In the year-long series Sounds Of Blaxploitation, Craig D. Lindsey plays the hits that defined a genre, drawing connections between the music of the moment and the films that gave it a platform.
Back in 1972, the Rev. Jesse Jackson was very in-demand when it came to inspiring Black folk. In the span of a few months, the self-described “country preacher” and founder of Operation PUSH (People United To Save Humanity) shared some powerful words at two all-star events that were also captured on film: Wattstax in Los Angeles and the PUSH Expo in Chicago. (Earlier that year, he also spoke at the National Black Political Convention in Gary, which was filmed by William Greaves for the documentary Nationtime.) Both events were also packed with Black recording artists performing R&B, jazz, blues, gospel—basically providing grooves you could start a revolution to.
An impeccably Afroed Jackson first showed up to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in August for the day-long Wattstax concert, which commemorated the seventh anniversary of the 1965 Watts riots. He gave a rousing opening speech, reciting his immortal “I Am—Somebody” poem, inciting every Black person in the stands to raise their fists in solidarity. (The year before, he recorded the spoken-word LP I Am Somebody on Stax subsidiary Respect Records.)
Director Mel Stuart followed up his future children’s classic Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory by leading an integrated crew (L.A. Rebellion member Larry Clark was one of the cameramen) filming the whole experience. Stuart also ventured out to South Central and interviewed brothas and sistas in the community (including Richard Pryor—another Stax labelmate—and Ted Lange, who would go on to play bartender Isaac on The Love Boat) about being Black in America.
Organized by iconic Southern soul label Stax Records (who eventually dropped two double albums’ worth of music from the film and the concert), Wattstax featured virtually everyone in the label’s roster performing in the middle of that football field. One-time Marvin Gaye duet partner Kim Weston kicked things off with a soulful rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” before getting solemn with “Lift Every Voice And Sing” (a.k.a. The Black National Anthem).
The Staple Singers, who showed up to the venue after eating ribs in the car, gave the crowd funky words of encouragement with “Respect Yourself,” while my two favorite performances are also the most fashionably outrageous: Funk band The Bar-Kays, decked out in gaudy white outfits, went nuts with “Son Of Shaft,” while wisecracking singer Rufus Thomas hit the stage in a magenta short suit with a cape (“Don’t I look clean?” he asked the audience) and got the audience down to the field for “Do The Funky Chicken.”
Stuart also captured performances from Stax stars away from the venue. Girl group The Emotions made a joyful noise in front of a church crowd. Johnnie Taylor sweat up a storm entertaining a nightclub full of playas and playettes. We even got bluesman Little Milton doing some golden-hour guitar-playing next to a trashcan fire.
Jackson returned near the end of the film to introduce Isaac Hayes, who made one hell of a grand entrance before jumping into “Theme From Shaft” and “Soulsville,” which is intercut with inner-city footage. Unfortunately, MGM didn’t like Hayes performing songs from his Shaft soundtrack and told Stuart to excise his live set from the film. A disappointed Hayes had to re-record a whole new song, “Rolling Down A Mountainside” (co-penned by Leon Ware), and re-create the live performance on a soundstage. Thankfully, when Wattstax had a 30th anniversary re-release in 2003, the original ending was restored.
Hayes and Jackson would cross paths once again a month later when Jackson held his five-day PUSH Expo, chronicled in Save The Children, the 1973 concert film named after the event’s central theme. Preaching in voiceover, Jackson opened that film declaring that this was all done for us and by us. “We got Black film crewmen, we got Black film producers, and just as we can produce Shaft and Super Fly, we can produce PUSH Black Expo, so Black folk all over the world can see us at our very best,” he said.
Thanks to executive producer and legendary music mogul Clarence Avant getting talent from Motown, Stax, and Atlantic, a who’s who of Black music stars make up Save The Children‘s bill: Quincy Jones, Roberta Flack, Ramsey Lewis, Nancy Wilson. Hayes and the Staples showed up representing Hitsville. (Their songs unfortunately don’t appear on the double-album soundtrack Motown later released.) Michael Jackson and his Jackson 5 brothers got all the youngins fired up with their medley of tunes. There’s a montage of singing groups—Temptations, O’Jays, Chi-Lites, etc.—wearing outfits more flamboyant than the next. We even had Sammy Davis, Jr., practically atoning for his endorsing (and hugging) Richard Nixon at the Republican National Convention by singing “I’ve Gotta Be Me.”
Just like Wattstax, Save The Children (directed by TV veteran Stan Lathan) combined live performances with pro-Black documentary footage. The opening-credit montage showed kids being kids in the Chicago projects, along with Marvin Gaye performing his song “Save The Children” (from his 1971 What’s Going On album) in front of the amphitheater crowd. Gaye was a recurring player in Children, as he and his band performed two more numbers from What’s Going On (with the great bassist James Jameson playing right behind him).
For so long, these two pictures were long-lost cinematic documents of the Blaxploitation era, a couple of docs that briefly played in theaters before getting shelved and forgotten in some film vault. Thankfully, they were revived and restored for new audiences decades later, in order to provide them with a continuously soulful snapshot of a time when African Americans came together to celebrate, cultivate, and commemorate. Even though you can spot Blaxplotiation stars like Melvin Van Peebles and Richard Roundtree in attendance, the only action was onstage, when Jackson encouraged people to be somebody. As fun as it was watching badass, ebony heroes and heroines bust the asses of any corrupt, racist figure that dares to mess with The People, films like Wattstax and Save The Children showed audiences what was really going on—and it was wonderful.
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