With over a half-century perspective on The Doors’ The Soft Parade, the group’s fourth studio album (released 7/18/69) sounds even more contrived than at the time of its release. And as successor to the prior year’s Waiting For The Sun, it might be fair to say that, by the time of the LP’s original issue, the quartet had frittered away most (or all) the credibility it had generated with its debut and a superior followup in the form of 1967’s Strange Days.
It’s a testament to how misconceived and clumsily executed is The Soft Parade that its 50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition content cannot realistically be reconfigured into a more positive and cogent statement. And that’s even with remixes and overdubs from guitarist Robbie Krieger on all but one of the original selections. Meanwhile, the extensive but otherwise predictable instrumentation in the form of Paul Harris’ strings and horns (lifted for the aforementioned overdubs) stands as a metaphor for the lack of inspiration afflicting the quartet in 1968 and 1969.
Having exhausted his backlog of originals, vocalist/composer Jim Morrison found little inspiration to compose new material. And with the legal fallout from that fateful night in Miami beginning to weigh heavily on the frontman, his continuing descent into substance abuse only furthered his disenchantment with his celebrity status arising from the Doors’ mainstream popularity. Thus, even as “Shaman’s Blues” and the title track stand as examples of the lead singer’s predilection for poetic symbolism, they arrived showing more than a few signs of the overwrought pretension(s) he could bring to such work.
In contrast to that generally familiar approach, the output from the aforementioned co-founder and fretboard for the group resulted in some material that was decidedly atypical of the style the quartet had solidified on its first two long-players (though Krieger had been involved in earlier compositions, including, most significantly, “Light My Fire”). In fact, “Runnin Blue” (which the author sang) and “Do It” only added to the diffuse impact of the album, even with the jarring likes of its nearly nine-minute title song as the conclusion.
All those creative factors and more moved producer Paul A. Rothchild to experiment with extravagant production on The Soft Parade. And, to be fair to him and the band itself, the use of intricate sonic arrangements had become de rigueur prior to the recording of this LP, thanks largely to The Beatles’ Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band of 1967. Such was that approach the Doors used more organically (and with more potency) on their aforementioned second long-player, albeit minus the utterly conventional orchestral charts.
The conflicting agendas subsequently hampered the one-two punch of the first numbers taped for The Soft Parade. “Wishful Sinful,” for instance, received a backdrop of strings that failed to conjure a tranquil counterpoint to the vivid visceral atmosphere of its counterpart, “Wild Child.” Similarly, saccharine touches reappeared in “Touch Me,” effectively dampening the erotic undercurrent of the lyrics.
Still, saxophonist Curtis Amy’s blistering solo there belied the overly polite arrangement and lyrics. Deeply evocative of the halcyon days of West Coast cool jazz, the horn man’s spotlight, combined with the furious drive of drummer John Densmore toward the end of the performance, ignited a flash of the fiery musicianship of the Doors, as contained in archive releases of recent vintage Live At The Matrix 1967: The Original Masters, Live in Bakersfield August 21, 1970, and Live at Konserthuset, Stockholm September 20, 1968.
Ever-astute journalist David Fricke’s essay in the expanded half-century milestone package of The Soft Parade graphically conjures up the paradox of vibrancy and lack of purpose that was the Doors at the end of the Sixties. Perhaps even more illuminating, however, is the insight of technical expert Bruce Botnick; his slight removal from the direct proceedings as they happened, combined with his intimate knowledge of the music, affords him (and his prose) an unusual clarity.
Still, the benefit of hindsight on this this Doors record is as distinctly limited as its overall commercial success. And even though the virtually unanimous critical dismissal of the effort has softened only slightly over the years, the return to basics for the foursome, not surprisingly, was a fait accompli, appearing just six months later in the form of Morrison Hotel. Still, even with the extended perspective of fifty-five years, the artistic success of that project could not have prepared the world for ‘The Lizard King”s ostensible departure from the Doors– following 1971’s L.A. Woman–much less his untimely passing a little over two months after its release in the spring of that same year.
