The Doors - The Soft Parade

The best part is when Jim Morrison starts talking about the "best part of the trip" during the title track. It's fucking hilarious. Jim...why don't you smoke another joint. I actually like this record. I think it's pretty much considered The Door's worst album and I can kinda understand why. The whole horns and strings thing is kinda weird, but I think it really works on some tracks. The title track for example is a great song. It gets kinda strange at times like Burt Bacharach was in the studio or something. The same is true for Tell All The People. But I really like the horns and Morrison's voice sounds great. I think he's a really under-rated crooner. If he had lived longer he could have evolved into Frank Sinatra's opening act. I can see him up there in a power blue velvet tux doing lounge version of Light My Fire and People Are Strange. Now I would have paid a lot of money to see that. But back to The Soft Parade. The hit was Touch Me. Not a great song because of it's super gay chorus, but it's got a good energy and I think the horns work well on it. The other high point on this record is Wild Child. Morrison's voice sound particularly raw on this one and it's got a catchy riff. I think the low point on this record is Wishful Sinful. It pretty much defines "filler" for The Doors. It's just terrible. But the real high point on this record is the eight and a half minute title track. It's got lots of that great Morrison nonsense poetry, like that crap at the beginning about petitioning the Lord with prayer. What the fuck? I guess it was the 60's and making sense was the last thing on every body's drug addled mind. Fine with me. It's a good song, often with hilarious results. The aforementioned "best part of the trip", and other great lyrics such as, "Peppermint, miniskirts, chocolate candy/Champion sax and a girl named Sandy", or "When all else fails/We can whip the horse's eyes/And make them sleep/And cry". If it weren't for Leonard Cohen Morrison might have been the greatest comedian of his generation.