Penn Jillette: Every Day is an Atheist Holiday!

THIS IS NOT A HALF-ASSED XMAS SONG.It’s not at all secular Coca-Cola Christmas. This is authentic Christmas jive. The music was either adapted from a song by Handel or ripped off from part of his Messiah . The melody descends right down the major scale on its way to hell, but lands firmly on the saved tonic. When the Sex Pistols’s music descended directly down the scale, the lyrics were “No future,” and those clever boys go back up and start down again a few times until they land on the tonic with “for you.” I’m not going to get too programmatic with “Joy to the World.” It is a descending scale, but it’s major and confident and root landing makes it safe and jubilant. The music is consonant with joy in the world.

But it’s not about joy in the world. It’s about joy to the world, and there is a world of difference there. I’ve read the Bible and I’ve listened carefully to all of the popular Christmas carols. I enjoy listening to lyrics. I’ve listened to the “Theme from Shaft ” a lot and it’s an almost perfect song. It’s recorded with a full orchestra including two wah-wah guitars. Yes, two wah-wahs. You know that the brown-chicken-brown-chicken-brown-chicken part is wah-wah, but the other guitar is wah-wah too. If Beethoven were writing today, he wouldn’t consider an ensemble without two wah-wah guitars to be a proper orchestra.

Isaac Hayes puts that quadruple wah orchestra to use to get the perfect classy, funky, sexy sound. He gives us a few measures of hi-hat for nothing, and the vocal doesn’t even start until we’re knocking on two minutes. The lyrics start out just right with rhetorical questions that are still answered with “Shaft.” It’s lush and inspiring and then… it turns into an Italian air show as the wings come off with one sloppy line. “He’s a complicated man, but no one understands him but his woman.” What? “He’s a complicated man BUT no one understands him but his woman?” Why is the first “but” in that line? How the fuck does that conjunction introduce something contrasting or contrary to what has already been stated? Huh? Are we to believe that complicated men are usually understood by most everyone other than their women? The word should not be “but.” “He’s a complicated man, AND no one understands him but his woman” is not very good either. The only being understood by his woman doesn’t really add information. I guess you could try “He’s a complicated man THEREFORE no one understand him but his woman,” or “He’s a complicated man ERGO no one understands him but his woman,” but those seem a little precious and double the syllables. “Consequently” is way too long—you don’t want a four-syllable word in pop music unless you’ve got the triple single syllable double negative of “can’t get no” to take the curse off your “satisfaction.” “Consequently” is also not exactly the right word. His complication doesn’t directly cause the lack of understanding; they’re really one and the same. It’s just restating the idea to me, which is what’s so wrong with the “but.” “Thus,” “hence” or even “so” would make sense if Isaac needed one syllable there, but I don’t feel the need. I would use nothing. “He’s a complicated man. No one understands him but his woman.” That’s fine, one but, one woman, no woman no cry—very Bob Marley. Do a full stop after “complicated man” and it will strengthen the idea; just let it hang there. Then right into “No one understands him but his woman.” Great.

Just when I’m confused by why a complicated man would normally be understood by people other than his woman, Mr. Hayes throws me another curve. I would have let this one slide by if the sandpaper of his “but” hadn’t sensitized my song safecracking fingertips. For most of the song, the excellent backup singers (one of them Telma Hopkins from Tony Orlando and Dawn—and Tony isn’t a private dick who is a sex machine to all the chicks and that’s damn right) answer Isaac with “Shaft” and then one “shut your mouth” after Isaac almost says “motherfucker.” Hayes explains that he was just talking about Shaft and they affirm that they can dig it, and I’m sure they can, even post–Dawn Telma.

The only other time they depart from just singing the surname “Shaft” is after my hated line with that confusing “but.” Right after that line, they add his given name before his surname and sing, “John Shaft” (no one mentions Shaft’s middle name, which I’ve heard is “Troy”). This means the full line with background becomes, “He’s a complicated man, but no one understands him but his woman, John Shaft.” Once you hear the chorus response of “John Shaft” as an appositive to “his woman,” it’s hard to ever disconnect it again. It certainly makes sense that a complicated African-American man could have a woman named John. Maybe transgendered, or a butch nickname, or named by the Man as some sort of weird racial commentary. What do I know? To me it would be a fine place for them to sing “Mrs. Shaft,” or if that’s not what the people want, maybe “Ms. Shaft,” although if you’re fighting the Man, you might not want to adopt your husband’s name at all. That’s a different generation’s battle and that brings us to my buddy Richie Rich’s suggestion that the line be “He’s a complicated man—no one understands him but his mother, Mrs. Shaft.” The meter fits and it makes sense on every front. If he really is that complicated, it seems like even his woman, John Shaft, might have trouble understanding him, but his mom, Mrs. Shaft, would certainly understand her sex machine son.

I’ve carried on publicly about Shaft almost as much as I’ve carried on about “Frosty the Snowman.” When the remake or reimagining or re-cashing-in of Shaft came out with the groovy leather coat, I was very excited that Isaac Hayes was redoing the song. I figured that Isaac was going to address my little quibbles and finally perfect the song. I attended the opening night and listened carefully, and there it was: “He’s a complicated man, BUT no one understands him but his woman, John Shaft.” What the f—?

Watch your mouth?

I’m just talking about word usage!

I don’t remember anything else from the movie. Right before Isaac died, someone called my radio show and said that Isaac had done a version on some situation comedy where he sang it my way. They played it over the phone, but I can’t find it. I don’t know how high on Isaac’s bucket list pleasing me with his lyrics was, so maybe it was a prank.