That ‘Truck Turner’ is a Baaad…..
July 12th, 2008 byIsaac Hayes’ soundtrack to Truck Turner, in which he also played the starring role, comprises the second half of this Double Feature. The theme song says it all, or at least most of it: “There’s some dudes in a bar with busted heads and broken jaws. Who hit ‘em?,” Ike asks. To which the Hot Buttered Soul Unlimited female vocalists reply, “Truck Turner.” “There’s some pimps in their graves - who blew those pimps away?” We get the same reply, “Truck Turner.” That’s pretty much your plot synopsis, right there.
Hayes’ instrumentation has proven more enduring if not worthwhile than the film it scores. “Blue’s Crib” is full of cool, a soul-funk groove sharply edged with guitar chords, like George Benson low-riding with War on a downtown Saturday night. This neatly segues into “Driving in the Sun,” a guitar melody so cleverly crafted that the hook nearly sounds like someone verbalizing its title.
Fans of soul-funk-jazz fusion artists such as Roy Ayers or Mandrill might enjoy the electric, extended guitar and keyboard jam of “Breakthrough.” And what a dream come true it must have been for Hayes to fantasize about “A House Full of Girls” on commission. But the hard-charging “Pursuit of the Pimpmobile” provides the action-packed funk fulcrum for the entire soundtrack, as it melts the string sound from an Aaron Spelling television production with the fire of Afro-Cuban percussion.




























