STAX: Soulsville, U.S.A. (2024) s01e03 Episode Script
Respect Yourself
1
Is it at once
getting much better
and still hopeless?
I don't want
to be given anything by you.
In the beginning ♪
You really loved me ♪
I was too blind ♪
I couldn't see ♪
When Dr. King was killed,
I thought my world had ended.
But now you've left me ♪
I couldn't produce or create
or do anything for a long time.
Oh, how I cried ♪
We had two great losses.
Otis Redding and The Bar-Kays,
and we had Martin Luther King.
Till your well runs dry ♪
It brings reality into focus.
The reality of living together
in this divided city.
What-what do I say?
You know, what can I say?
We were just
totally, totally devastated.
And not only that,
our masters,
they had been taken from us.
I miss my water ♪
We didn't know what was going
to happen with our career
or with our music.
We had been screwed
without a kiss.
You don't miss your ♪
That's what
it really amounted to.
We had nothing.
We closed down
for several days.
We went through a
a period of-of-of depression,
I guess, is the word.
The whole company.
The attitude
in the industry
was Stax is dead. It's over.
I mean, how could you think
of it any other way?
Those in New York,
they look down.
They think we're dumb bunnies,
if you will,
and they tried to keep us
"in our place."
I didn't accept that though.
I couldn't.
And I got to thinking,
well, wait a minute.
I came to Stax Records
because of that sound
that comes out of Stax.
And it was that sound
that's behind our top artists,
Sam and Dave, Carla Thomas,
Rufus Thomas,
William Bell, Eddie Floyd,
Otis Redding.
This is
my lover's prayer ♪
I realized we no longer
have our catalog
but we still had our people.
I knew what Stax really was.
It was a product of creative
and rare people,
and great, authentic music art.
We weren't
with Atlantic anymore,
but we can rebuild Stax.
I started talking
to Jim and Estelle
about becoming an independent
recorded music business.
We didn't think
we could handle it,
independently.
Even though we had made
a lot of money,
it takes a lot of money
to be independent.
You step out there alone.
Risky business.
Jim said, "Well,
find somebody
to make a deal with us."
I got with a friend of mine
named Clarence Avant.
Clarence was a major broker
in the recorded music industry.
I convinced him
that there was a future here.
Then I said, "Clarence,
I need a deal."
He said, "I think maybe
we can get something done
at Gulf+Western."
Estelle, myself, and Al thought
Gulf+Western
would give us distribution
and the visibility
that we needed.
So we went to New York.
Clarence
made the appointment
with the Chairman of the Board
of Gulf+Western,
Charlie Bluhdorn.
Clarence explained what had
happened with us,
and told him what we needed was
an opportunity and a chance.
Charlie Bluhdorn was saying,
"I don't know.
It seems as though
the Stax period
is over in the marketplace."
And Clarence Avant
got up and said,
"Charlie Bluhdorn,
I wouldn't bring this to you
unless it meant money to you,
and I know you wanna
make money."
He was screaming.
He sold it.
He literally sold it.
And Bluhdorn said,
"Okay, Clarence."
So we made the deal.
Gulf+Western gave us
the money that we needed,
but now we needed
to find something
that we can release
in this marketplace.
Al came to me and said,
"I want you to go
to the tape library,
find something good."
Atlantic didn't own anything
that hadn't been released.
We could take that music
and work with that.
And we came up with a track
of Booker T. & the M.G.'s,
but it needed some work.
I said, "Well, this song sounds
kind of jumpy, islandy.
Why don't we put
a marimba on it?"
I took the marimba and just
played this melody on it,
played through the whole song.
So we put it down, mixed it,
took it to Al Bell,
said, "Here's your song."
I said, "Oh, that limbo
is happening in New York,
Philadelphia, Boston.
And this has that limbo feel
on it with this marimba."
I said, "We're gonna call it
'Soul Limbo.'"
We released it
in the marketplace
and that record took off.
"Soul Limbo" gave me
a bit more confidence
but it was just one song.
We needed a lot more.
So I sat down with a legal pad,
and I started writing the names
of all of the artists.
Booker T. & the M.G.'s,
Albert King, Carla Thomas,
Rufus Thomas.
I started creating concepts
like "boy meets girl."
That's where I could take
all of our male artists
and combine them
with our female artists,
and that would give me
another album.
Then I thought about,
okay, guitars only.
That will make noise
in the marketplace.
And I kept coming up
with albums like that.
Al called a meeting.
He said, "We need to build back
the Stax catalog
and then flood the market
with product.
Let's work hard
to make it happen quickly."
He wanted all of this product,
more product out of one company
than all of the companies
producing rhythm and blues
in the United States
collectively.
The soul explosion.
Al Bell didn't
share all the particulars.
He just generated
the excitement.
He was a master
at generating enthusiasm.
And even though there was
division in my band,
everybody just went to work
like crazy.
"We're doing this."
Hold on. Take two.
One, two
We had "no time to lose."
Al Bell was the drum major.
We were all in.
We went
to the studio around the clock
in a very short period of time.
I'm talking about
three months.
When I came to
Stax, it was starting all over.
But personally, I couldn't have
been at a better place
at a better time.
I started
as a trainee engineer.
It was just an unbelievable
opportunity.
'Course I was thrown
in the fire.
As a guitarist,
they needed songs,
and I was able
to start songwriting.
It was sink or swim.
I was a writer,
and being the only female
was not an easy task.
You know, we're talking about
the sexist '60s here.
Some guys didn't feel like women
could do what they could do,
'cause this is
an all-male environment.
So Al Bell gave me
this great big opportunity.
Good idea. Take one.
We went on a 24-hour,
seven-day-a-week
production basis.
Instead of
four or five songs,
I'm working on four
or five albums
with 10 to 12 songs
on each one of them.
It was like
a nine-to-nine situation.
I'd go home to take a shower
and that'd be about it.
It was just more
than you could handle.
I mean, it was just
wearing us out.
Steve Cropper said, "Al, you're
working the musicians to death."
I said, "No, I'm not, Steven.
I'm working them to life.
We gotta get this done
if we're gonna survive
out here in this music business.
I'm talking about
working them to life."
I like me on a minor third,
and you men with the seventh.
Two, three
Al Bell approached me
and said, "I gotta produce
a lot of albums."
I said, "Can I do an album too?"
He said, "Sure!"
I said, "However I want to?"
"Yes! You got carte blanche."
It was a lot in me
wanted to break out.
I was a songwriter,
I was a producer, an arranger.
But I had aspirations
of being a singer.
I was like a sponge.
I had soaked up a lot
of different influences.
Blues, jazz, pop, classical.
But at that time at Stax,
I didn't have a chance
to express it.
-Rolling. Number one.
Every day around lunchtime,
Isaac would come down the hall.
We were all going to lunch.
And he had a tape up there
that, uh,
he would get you to put on,
and they were these old ballads,
like, uh,
"
for Sentimental Reasons."
You know, it was
Boy, and it was taking
our lunch time.
I'll just take
my time on this thing now.
One, two
And he had this creamy voice
that just
Ohh, yeah ♪
He was honing his craft.
Mm-hm ♪
He'd sing those songs.
He was getting
the voice thing together.
One, two, three, four.
Isaac was
looking for a different sound.
After the plane crash,
the people at Stax asked us,
"What do y'all want to do about
continuing The Bar-Kays?"
I'm looking to my left
and I don't see no Jimmie King.
I'm looking to my right
and I don't see
no Phalon Jones,
my best friend.
Only two people left.
Just myself and Ben Cauley,
the one survivor.
It was an eerie feeling.
But I said,
"We got to carry on."
At 18 years old, I debuted
a new Bar-Kays band.
When I became a member
of the Bar-Kays
as a drummer,
there was Harvey Henderson
on saxophone,
Ben Cauley, James Alexander,
and Michael Toles.
And they got another white kid
to play organ,
Ronnie Gorden.
I saw a great drive
to make a monument
to that tragedy.
We didn't really know
what we was doing,
but what attracted
Isaac to us
was the fearlessness.
He would sit at the piano,
and he'd work
all the different parts out.
He was creative enough
and open enough
to just let you go.
If your idea was something
nice, he'd go along with it.
That gave me a lot of freedom.
Now tell me, what I say ♪
He knew
he wanted to do
something different
from the ordinary,
so all the stuff we did,
it was a lot of trial and error.
Once we locked into a groove
he would say,
"That's it, let's record it."
It was just, like,
an amazing way to create music.
I was a background
vocalist in Detroit.
I sang with Aretha Franklin,
George Clinton,
so many Motown artists.
1969, some songs
from Isaac Hayes came up.
One song was "Walk On By."
Dionne Warwick
had recorded this song first.
If you see me
walking down the street ♪
And I start to cry
each time we meet ♪
Walk on by ♪
Foolish pride ♪
I listened to it at home.
I was like, shoot, I'm gonna
have to turn myself
into a music note.
You gave me ♪
I didn't ask you for it ♪
But you gave me ♪
When you said goodbye ♪
I'm like, damn.
So I smoke me a joint.
Turned me right into
a music note.
I called my sister Diane Davis,
and Rose Edwards.
That was the first time
we heard it.
Oh, I loved it.
Oh, my gosh.
Isaac's music
was almost symphonic.
Diane, Rose, and I
singing together,
we could just sound
like one person.
We had one hell of a blend.
All that I have left,
so let me hide ♪
The tears and the sadness ♪
You gave me ♪
When you said good ♪
Oh, when you said good ♪
Bye ♪
Walk on ♪
Isaac was very pleased.
Walk on by ♪
That's it.
That's perfect. Beautiful.
We had those musicians
in there every day,
hour after hour after hour,
and we created 28 albums.
The idea
was simply to establish
massive presence
in the marketplace.
But a lot of people
thought this was craziness.
The cost of manufacturing
that number of records.
But beyond the cost,
how do you promote 28 albums?
When we were working
with Atlantic,
I would always attend
sales meetings
when they would bring in
all of the distributors.
And I marveled at how
Jerry Wexler would stand up
behind a stereo player
and play songs from all
of Atlantic's new releases.
He would inspire
those distributors.
Afterwards,
Jerry Wexler would talk about,
"Ah, I just raised a million
and a half dollars."
I said, "I'm gonna
do the same thing.
But I'm gonna do it
in Memphis."
The rest of the show,
continuing the rest of
the Stax Soul Explosion.
I brought media to Memphis.
We had Record World
and Billboard,
Rolling Stone.
We needed a new label.
So I got the graphic design
person at Paramount Pictures,
and he said "Al,
what is Stax really?"
I said, "It's about good music.
It's about making people
feel good.
That's what Stax--"
He said, "I got it."
Next thing I knew,
he'd come
with that finger snap.
Bam! Stax.
My mind was on one thing:
causing these distributors
to come in here, feel good,
and take this pen,
and write down that order.
That was the only thing
on my mind.
Thank you!
Thank you so very much.
For most people
in the music industry,
this is people in
a backwaters town like Memphis
who have no idea
what they're doing.
People thought,
"This is not going to work."
And you're swingin'
with the Queen
on this beautiful
Monday morning!
Ahh, oh, hear me now ♪
All you fellas
gather 'round me ♪
And let me give you
some good advice ♪
What I'm gonna
gonna ask you now ♪
You'd better think about it
twice ♪
While you're lyin'
cheating on your woman ♪
There is something
you never even thought of ♪
Now tell me, who's
making love to your old lady ♪
While you were out
making love ♪
Hear me now ♪
Now, who's making love
to your old lady ♪
While you were out
making love ♪
I wrote "Who's Making Love."
A song about reaping
what you sow.
When it came out,
women were buying this song
off the rack
like it was golden.
Thinking that a woman ♪
They wanted to go home
and play this for that fella
that was going out cheating,
you know what I mean?
Fellas, let me ask you
somethin' ♪
You better think about this
'cause this could be you.
Never even dreamed of ♪
Now tell me
who's making love ♪
-To your old lady ♪
While you were out
making love ♪
I've had so many men
who would say,
"Woman, you had me
going back home,
turning around so many times."
He'd say, "Every time I would
hear this song on the radio,
I want to go home
and check on my wife."
I'm not trying
to run your life ♪
'Cause it's up to you ♪
Oh, you ♪
Oh, oh, you, you, and you ♪
It just shot up the charts.
I ask this question,
I used to be ♪
Within six weeks,
it had sold its first million.
My old lady ♪
While I was out making love ♪
"Who's Making Love"
was the biggest selling
Stax single
up to that date.
It sold two million copies
before all was said and done.
You're listening to WLIB FM.
Here's another two
for the price of one.
-Isaac Hayes.
I was with some friends
when I heard Hot Buttered Soul
on the radio.
I had completely forgot
about the recording.
Radio's still playing
three-minute singles.
Outta nowhere, they're playing
this amazingly long song
of Isaac's on the radio.
If you see me
walking down the street ♪
And I start to cry ♪
Each time we meet ♪
Then walk on by ♪
Walk on by ♪
You know,
I would go out on stage,
and I was sorta nervous.
"Oh, God."
So I put the shades on
Just let me hide
the tears and the sadness ♪
And it became
like a security blanket.
You put the hurt on me,
you socked it to me, mama ♪
When you said goodbye ♪
People said I had started
a different trend,
big large orchestrations,
big sound.
Oh, mama ♪
All that mattered
was that I had
the opportunity
to express myself.
Walk ♪
Hot Buttered Soul exploded.
Top of the charts
on the R&B market,
adult contemporary,
easy listening,
jazz, and pop.
Said I'm beggin' you,
I'm beggin you to walk on by ♪
Gutted as they were,
demoralized as they were,
they rebuilt this company
and made it a bigger company
than it ever was before.
Smoke ain't makin' me cry,
no, no, no ♪
It's the hurt
you put on me, yeah ♪
We were an old business,
and yet we were a new business.
Things changed,
and they were changing
very fast.
Success forced us
to have accountants,
lawyers, more secretaries,
more offices,
more promotion guys.
We were growing,
and it was not
that same warm family,
every time
you go to the studio
you sit around and everybody
just having a good time.
Al Bell's decisions to expand
have great consequences
as to record sales,
but terrible consequences
in terms of morale.
It got too big.
It got too big,
and I had not as much voice
as I would liked to have.
The company
became corporate.
Mass production,
assembly-line-type feeling.
That whole concept
was so foreign to me,
I just never accepted it.
It was a pain that added
to other pain for me.
I didn't wanna leave.
I had to leave.
I had been Jim's liaison
between him and the musicians.
One, two, three.
And all of a sudden one day,
they got everybody else
making decisions.
He felt that he was
kind of cast aside.
Which is not the case.
Very difficult
for me to leave Stax.
But I knew I had to go.
I had to get rid
of my record shop.
They wanted the space
for their studios,
and, uh
I don't know. I
I don't think they wanted me
around anyway.
My sister Estelle,
she and Al had their problems,
and she didn't feel like she had
enough, you know, input.
Al Bell,
there's just so many things
that he disagreed on.
She'd say,
"We need this kind of music.
We don't need any more
of that kind of music.
We're not controlling our thing
and what our thing
should be about."
I think that may have
been the case with Mrs. Axton.
Couldn't sit and do nothing.
I went back in the office.
I even went in the mail room.
But I decided, well, I'll never
have any influence
in the future.
Had to try
to keep peace, you know.
In the end, I made the decision
to ask
that my sister step down.
Al became vice president
of the company,
and he became
an equal shareholder.
Never, in her whole life,
have I ever seen her
so emotionally broken.
It broke her heart.
It was difficult
for the Stax family.
She provided the maternal
support for the organization
from the beginning.
And then she just
boxed up her things
and walked out the door.
When these people
left the company,
there were discomforts
and feelings
amongst the creative people.
And I must tell you,
I don't mean it in a rude,
cold, or insensitive manner,
but we had to continue pursuing
our business objectives.
I had to look forward.
Nation time, it's nation time.
Get up, Diana Ross.
Get up, Jimmie Brown.
It's nation time, build it.
Get up, muffet dragger.
Get up, Rastus, for real.
It's nation time!
It's nation time! ♪
Get up, come along,
come on ♪
And get up
and get down tonight ♪
The world was changing.
And get down, get up ♪
The problem now
is fundamentally economic.
The solution
is fundamentally economic.
The goal
is fundamentally economic.
There was a growing
sense of Black awareness.
Stax wanted to address
what was happening nationally.
We're one of the few completely
Black-oriented companies
in America today.
Eighty-five to 90%
of our artists are Black.
Our personnel, the same way.
We're researching Black
because that's where
our product is directed.
And we're supported Black.
Remember,
we're talking about
Black consciousness.
We got to build and keep
that dollar in the community.
Do you understand?
We needed someone
to help paint the picture,
to put the package together.
I met a guy in advertising,
Mr. Larry Shaw.
Dad was, at the time,
with an ad agency in Chicago.
His ads were speaking
to Black people.
Speaking in our language.
Hey, aren't you
Frederick Douglass?
Are you gonna
go out into the world
with your hair
looking like that?
Well, Mr. Douglass, you know,
times have changed.
We wear the natural now.
You call that a natural?
That's a mess.
It was uplifting
and culturally relevant.
Man, ain't nobody
gonna believe this!
Very unapologetic.
"This is who we are."
It was just a manifestation
of being Black in America.
He understood
all of the things
that we faced as a people,
and things that could be done
to improve our conditions.
I needed him.
Larry came to Stax Records.
He was ready for us,
and we were ready for him.
We were not apologizing
for who we were.
You could see it in the fabric
of everything
we were doing at Stax.
I know a place ♪
Uh ♪
Ain't nobody cryin' ♪
Ain't nobody worried ♪
No ♪
Ain't no smilin' faces ♪
Mm-mm, no, no ♪
Lyin' to the races ♪
Help me, now ♪
I'll take you there ♪
When I showed up
at Lincoln University,
a Black college
in Pennsylvania,
my classmates acted like
I had just come off
the Underground Railroad.
They'd go,
"Where you from, brother?"
I said "Memphis."
They'd go, "Tennessee?"
It was only basically
three things
that they knew about Memphis:
Dr. King's assassination,
Elvis,
and they knew about Stax.
You would bring your girlfriend
over to the dorm room,
and the universal signal
for your roommate
that work was going on
inside the room
was Isaac on the stereo.
If you had the misfortune
of hearing Isaac
coming up under the door,
find somewhere else to sleep.
By my junior year,
you couldn't go
in a dorm room,
not one
if they had anything
on the wall, it was Isaac.
When Isaac Hayes
walked on the stage,
just set 'em on fire.
People went crazy.
I grew up really poor.
And my grandparents raised me.
I can remember segregation
and sitting
in the back of the bus,
sitting in the crow's nest
in the movie.
Colored and white fountains.
I had to live with that.
Didn't like it.
I started wearing these chains.
What once represented bondage
and captivity to a Black man,
it represents strength.
I wore it with pride.
And it meant something
to Black people.
Ladies and gentlemen
The name, Black Moses,
just caught on like wildfire.
Look at that.
-Look at that.
Is this the start of
a Black Moses movement or what?
It thrust me out
in the national spotlight.
There was a meeting at MGM
and they were talking about,
why not aim a movie to
the Black consumer market
with a Black director,
leading actor,
editor, a Black composer,
and my name was brought up.
Isaac
and Gordon Parks and Al Bell
came in the studio to introduce
the band to the project.
We watched the opening footage
of Shaft
on this little Moviola machine.
"All right,
all y'all gather around me."
So all our heads were pushed
to look at that little screen.
Now the sequence we saw
this morning, Times Square,
panned in off the skyscrapers
along 42nd Street,
over the marquees.
And when Shaft pops up
out of that subway,
that's when this
should really come on.
When Isaac said, "Hey man, we're
gonna start playing right here."
He said, "Clarence," he said,
"Watch Roundtree's feet."
He said, "I want you to give me
some 16ths to that tempo."
So I'd start watching, and I
"Shaft," I mean,
it just was amazing.
That's all I can say.
-Yeah, that's what I wanted.
And the 16ths
was perfect
for what was needed there.
That was great
for that Shaft walk.
-Uh-huh.
-Isaac Hayes, genius.
Shaft.
Hotter than Bond,
cooler than Bullitt.
Rated R.
If you want to see Shaft,
ask your momma.
We advertised
on Black radio,
on Top 40 radio,
on mainstream radio,
in the newspapers,
and we blew up
in the marketplace,
-I gotta tell you.
-Shaft!
After we had won a Grammy,
I wanted to ensure
that Isaac got the creative
recognition that he deserved.
I said, "What we gotta do is,
we gotta figure out a way
to ensure that Isaac Hayes
gets an Oscar nomination."
I mean, that's the ultimate.
But my friend Quincy Jones
told me,
"Al, you're gonna have
a problem
because those guys
that make those nominations, Al,
they're long-haired white guys.
I don't know how
you're gonna do it,
but you're gonna have
to do something
to cause those guys
that make the decisions
to even consider 'Shaft.'"
Shaft is a bad mother
Shut yo' mouth.
I said,
"Let's figure out
what we have to do to appeal
to white people."
I took it on as a challenge.
The first thing we did
was determine the names
of all those people that
would be making that decision
and check what radio stations
did they listen to.
We went in and bought time
on all of those radio stations,
heavy rotation.
And then we got Sammy Davis Jr.
to record "Shaft."
Yeah, he's bad, bad, bad,
bad, bad, bad, bad ♪
Bad, bad, bad, bad,
bad, bad, bad ♪
Bad, bad, bad, bad,
bad, bad, bad ♪
So we had people talking
about it in the industry.
But I kept hearing, "It's Black,
it's Black, it's Black."
So we needed to do
something unique
to try to put
a white perspective on "Shaft."
We found out Pasadena
City College marching band
plays on the Rose Bowl.
So all of a sudden now,
"Shaft" isn't so Black.
And it worked.
So we get a nomination.
Fabulous.
And I ask for Isaac Hayes
to perform on Oscar Awards.
And they said, "No, we don't
we don't have
any available time."
I said, "Listen, if we can't
work out an arrangement
to get Isaac Hayes
on there live, performing,
I'm gonna come and go downstairs
in front of your building,
call a press conference,
and tell these people
in the press
that y'all are racist."
They said, "Al, you wouldn't
do that, would you?"
I said, uh, "Yeah, I'll do that
unless we can work out some
kind of understanding
on getting Isaac Hayes."
"Al, we don't have the budget."
I said,
"We'll pay for everything
that has to be paid for."
"If you'll pay for it, Al,
we'll do it."
Live,
the 44th Annual
Academy Awards presentation.
Isaac came down,
playing his organ
with smoke coming up
all around him.
Who's the Black
private dick ♪
That's a sex machine
to all the chicks? ♪
-Shaft! ♪
-You're damn right ♪
And the winner is
Isaac Hayes,
"Theme From Shaft."
Who is the man
that would risk his neck ♪
For his brother man? ♪
Shaft! ♪
Can you dig it? ♪
I would like to thank
the Academy.
And I would like to thank
the Stax organization
for encouraging me
to score a motion picture.
Most of all,
I would like to thank a lady
who's here with me tonight
because years ago,
her path and her prayers
kept my feet
on the path of righteousness,
and that's my grandmother,
and
this is a thrill for me.
And also, a few days
is her 80th birthday, and I
this is her present from me.
-Thank you.
Isaac is the first
Black songwriter
to ever win an Academy Award,
and it takes him
to a level of superstardom
that probably no other Black
artist had at that moment.
I told Isaac, "I'm gonna
advertise in the newspapers,
I'm gonna advertise
on radio and television
that Isaac Hayes is coming
to give the Oscar
back to the people."
Can you imagine the impact
and effect it had?
Oh my goodness,
you should see the kids
when they would
see Isaac pull up.
Oh man, they would go
come running.
They would be at the fence
looking at the car.
And nobody had ever seen
anything like it before.
When I moved to Memphis
and was writing my book,
I met a gentleman
who worked as a fireman.
He told me how, as a kid,
his mom would walk him to school
and they would go by Stax
every day.
His mother made a point of it,
that this was who you could be.
These were Black people,
Black people
from our neighborhood.
This was success.
Again, I thank
the city of Memphis,
and I'm proud to represent
the city of Memphis,
Black and white.
And we should take it
upon ourselves
to be the model city
which we say we are.
If there be more,
I shall go out
and try to spread the goodwill
and the good word
through the universal language
of music.
-Yeah ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Mm-mm, yeah ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Yeah, respect yourself ♪
You, you, you, you
respect yourself ♪
Di-di-di-di ♪
If you don't
respect yourself ♪
Ain't nobody gonna
give a good cahoot ♪
-Na-na-na-na-na-na ♪
-Respect yourself ♪
Na-na-na-na-na ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Di-di-di-di ♪
Respect yourself ♪
-Na-na-na-na-na ♪
-You, respect yourself ♪
Di-di-di-di ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Na-na-na-na-na ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Di-di-di-di ♪
Respect yourself ♪
-Na-na-na-na-na ♪
-I mean, respect yourself ♪
Is it at once
getting much better
and still hopeless?
I don't want
to be given anything by you.
In the beginning ♪
You really loved me ♪
I was too blind ♪
I couldn't see ♪
When Dr. King was killed,
I thought my world had ended.
But now you've left me ♪
I couldn't produce or create
or do anything for a long time.
Oh, how I cried ♪
We had two great losses.
Otis Redding and The Bar-Kays,
and we had Martin Luther King.
Till your well runs dry ♪
It brings reality into focus.
The reality of living together
in this divided city.
What-what do I say?
You know, what can I say?
We were just
totally, totally devastated.
And not only that,
our masters,
they had been taken from us.
I miss my water ♪
We didn't know what was going
to happen with our career
or with our music.
We had been screwed
without a kiss.
You don't miss your ♪
That's what
it really amounted to.
We had nothing.
We closed down
for several days.
We went through a
a period of-of-of depression,
I guess, is the word.
The whole company.
The attitude
in the industry
was Stax is dead. It's over.
I mean, how could you think
of it any other way?
Those in New York,
they look down.
They think we're dumb bunnies,
if you will,
and they tried to keep us
"in our place."
I didn't accept that though.
I couldn't.
And I got to thinking,
well, wait a minute.
I came to Stax Records
because of that sound
that comes out of Stax.
And it was that sound
that's behind our top artists,
Sam and Dave, Carla Thomas,
Rufus Thomas,
William Bell, Eddie Floyd,
Otis Redding.
This is
my lover's prayer ♪
I realized we no longer
have our catalog
but we still had our people.
I knew what Stax really was.
It was a product of creative
and rare people,
and great, authentic music art.
We weren't
with Atlantic anymore,
but we can rebuild Stax.
I started talking
to Jim and Estelle
about becoming an independent
recorded music business.
We didn't think
we could handle it,
independently.
Even though we had made
a lot of money,
it takes a lot of money
to be independent.
You step out there alone.
Risky business.
Jim said, "Well,
find somebody
to make a deal with us."
I got with a friend of mine
named Clarence Avant.
Clarence was a major broker
in the recorded music industry.
I convinced him
that there was a future here.
Then I said, "Clarence,
I need a deal."
He said, "I think maybe
we can get something done
at Gulf+Western."
Estelle, myself, and Al thought
Gulf+Western
would give us distribution
and the visibility
that we needed.
So we went to New York.
Clarence
made the appointment
with the Chairman of the Board
of Gulf+Western,
Charlie Bluhdorn.
Clarence explained what had
happened with us,
and told him what we needed was
an opportunity and a chance.
Charlie Bluhdorn was saying,
"I don't know.
It seems as though
the Stax period
is over in the marketplace."
And Clarence Avant
got up and said,
"Charlie Bluhdorn,
I wouldn't bring this to you
unless it meant money to you,
and I know you wanna
make money."
He was screaming.
He sold it.
He literally sold it.
And Bluhdorn said,
"Okay, Clarence."
So we made the deal.
Gulf+Western gave us
the money that we needed,
but now we needed
to find something
that we can release
in this marketplace.
Al came to me and said,
"I want you to go
to the tape library,
find something good."
Atlantic didn't own anything
that hadn't been released.
We could take that music
and work with that.
And we came up with a track
of Booker T. & the M.G.'s,
but it needed some work.
I said, "Well, this song sounds
kind of jumpy, islandy.
Why don't we put
a marimba on it?"
I took the marimba and just
played this melody on it,
played through the whole song.
So we put it down, mixed it,
took it to Al Bell,
said, "Here's your song."
I said, "Oh, that limbo
is happening in New York,
Philadelphia, Boston.
And this has that limbo feel
on it with this marimba."
I said, "We're gonna call it
'Soul Limbo.'"
We released it
in the marketplace
and that record took off.
"Soul Limbo" gave me
a bit more confidence
but it was just one song.
We needed a lot more.
So I sat down with a legal pad,
and I started writing the names
of all of the artists.
Booker T. & the M.G.'s,
Albert King, Carla Thomas,
Rufus Thomas.
I started creating concepts
like "boy meets girl."
That's where I could take
all of our male artists
and combine them
with our female artists,
and that would give me
another album.
Then I thought about,
okay, guitars only.
That will make noise
in the marketplace.
And I kept coming up
with albums like that.
Al called a meeting.
He said, "We need to build back
the Stax catalog
and then flood the market
with product.
Let's work hard
to make it happen quickly."
He wanted all of this product,
more product out of one company
than all of the companies
producing rhythm and blues
in the United States
collectively.
The soul explosion.
Al Bell didn't
share all the particulars.
He just generated
the excitement.
He was a master
at generating enthusiasm.
And even though there was
division in my band,
everybody just went to work
like crazy.
"We're doing this."
Hold on. Take two.
One, two
We had "no time to lose."
Al Bell was the drum major.
We were all in.
We went
to the studio around the clock
in a very short period of time.
I'm talking about
three months.
When I came to
Stax, it was starting all over.
But personally, I couldn't have
been at a better place
at a better time.
I started
as a trainee engineer.
It was just an unbelievable
opportunity.
'Course I was thrown
in the fire.
As a guitarist,
they needed songs,
and I was able
to start songwriting.
It was sink or swim.
I was a writer,
and being the only female
was not an easy task.
You know, we're talking about
the sexist '60s here.
Some guys didn't feel like women
could do what they could do,
'cause this is
an all-male environment.
So Al Bell gave me
this great big opportunity.
Good idea. Take one.
We went on a 24-hour,
seven-day-a-week
production basis.
Instead of
four or five songs,
I'm working on four
or five albums
with 10 to 12 songs
on each one of them.
It was like
a nine-to-nine situation.
I'd go home to take a shower
and that'd be about it.
It was just more
than you could handle.
I mean, it was just
wearing us out.
Steve Cropper said, "Al, you're
working the musicians to death."
I said, "No, I'm not, Steven.
I'm working them to life.
We gotta get this done
if we're gonna survive
out here in this music business.
I'm talking about
working them to life."
I like me on a minor third,
and you men with the seventh.
Two, three
Al Bell approached me
and said, "I gotta produce
a lot of albums."
I said, "Can I do an album too?"
He said, "Sure!"
I said, "However I want to?"
"Yes! You got carte blanche."
It was a lot in me
wanted to break out.
I was a songwriter,
I was a producer, an arranger.
But I had aspirations
of being a singer.
I was like a sponge.
I had soaked up a lot
of different influences.
Blues, jazz, pop, classical.
But at that time at Stax,
I didn't have a chance
to express it.
-Rolling. Number one.
Every day around lunchtime,
Isaac would come down the hall.
We were all going to lunch.
And he had a tape up there
that, uh,
he would get you to put on,
and they were these old ballads,
like, uh,
"
for Sentimental Reasons."
You know, it was
Boy, and it was taking
our lunch time.
I'll just take
my time on this thing now.
One, two
And he had this creamy voice
that just
Ohh, yeah ♪
He was honing his craft.
Mm-hm ♪
He'd sing those songs.
He was getting
the voice thing together.
One, two, three, four.
Isaac was
looking for a different sound.
After the plane crash,
the people at Stax asked us,
"What do y'all want to do about
continuing The Bar-Kays?"
I'm looking to my left
and I don't see no Jimmie King.
I'm looking to my right
and I don't see
no Phalon Jones,
my best friend.
Only two people left.
Just myself and Ben Cauley,
the one survivor.
It was an eerie feeling.
But I said,
"We got to carry on."
At 18 years old, I debuted
a new Bar-Kays band.
When I became a member
of the Bar-Kays
as a drummer,
there was Harvey Henderson
on saxophone,
Ben Cauley, James Alexander,
and Michael Toles.
And they got another white kid
to play organ,
Ronnie Gorden.
I saw a great drive
to make a monument
to that tragedy.
We didn't really know
what we was doing,
but what attracted
Isaac to us
was the fearlessness.
He would sit at the piano,
and he'd work
all the different parts out.
He was creative enough
and open enough
to just let you go.
If your idea was something
nice, he'd go along with it.
That gave me a lot of freedom.
Now tell me, what I say ♪
He knew
he wanted to do
something different
from the ordinary,
so all the stuff we did,
it was a lot of trial and error.
Once we locked into a groove
he would say,
"That's it, let's record it."
It was just, like,
an amazing way to create music.
I was a background
vocalist in Detroit.
I sang with Aretha Franklin,
George Clinton,
so many Motown artists.
1969, some songs
from Isaac Hayes came up.
One song was "Walk On By."
Dionne Warwick
had recorded this song first.
If you see me
walking down the street ♪
And I start to cry
each time we meet ♪
Walk on by ♪
Foolish pride ♪
I listened to it at home.
I was like, shoot, I'm gonna
have to turn myself
into a music note.
You gave me ♪
I didn't ask you for it ♪
But you gave me ♪
When you said goodbye ♪
I'm like, damn.
So I smoke me a joint.
Turned me right into
a music note.
I called my sister Diane Davis,
and Rose Edwards.
That was the first time
we heard it.
Oh, I loved it.
Oh, my gosh.
Isaac's music
was almost symphonic.
Diane, Rose, and I
singing together,
we could just sound
like one person.
We had one hell of a blend.
All that I have left,
so let me hide ♪
The tears and the sadness ♪
You gave me ♪
When you said good ♪
Oh, when you said good ♪
Bye ♪
Walk on ♪
Isaac was very pleased.
Walk on by ♪
That's it.
That's perfect. Beautiful.
We had those musicians
in there every day,
hour after hour after hour,
and we created 28 albums.
The idea
was simply to establish
massive presence
in the marketplace.
But a lot of people
thought this was craziness.
The cost of manufacturing
that number of records.
But beyond the cost,
how do you promote 28 albums?
When we were working
with Atlantic,
I would always attend
sales meetings
when they would bring in
all of the distributors.
And I marveled at how
Jerry Wexler would stand up
behind a stereo player
and play songs from all
of Atlantic's new releases.
He would inspire
those distributors.
Afterwards,
Jerry Wexler would talk about,
"Ah, I just raised a million
and a half dollars."
I said, "I'm gonna
do the same thing.
But I'm gonna do it
in Memphis."
The rest of the show,
continuing the rest of
the Stax Soul Explosion.
I brought media to Memphis.
We had Record World
and Billboard,
Rolling Stone.
We needed a new label.
So I got the graphic design
person at Paramount Pictures,
and he said "Al,
what is Stax really?"
I said, "It's about good music.
It's about making people
feel good.
That's what Stax--"
He said, "I got it."
Next thing I knew,
he'd come
with that finger snap.
Bam! Stax.
My mind was on one thing:
causing these distributors
to come in here, feel good,
and take this pen,
and write down that order.
That was the only thing
on my mind.
Thank you!
Thank you so very much.
For most people
in the music industry,
this is people in
a backwaters town like Memphis
who have no idea
what they're doing.
People thought,
"This is not going to work."
And you're swingin'
with the Queen
on this beautiful
Monday morning!
Ahh, oh, hear me now ♪
All you fellas
gather 'round me ♪
And let me give you
some good advice ♪
What I'm gonna
gonna ask you now ♪
You'd better think about it
twice ♪
While you're lyin'
cheating on your woman ♪
There is something
you never even thought of ♪
Now tell me, who's
making love to your old lady ♪
While you were out
making love ♪
Hear me now ♪
Now, who's making love
to your old lady ♪
While you were out
making love ♪
I wrote "Who's Making Love."
A song about reaping
what you sow.
When it came out,
women were buying this song
off the rack
like it was golden.
Thinking that a woman ♪
They wanted to go home
and play this for that fella
that was going out cheating,
you know what I mean?
Fellas, let me ask you
somethin' ♪
You better think about this
'cause this could be you.
Never even dreamed of ♪
Now tell me
who's making love ♪
-To your old lady ♪
While you were out
making love ♪
I've had so many men
who would say,
"Woman, you had me
going back home,
turning around so many times."
He'd say, "Every time I would
hear this song on the radio,
I want to go home
and check on my wife."
I'm not trying
to run your life ♪
'Cause it's up to you ♪
Oh, you ♪
Oh, oh, you, you, and you ♪
It just shot up the charts.
I ask this question,
I used to be ♪
Within six weeks,
it had sold its first million.
My old lady ♪
While I was out making love ♪
"Who's Making Love"
was the biggest selling
Stax single
up to that date.
It sold two million copies
before all was said and done.
You're listening to WLIB FM.
Here's another two
for the price of one.
-Isaac Hayes.
I was with some friends
when I heard Hot Buttered Soul
on the radio.
I had completely forgot
about the recording.
Radio's still playing
three-minute singles.
Outta nowhere, they're playing
this amazingly long song
of Isaac's on the radio.
If you see me
walking down the street ♪
And I start to cry ♪
Each time we meet ♪
Then walk on by ♪
Walk on by ♪
You know,
I would go out on stage,
and I was sorta nervous.
"Oh, God."
So I put the shades on
Just let me hide
the tears and the sadness ♪
And it became
like a security blanket.
You put the hurt on me,
you socked it to me, mama ♪
When you said goodbye ♪
People said I had started
a different trend,
big large orchestrations,
big sound.
Oh, mama ♪
All that mattered
was that I had
the opportunity
to express myself.
Walk ♪
Hot Buttered Soul exploded.
Top of the charts
on the R&B market,
adult contemporary,
easy listening,
jazz, and pop.
Said I'm beggin' you,
I'm beggin you to walk on by ♪
Gutted as they were,
demoralized as they were,
they rebuilt this company
and made it a bigger company
than it ever was before.
Smoke ain't makin' me cry,
no, no, no ♪
It's the hurt
you put on me, yeah ♪
We were an old business,
and yet we were a new business.
Things changed,
and they were changing
very fast.
Success forced us
to have accountants,
lawyers, more secretaries,
more offices,
more promotion guys.
We were growing,
and it was not
that same warm family,
every time
you go to the studio
you sit around and everybody
just having a good time.
Al Bell's decisions to expand
have great consequences
as to record sales,
but terrible consequences
in terms of morale.
It got too big.
It got too big,
and I had not as much voice
as I would liked to have.
The company
became corporate.
Mass production,
assembly-line-type feeling.
That whole concept
was so foreign to me,
I just never accepted it.
It was a pain that added
to other pain for me.
I didn't wanna leave.
I had to leave.
I had been Jim's liaison
between him and the musicians.
One, two, three.
And all of a sudden one day,
they got everybody else
making decisions.
He felt that he was
kind of cast aside.
Which is not the case.
Very difficult
for me to leave Stax.
But I knew I had to go.
I had to get rid
of my record shop.
They wanted the space
for their studios,
and, uh
I don't know. I
I don't think they wanted me
around anyway.
My sister Estelle,
she and Al had their problems,
and she didn't feel like she had
enough, you know, input.
Al Bell,
there's just so many things
that he disagreed on.
She'd say,
"We need this kind of music.
We don't need any more
of that kind of music.
We're not controlling our thing
and what our thing
should be about."
I think that may have
been the case with Mrs. Axton.
Couldn't sit and do nothing.
I went back in the office.
I even went in the mail room.
But I decided, well, I'll never
have any influence
in the future.
Had to try
to keep peace, you know.
In the end, I made the decision
to ask
that my sister step down.
Al became vice president
of the company,
and he became
an equal shareholder.
Never, in her whole life,
have I ever seen her
so emotionally broken.
It broke her heart.
It was difficult
for the Stax family.
She provided the maternal
support for the organization
from the beginning.
And then she just
boxed up her things
and walked out the door.
When these people
left the company,
there were discomforts
and feelings
amongst the creative people.
And I must tell you,
I don't mean it in a rude,
cold, or insensitive manner,
but we had to continue pursuing
our business objectives.
I had to look forward.
Nation time, it's nation time.
Get up, Diana Ross.
Get up, Jimmie Brown.
It's nation time, build it.
Get up, muffet dragger.
Get up, Rastus, for real.
It's nation time!
It's nation time! ♪
Get up, come along,
come on ♪
And get up
and get down tonight ♪
The world was changing.
And get down, get up ♪
The problem now
is fundamentally economic.
The solution
is fundamentally economic.
The goal
is fundamentally economic.
There was a growing
sense of Black awareness.
Stax wanted to address
what was happening nationally.
We're one of the few completely
Black-oriented companies
in America today.
Eighty-five to 90%
of our artists are Black.
Our personnel, the same way.
We're researching Black
because that's where
our product is directed.
And we're supported Black.
Remember,
we're talking about
Black consciousness.
We got to build and keep
that dollar in the community.
Do you understand?
We needed someone
to help paint the picture,
to put the package together.
I met a guy in advertising,
Mr. Larry Shaw.
Dad was, at the time,
with an ad agency in Chicago.
His ads were speaking
to Black people.
Speaking in our language.
Hey, aren't you
Frederick Douglass?
Are you gonna
go out into the world
with your hair
looking like that?
Well, Mr. Douglass, you know,
times have changed.
We wear the natural now.
You call that a natural?
That's a mess.
It was uplifting
and culturally relevant.
Man, ain't nobody
gonna believe this!
Very unapologetic.
"This is who we are."
It was just a manifestation
of being Black in America.
He understood
all of the things
that we faced as a people,
and things that could be done
to improve our conditions.
I needed him.
Larry came to Stax Records.
He was ready for us,
and we were ready for him.
We were not apologizing
for who we were.
You could see it in the fabric
of everything
we were doing at Stax.
I know a place ♪
Uh ♪
Ain't nobody cryin' ♪
Ain't nobody worried ♪
No ♪
Ain't no smilin' faces ♪
Mm-mm, no, no ♪
Lyin' to the races ♪
Help me, now ♪
I'll take you there ♪
When I showed up
at Lincoln University,
a Black college
in Pennsylvania,
my classmates acted like
I had just come off
the Underground Railroad.
They'd go,
"Where you from, brother?"
I said "Memphis."
They'd go, "Tennessee?"
It was only basically
three things
that they knew about Memphis:
Dr. King's assassination,
Elvis,
and they knew about Stax.
You would bring your girlfriend
over to the dorm room,
and the universal signal
for your roommate
that work was going on
inside the room
was Isaac on the stereo.
If you had the misfortune
of hearing Isaac
coming up under the door,
find somewhere else to sleep.
By my junior year,
you couldn't go
in a dorm room,
not one
if they had anything
on the wall, it was Isaac.
When Isaac Hayes
walked on the stage,
just set 'em on fire.
People went crazy.
I grew up really poor.
And my grandparents raised me.
I can remember segregation
and sitting
in the back of the bus,
sitting in the crow's nest
in the movie.
Colored and white fountains.
I had to live with that.
Didn't like it.
I started wearing these chains.
What once represented bondage
and captivity to a Black man,
it represents strength.
I wore it with pride.
And it meant something
to Black people.
Ladies and gentlemen
The name, Black Moses,
just caught on like wildfire.
Look at that.
-Look at that.
Is this the start of
a Black Moses movement or what?
It thrust me out
in the national spotlight.
There was a meeting at MGM
and they were talking about,
why not aim a movie to
the Black consumer market
with a Black director,
leading actor,
editor, a Black composer,
and my name was brought up.
Isaac
and Gordon Parks and Al Bell
came in the studio to introduce
the band to the project.
We watched the opening footage
of Shaft
on this little Moviola machine.
"All right,
all y'all gather around me."
So all our heads were pushed
to look at that little screen.
Now the sequence we saw
this morning, Times Square,
panned in off the skyscrapers
along 42nd Street,
over the marquees.
And when Shaft pops up
out of that subway,
that's when this
should really come on.
When Isaac said, "Hey man, we're
gonna start playing right here."
He said, "Clarence," he said,
"Watch Roundtree's feet."
He said, "I want you to give me
some 16ths to that tempo."
So I'd start watching, and I
"Shaft," I mean,
it just was amazing.
That's all I can say.
-Yeah, that's what I wanted.
And the 16ths
was perfect
for what was needed there.
That was great
for that Shaft walk.
-Uh-huh.
-Isaac Hayes, genius.
Shaft.
Hotter than Bond,
cooler than Bullitt.
Rated R.
If you want to see Shaft,
ask your momma.
We advertised
on Black radio,
on Top 40 radio,
on mainstream radio,
in the newspapers,
and we blew up
in the marketplace,
-I gotta tell you.
-Shaft!
After we had won a Grammy,
I wanted to ensure
that Isaac got the creative
recognition that he deserved.
I said, "What we gotta do is,
we gotta figure out a way
to ensure that Isaac Hayes
gets an Oscar nomination."
I mean, that's the ultimate.
But my friend Quincy Jones
told me,
"Al, you're gonna have
a problem
because those guys
that make those nominations, Al,
they're long-haired white guys.
I don't know how
you're gonna do it,
but you're gonna have
to do something
to cause those guys
that make the decisions
to even consider 'Shaft.'"
Shaft is a bad mother
Shut yo' mouth.
I said,
"Let's figure out
what we have to do to appeal
to white people."
I took it on as a challenge.
The first thing we did
was determine the names
of all those people that
would be making that decision
and check what radio stations
did they listen to.
We went in and bought time
on all of those radio stations,
heavy rotation.
And then we got Sammy Davis Jr.
to record "Shaft."
Yeah, he's bad, bad, bad,
bad, bad, bad, bad ♪
Bad, bad, bad, bad,
bad, bad, bad ♪
Bad, bad, bad, bad,
bad, bad, bad ♪
So we had people talking
about it in the industry.
But I kept hearing, "It's Black,
it's Black, it's Black."
So we needed to do
something unique
to try to put
a white perspective on "Shaft."
We found out Pasadena
City College marching band
plays on the Rose Bowl.
So all of a sudden now,
"Shaft" isn't so Black.
And it worked.
So we get a nomination.
Fabulous.
And I ask for Isaac Hayes
to perform on Oscar Awards.
And they said, "No, we don't
we don't have
any available time."
I said, "Listen, if we can't
work out an arrangement
to get Isaac Hayes
on there live, performing,
I'm gonna come and go downstairs
in front of your building,
call a press conference,
and tell these people
in the press
that y'all are racist."
They said, "Al, you wouldn't
do that, would you?"
I said, uh, "Yeah, I'll do that
unless we can work out some
kind of understanding
on getting Isaac Hayes."
"Al, we don't have the budget."
I said,
"We'll pay for everything
that has to be paid for."
"If you'll pay for it, Al,
we'll do it."
Live,
the 44th Annual
Academy Awards presentation.
Isaac came down,
playing his organ
with smoke coming up
all around him.
Who's the Black
private dick ♪
That's a sex machine
to all the chicks? ♪
-Shaft! ♪
-You're damn right ♪
And the winner is
Isaac Hayes,
"Theme From Shaft."
Who is the man
that would risk his neck ♪
For his brother man? ♪
Shaft! ♪
Can you dig it? ♪
I would like to thank
the Academy.
And I would like to thank
the Stax organization
for encouraging me
to score a motion picture.
Most of all,
I would like to thank a lady
who's here with me tonight
because years ago,
her path and her prayers
kept my feet
on the path of righteousness,
and that's my grandmother,
and
this is a thrill for me.
And also, a few days
is her 80th birthday, and I
this is her present from me.
-Thank you.
Isaac is the first
Black songwriter
to ever win an Academy Award,
and it takes him
to a level of superstardom
that probably no other Black
artist had at that moment.
I told Isaac, "I'm gonna
advertise in the newspapers,
I'm gonna advertise
on radio and television
that Isaac Hayes is coming
to give the Oscar
back to the people."
Can you imagine the impact
and effect it had?
Oh my goodness,
you should see the kids
when they would
see Isaac pull up.
Oh man, they would go
come running.
They would be at the fence
looking at the car.
And nobody had ever seen
anything like it before.
When I moved to Memphis
and was writing my book,
I met a gentleman
who worked as a fireman.
He told me how, as a kid,
his mom would walk him to school
and they would go by Stax
every day.
His mother made a point of it,
that this was who you could be.
These were Black people,
Black people
from our neighborhood.
This was success.
Again, I thank
the city of Memphis,
and I'm proud to represent
the city of Memphis,
Black and white.
And we should take it
upon ourselves
to be the model city
which we say we are.
If there be more,
I shall go out
and try to spread the goodwill
and the good word
through the universal language
of music.
-Yeah ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Mm-mm, yeah ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Yeah, respect yourself ♪
You, you, you, you
respect yourself ♪
Di-di-di-di ♪
If you don't
respect yourself ♪
Ain't nobody gonna
give a good cahoot ♪
-Na-na-na-na-na-na ♪
-Respect yourself ♪
Na-na-na-na-na ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Di-di-di-di ♪
Respect yourself ♪
-Na-na-na-na-na ♪
-You, respect yourself ♪
Di-di-di-di ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Na-na-na-na-na ♪
Respect yourself ♪
Di-di-di-di ♪
Respect yourself ♪
-Na-na-na-na-na ♪
-I mean, respect yourself ♪