Isaac Hayes Short Stax and Albert King Short Stax deliver a solid introduction to the joys of each particular artist.

Hayes’ Short Stax features his slow grind on the Jackson 5ive hit “Never Can Say Goodbye,” originally an April 1971 single then subsequently featured in its full-length splendor as the opening track for Hayes’ historic Black Moses album. Hayes sounds supremely pained for someone who can’t say goodbye and later recalled, “I was going through some emotional turmoil. You can tell by the tunes on that album. I was going through a breakup of my marriage. That’s the only way I could express myself, cry out through that.”

It includes the “Theme from Shaft” single that rose to #2 R&B, #1 Pop on the singles charts, won three Grammy Awards and copped the Academy Award for Best Song from a motion picture, the first such honor for an African-American composer. It’s rounded out by “Run Fay Run,” a funky li’l instrumental rocked hard by congas and horns and composed by Hayes as part of the score for the film Tough Guys, in which he also performed a starring role. (Tough Guys was subsequently paired with Hayes’ soundtrack to Truck Turner and released on CD in 1993.)

Just like Hayes’ extended spoken introductions and interludes became his soul music signature, Albert King’s blues told stories that held so much pain you just had to smile. It’s not included here, but the title of King’s famous single “Crosscut Saw” creates the perfect image for the sound of his shredding, toothsome electric blues lead guitar.

So who better to instruct this swivel-hipped primer “That’s What the Blues Is All About” with the Bar-Kays, Memphis Horns and Isaac Hayes Movement all laying down hot buttered blues (originally released on his 1974 Stax album I Want to Get Funky)? You also get the single edit of King’s trademark “I’ll Play the Blues for You,” the title track of his landmark ‘72 album that has since been enshrined in the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame.

“Answer to the Laundromat Blues” is a “reply” to King’s own “Laundromat Blues,” a hit 1966 “my woman’s cheating on me with her new man down at the laundromat” single that appeared on I’ll Play the Blues for You. Though his electric guitar scalds and stings like hot soapy water in your eyes, King’s opening lecture is nothing short of hilarious:

“This number is being especially played and dedicated to all of the women from all of the men. You see, you girls had a good thing going but we’re hip to ya now. You take two or three pieces and go down to the laundromat and it takes you eight hours to wash ‘em. No good. We’re gonna buy you washers and dryers and we’re gonna put you at home in the basement. Then we’re gonna kick the door down that goes to the basement, where we can hear the washer when it stops. And baby, baby, baby, when that washer stops you’d better be through, or you’d better have a darn good explanation…”

My, how times have changed! The second part of King’s rap essentially promises (in detail) a whuppin’ to the woman who steps out of line, and certainly sounds politically incorrect these days. Unless, of course, King was recording as a gangsta rappah…