ZapTown

Willie Hutch
The Mack
1973 – Motown

Origin: Los Angeles, California
Style: R&B

In a time when music was just as important as the films they represented, Willie Hutch was at the top of his game at the beginning of his game. Next to the Shaft theme song, “Brother’s Gonna Work It Out” is recognized as one of the top funk songs in a blaxploitation film. In the late ‘90s, The Chemical Brothers gave the song a mixed up resurrection on the DJ album of the same title, which stemmed from a BBC Radio 1 performance called “The Anti-Nazi Mix.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_1_Anti-Nazi_Mix)

Thanks to the band Sisters Love, who made a cameo in the film — they are the all female soul act at the “Playas Convention” — their manager suggested that Willie Hutch score the film. Hutch had some experience with Motown from the release Fully Exposed, but he had never composed a soundtrack before.

So Hutch gathered an extensive cast of band members, an eight-piece horn section and a massive string section. From the beginning jive sound of “Vampin,” you know this is not an ordinary soundtrack. Influenced by Quincy Jones, Hutch uses a more orchestrated approach to the music than straight up funk.

For example “Theme of the Mack” is a beautiful piece of soul with a sax solo that heats up like a fireplace and a guitar that flickers like candlelight.

Without the film, you may not realize that “Mack’s Stroll” captures the essence of ghetto life and a battle between good and evil, the pusher and pimp with liberation. But “The Getaway (Chase Scene)” is perfectly clear (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAo9nlBzYJY).

Despite obvious song correlations with the film, “Slick” is Richard Pryor’s (Slick is his character name) theme song to the film, the joy of this release is that you do not need the movie to get down with this soundtrack. It’s more like the movie needs the soundtrack to exist.

And by the end of it all, as the credits begin to roll, the moment has arrived, and the tom thumping intro of “Brother’s Gonna Work It Out” begins. It’s quite clever to make the outro theme to the film different from the intro. And not another song from the album has made such a higher impression as this song.

Cross-Reference: Quincy Jones, Sisters Love, Curtis Mayfield