Isaac Hayes was Stax Records' secret weapon before he was its biggest star. He and David Porter wrote Soul Man and Hold On I'm Coming for Sam & Dave, but Hayes had a different idea for his own career: symphonic soul, songs that took their time, a baritone voice that narrated its way through the grooves like a man who'd seen things. Hot Buttered Soul changed everything.

Four songs. That's all Hot Buttered Soul had. Four songs, each one a landscape: strings, horns, wah-wah guitar, and Hayes's voice arriving late and leaving early. He wore gold chains. He shaved his head. He won an Oscar for the Theme from Shaft -- the first Black composer to win Best Original Song. He showed up to the ceremony in a tuxedo made of gold links.

Then he became the voice of Chef on South Park, quit South Park over the Scientology episode, and somehow all of it made sense. Isaac Hayes was never one thing. He was a songwriter, a producer, a vocalist, an actor, a cultural figure who lived at the intersection of Black cool and Black ambition. The gold chains were never an affectation. They were armor.

Isaac Hayes wrote Soul Man for Sam & Dave, then stepped up and made Hot Buttered Soul. Won an Oscar for Shaft. Became the voice of Chef. Black Moses. A man of multitudes.