Barry Beckett (Wurlitzer electric piano), Roger Hawkins (drums), Terry Manning (harmonica), the Memphis Horns and Ben Cauley (horns). Produced by Al Bell.
Renegade Note: Mavis Staples appears to call upon her family members for the instrumental solos, but the music was actually performed by the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. Built around an unmistakably reggae-influenced bass line, “I’ll Take You There” turned a vision of spiritual and social deliverance into the Staple Singers’ only No. 1 pop hit.
24-CARAT BLACK — Foodstamps (1973)
Personnel: Album personnel include Princess Hearn, Kathleen Dent, and Valerie Malone (vocals), Larry Austin (bass), Ernest Latimore (guitar), James Talbert (electric piano), William Talbert (organ), Tyrone Steels (percussion), Jerome Derrickson (tenor saxophone), Gregory Ingram (alto saxophone), and Ricky Foster (trumpet). Arranged and produced by Dale Warren.
Renegade Note: Conceived as part of Dale Warren’s ambitious album Ghetto: Misfortune’s Wealth, “Foodstamps” uses funk as social theater. Largely overlooked when released, the record later became a prized deep-soul artifact, and Tyrone Steels’s drum break found new life in Digable Planets’ Grammy-winning “Rebirth of Slick (Cool Like Dat).”
THE BAR-KAYS — Son of Shaft (1971)
Personnel: Larry Dodson (lead vocals), James Alexander (bass), Michael Toles (guitar), Winston Stewart (keyboards), Harvey Henderson (tenor saxophone, flute), Ben Cauley (trumpet), and Willie Hall (drums).
Renegade Note: Closing the journey, “Son of Shaft” answers Isaac Hayes’s cinematic masterpiece with a tougher, more aggressive statement from the rebuilt Bar-Kays. Heard after the original lineup’s “Soul Finger,” the recording completes a story of tragedy, survival, and reinvention: young Memphis musicians becoming one of Stax’s defining funk bands.
🔗 Quick Links:
🎧 Listen live on KDOG 9 AM Pacific Time→ Here
🎧 Listen live on KCSM HD2 9 PM Pacific Time→ Here
📆 Add to Calendar — Funky Friday (Weekly):
• 9 AM KDOG
Add to Google Calendar
• 9 PM KCSM HD2
Add to Google Calendar
🎶 Catch the Replay → Here
📖 Full Episode Recaps + Setlists → Here
📻 Renegade Radio Site → Here
Funk Facts
ISAAC HAYES — Theme from Shaft
Built around Willie Hall’s relentless sixteenth-note hi-hat, Charles “Skip” Pitts’ wah-wah guitar, James Alexander’s bass, congas, keyboards, backing vocals, and sweeping orchestration. The arrangement expands the rhythmic language of Memphis soul into widescreen cinematic funk while remaining anchored to an extraordinarily disciplined groove.
THE BAR-KAYS — Soul Finger
Driven by bright trumpet and saxophone lines, stabbing organ, clipped guitar, bouncing bass, tight drums, and the unforgettable shouts of neighborhood children recruited outside the Stax studio. The arrangement combines youthful exuberance with the precision of a working rhythm section, capturing the original Bar-Kays before tragedy changed the band forever.
RUFUS THOMAS — (Do the) Push and Pull, Part 1
Constructed from a stripped-down rhythm section, percussive guitar, muscular bass, crisp drums, organ accents, and Rufus Thomas’ improvised dance instructions. The arrangement leaves enough open space for Thomas to direct the action, turning the recording into something between a funk workout, a neighborhood party, and a dance lesson.
JOHNNIE TAYLOR — Hijackin’ Love
Built around clipped guitar, churning bass, hard-pocket drums, sharp horn punctuation, and Johnnie Taylor’s forceful, gospel-trained lead vocal. The arrangement applies the directness of Stax soul to a tougher rhythmic framework, giving Taylor room to turn romantic betrayal into an accusation delivered with absolute authority.
JEAN KNIGHT — Mr. Big Stuff
Driven by a thick, instantly recognizable bass line, crisp drums, economical guitar, organ, tightly arranged horns, backing vocals, and Jean Knight’s coolly dismissive delivery. The arrangement demonstrates how a compact groove and an unforgettable vocal attitude can create funk without unnecessary ornamentation.
LINDA LYNDELL — What a Man
Built around strutting bass, syncopated drums, rhythmic guitar, punchy horns, handclaps, backing responses, and Linda Lyndell’s exuberant lead vocal. The arrangement moves with the confidence of its subject, using repetition and call-and-response to turn personal admiration into an irresistible communal celebration.
THE STAPLE SINGERS — Heavy Makes You Happy (Sha-Na-Boom-Boom)
Constructed from the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section’s earthy pocket, warm guitar, rolling bass, compact drums, bright horn accents, and the Staple Singers’ gospel-rooted vocal blend. The arrangement bridges sacred harmony and secular celebration, showing how naturally the family’s sound could settle into the increasingly funky Stax vocabulary.
THE SOUL CHILDREN — Hearsay
Driven by tense rhythm guitar, active bass, insistent drums, carefully placed orchestration, and four vocalists trading accusations, denials, and emotional reactions. The arrangement treats the singers as characters inside the same unfolding drama, transforming neighborhood gossip into a layered piece of rhythmic theater.
BOOKER T. & THE M.G.’S — Melting Pot
Built around Booker T. Jones’ simmering keyboards, Steve Cropper’s economical guitar, Donald “Duck” Dunn’s deeply grounded bass, and Al Jackson Jr.’s precise drumming. The extended arrangement allows the classic Stax rhythm section to stretch beyond the compact structure of its early instrumentals while preserving the restraint, space, and collective discipline at the heart of its sound.
ROY LEE JOHNSON & THE VILLAGERS — The Dryer
Constructed from a grinding guitar figure, repeated vocal commands, churning bass, tightly locked drums, and a groove that circles with almost mechanical persistence. The arrangement strips funk to its essential moving parts, using repetition not as limitation, but as a source of accumulating pressure.
BLACK NASTY — Getting Funky ’Round Here
Driven by heavy bass, distorted guitar, electric keyboards, muscular drums, and raw lead and backing vocals. The arrangement brings the harder edge of early-1970s Detroit into the Stax universe, combining rock weight, family-band energy, and deep funk without polishing away the group’s rough character.
THE STAPLE SINGERS — I’ll Take You There
Built around David Hood’s reggae-influenced bass line, Barry Beckett’s Wurlitzer electric piano, Roger Hawkins’ relaxed drums, restrained guitar, horn accents, and Mavis Staples’ commanding lead vocal. The arrangement creates its power through patience and repetition, turning a remarkably spare Muscle Shoals groove into a vision of spiritual, social, and musical deliverance.
24-CARAT BLACK — Foodstamps
Constructed from ominous keyboards, restless bass, sharp guitar, layered percussion, dramatic horns, and voices that move between individual testimony and collective observation. The arrangement uses funk as cinematic social commentary, creating a tense urban soundscape in which the groove carries both physical force and narrative weight.
THE BAR-KAYS — Son of Shaft
Driven by James Alexander’s aggressive bass, Michael Toles’ cutting guitar, Willie Hall’s forceful drums, keyboards, horns, and Larry Dodson’s swaggering lead vocal. The arrangement takes the cinematic language associated with Shaft and pushes it toward a heavier, more confrontational band sound, bringing the episode full circle through the rebuilt Bar-Kays’ unmistakable brand of Memphis funk.
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