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11/23/2004

John Beifuss

'Hustle' it up

Brewer's film blends rap and old school of cool


Although "Hustle & Flow" is certain to earn an R rating for its adult content, Craig Brewer's new made-in-Memphis movie contains no sex scenes.

It does, however, showcase a single passionate kiss.

"That's one of the baddest kisses in show business," observed one of the baddest cats in show business, Charles "Skip" Pitts, the veteran Stax guitarist who played the famous wah-wah guitar licks on Isaac Hayes's Oscar-winning "Theme from Shaft."

Pitts was watching the kiss unfold last Thursday on a video monitor at Ardent Studios in Midtown, where a Stax reunion of sorts was taking place inside Studio A, the site of memorable recording sessions by Big Star, the Replacements, R.E.M. and ZZ Top.

As the kiss continued (the kind of deep smooch known as a "soul kiss," appropriately enough), a bluesy guitar riff recorded by Pitts the day before percolated on the soundtrack, accompanied by the churchy organ sounds of keyboard player Marvell Thomas.

In an adjacent room, playing live to a large, widescreen projection of the scene, legendary trumpeter Ben Cauley -- the only survivor of the 1967 Otis Redding plane crash -- and three other horn players added a triumphant crescendo of brass to the rhythm track.

"I love what I did," said Pitts, 57, of his contribution to the soundtrack. "It feels fresh -- very fresh, man."

Fresh, yes -- yet also intended to evoke the heyday of soul music's most creative era, an era in which Memphis reached its peak as a commercial recording center.

"To have these classic musicians is the icing on the cake to shooting a little movie in Memphis," said filmmaker John ("Boyz N the Hood") Singleton, executive producer of "Hustle & Flow." "You couldn't do it anywhere else in the world."

Set in the underground, inner-city rap culture of Memphis, "Hustle & Flow," which likely will be released next year, is scheduled to feature new music by Al Kapone, Juicy "J," Nasty Nardo, Yo Gotti and possibly other local hip-hop artists.

But the movie also will feature a complementary nonrap soundtrack inspired, in part, by the funky-jazzy-soulful music created by such composers as Hayes, Curtis Mayfield and Lalo Schifrin for the gritty urban dramas and "blaxploitation" films of the '70s.

The composer of the music that will accompany dramatic and comic action in "Hustle & Flow" is Memphis musician Scott Bomar, 30, a longtime force on the local club and recording scene (and a cousin to Justin Timberlake). Brewer's film marks Bomar's debut as a soundtrack composer, although his former band, Impala, scored "Teenage Tupelo" (1995), a readymade cult film by Memphis director John Michael McCarthy.

Singleton and "Hustle & Flow" producer Stephanie Allain gave Bomar their blessing after hearing his work as bass player and band leader with the Bo-Keys, a retro-soul instrumental combo inspired by such Stax bands as Booker T. & the MGs, the Mar-Keys and the Bar-Kays.

To create the Bo-Keys (who have released one album to date, "The Royal Sessions"), Bomar reunited some of Stax's most famous session musicians and combined them with some younger players; the reunion continued last week at Ardent during two days of soundtrack recording.

In addition to Pitts, Thomas and Cauley, Stax drummer Willie Hall, 54, is playing on the soundtrack. At Stax, Hall played with Hayes, who dropped by the recording sessions last week. Apparently, he approved: "You've all been blessed by Moses," said the performer known as "the Black Moses."

Aside from Cauley, 57, the horn players are relatively young. They included Kirk Smothers, 41, on baritone sax, tenor sax and flute; Derrick Williams, 40, on tenor and alto sax; and Bo-Key Marc Franklin, 29, on trumpet. Franklin also wrote the horn charts for the sessions.

Other musicians contributing to the soundtrack were percussionist Hector Diaz, drummer Paul Buchignani and Bomar himself, who played bass as well as guitar and keyboards. In addition, local hip-hop experimentalists DJ Redeye Jedi of the Tunnel Clones and Empee of Kontrast will remix some of Bomar's soundtrack recordings.

Singleton said Bomar was "a groove to work with," while Cauley called the young band leader "a nice cat."

Brewer first talked to Bomar about composing the soundtrack to "Hustle" almost two years ago, when the movie was still just a dream in the writer-director's mind. Brewer was a fan of Bomar's work, and he knew the musician was steeped in Memphis soul.

Bomar read the script, and "it just completely captured what it was like to make music with your friends. It captured the fun, it captured the energy, it captured the idea of people coming together and having faith that they can create something worthwhile."

Brewer had strong ideas about what type of music he wanted in almost every scene of the film. "He would tell me what he heard in his head, and I would find the chords," said Bomar, who visited the set during shooting this summer, "to get the vibe and feel" of the film. Bomar created demo recordings for the soundtrack sessions.

These ideas were honed into shape with the help of the musicians, Ardent engineer Matt Martone and music editor Shie Rozow, 32, of Los Angeles, who previously worked with Singleton on "2 Fast 2 Furious."

Or, as Pitts explained of Bomar's methods: "He put down some licks, according to the way he knows I can play, and then I added some parts that I felt."

Rozow -- music editor on the hit TV series "Desperate Housewives," and an assistant music editor on such blockbusters as "Chicago" and "Spider-Man 2" -- was necessary to the process because of his experience in recording for films, which requires precision timing in terms of matching picture to sound.

For instance, he advised Bomar on adjusting the tempos of some compositions to fit the time allotted for a scene.

During the recording sessions, the musicians played live to a projected image of the film, so they could see the action they were accompanying. With the help of a computer, Rozow matched and edited the music to the image as it was recorded.

Bomar said "Hustle & Flow" might be the right movie for the right time. "The climate of the country is very similar now to what it was in the blaxploitation era," he said, citing the current atmosphere of war and political divisiveness. "So, conceptually, it makes sense that a movie set in a modern time would contain music that reminds us of Memphis's past."

But whether it's old school soul or cutting-edge crunk, music is "a sign of the times," Hall said. "It's like a snowball rolling downhill -- it keeps growing, and you can't stop it. That's the beauty of it."