MAYFIELD, CURTIS

Curtis Mayfield's venture into blaxploitation scoring - Super Fly - was *the* film responsible for a certain, now-entrenched association: fast, chicken-picking funk music and car chases. Directed by Minneapolis titan Gordon Parks Jr, the film follows the New York pimping and dope pushing scene, as our protagonist Youngblood Priest attempts to escape the underworld drug trade. Mayfield's score, now reissued on vinyl through Rhino, is a morally clear-eyed foil to the film's glossy cocaine-powdered superfice. Lead song 'Freddie's Dead', for instance, presents angel's breath soul against bombastic, eulogistic drum struts, and lyrics urging universal understanding for difficult people, hard as this may be.