Waiting for the Sun & The Soft Parade

IMO In almost every case I find that adding string/horn arrangements to something that is needing a boost is little more than turd polish.

 

Interesting that both these albums are singled out (and often critiqued the most) as both of them are my two favorites by the group, for somewhat differing reasons. Maybe that says something more about me?

Not that I have anything against the "Widely Applauded Doors Albums". The debut, Strange Days, Morrison Hotel and, especially, LA Woman, are all obviously integral parts of the canon.

I guess that I just see "Waiting For The Sun" and "The Soft Parade" to be the most indicative snapshots of why the Doors were "The Doors". Or at least the albums that are most indicative of why I enjoy them. There are a few moments on the other albums that I sometimes lose interest or focus on. But I can play these two anytime and enjoy each and every track.

 

I was a Doors obsessive at age 12 and they are perhaps the only band I used to totally love that I only grudgingly like a little bit now. And these middle two are my go-tos, I love the kitschy baroque sounds of that era of smart pop-rock and I definitely DON'T like this band trying to be super bluesy, and in general like them better when they are being slight and lovely then making big heavy statements. (That said, title track of Soft Parade to me is the most successfully interesting of their big heavy statements, tho it MIGHT be because they didn't wear me out on classic rock radio.) The whole SP lp is just so fun, pretty, silly, energetic, not a track on it I don't smile when I hear, only Doors LP I can say that of.

 

I'm the very same. I like my Doors moody but flowery, rather than bluesy. It's the reason that something like "Riders On The Storm" is arguably my all-time favorite Doors song, but I'm not as big a fan of things like "The Changeling" or "Crawling King Snake".

I think Morrison, as a poet, was at his most definitive when he was a bit exotic, dreamy, mystical and subdued. It was more charismatic anyway. Thus the reason I find albums like "Waiting For The Sun" or "The Soft Parade" to be more...true...to what I love about the group. I start to get a little...tuned out...after awhile if the whole album just turns into varying versions of "Roadhouse Blues", so to speak. Like almost all artists, I need that counter balance of some exoticness or balladry.

 

Me too. The only problem for me is, I tend to want to follow the bouncing ball and drink along.

 

‘Waiting for the Sun’ is my least favourite of the six Morrison-era Doors albums. Side one is pretty great, but side two collects all of their most forgettable songs in one spot. ‘The Soft Parade’ I like more — damn, do I ever love that title track! — but I still rank it below the other four. ‘L.A. Woman’ is my favourite overall.

 

THE MONK BOUGHT LUNCH. ha ha ! He Bought a little.

That is all I can add.

 

My cousin and I would get high and listen to my Doors 2CD best of. I also had fairly beat-up LPs that I bought at flea markets. When "Waiting for the Sun" would play on the CD, I would grab my WFTS LP and use my finger to do a bouncing ball to each word on the cover as Jim sang them. And I would sit there just bouncing on "Wai-ting" over and over for those parts. Good times. I can never hear that song without picturing him laughing like it was the funniest thing ever.

 

I'd say it was time for a refresher course...

 

Speaking of going song by song -- Who else but the Doors could get away with a song like, the river knows and then following it with, five to one!!! Don't look now, but you purist Rock and Roller's just got slipped some fusion

The whole album is fusion. I love it!

 

Well said. I love how the album closes with that contrasting one-two punch. It's yet another reason why the album is my favorite. Only in the 60's!

 

The Soft Parade's title track is their greatest studio epic. It could have been "Celebration of the Lizard," but we all know how that worked out.

I love all of the albums. I have no idea why these two get passed over often.

 

I really like the 40th Anniversary Edition CD of Waiting For The Sun with the bonus tracks including Celebration of the Lizard.
I think that had they included that track on the original album, the album would have been a masterpiece.

 

Why is Soft Parade heavily criticized?

Tell all the people is ok, but kinda cheesy.

Do it and Easy Ride, bleh. These are throw-away songs. Should never have been recorded. We're doodling some music; now let's add even crappier, meaningless/confusing lyrics to them! - Yikes!

I do have to acknowledge the completely unexpected, hardcore psychedelic-funk break in The song, The Soft Parade, though. Where did that come from?! Wish they would've tapped into that creativity a bit more on this album and spread it around.

What a mess!

 

Yeah but I still like it.

 

Waiting For The Sun IS the summer of '68 to me. I bought it soon after it was released & played it constantly into the fall. Many years later I found my wife-t0-be had a similar experience. When The Soft Parade came out the following summer my friend Barney Miller (his real name, and this was before the TV show) bought it & raved about its greatness, but to me it sounded partly like an attempt to be super-commercial & partly a sort of parody of the "heavy" side of the band, with a goofy Krieger vocal thrown in. I still enjoyed it, but it didn't cast a spell the way Waiting For The Sun had done.

 

Soft Parade is arguably the only flawed album in their career with Morrison on the line-up.

Still, it is a pretty good album. Wishful Sinful, Touch Me, Soft Parade, Wild Child... that stuff is LIGHT YEARS AWAY from their peers. They were so gritty and inventive, its unbelievable.

The Doors was my "first" love as a kid. The first band that knocked me out of myself and into music. I love them.

 

Who Scared You is what it's missing. How do you leave that one off...? Would've been one of the anchors.

Still, Wishful Sinful, Wild Child, Touch Me, and the title track (sans the Petition intro) are enough goodies to entice me. I like Tell All the People, too, but guess I can see where you'd detect a cheese factor.

 

Even if neither is a likely candidate for "best" Doors album, it's still my favorite period of the Doors (their most psychedelic) and Waiting For the Sun is my personal favorite album of theirs. Love their more baroque stuff.

 

A friend who attended the Air Force Academy blasted the intro out his dorm window as cadets and parents walked through the immediate grounds on the way to church, so ya, I have a soft spot for it, especially the spoken intro.

"You cannot petition the Lord with prayer!"

Tell All The People is a departure and I understand their need to expand. The horns rocked me the first time I heard it. Bought both when they were released in the late 60's and the context to the music of the times made them instant classics for me.

Time to put on both for an appreciation listen, especially after all the bad and good reviews here.

And the rest of the album including the long title song, with its various "movements", is like a rock symphony. Love the album, and Waiting For The Sun also. Not their highest points, but by all standards, pretty damn fine. Just don't hold them up to their first two for comparison, and their last two, and you'll be fine...

 

I haven't read the rest of the thread. And of course, I have no real way of judging whether my assessment of others' views is correct.

But generally, I think I like Waiting for the Sun a lot more than many do, and like The Soft Parade a lot less than many do.

I agree that adding "Who Scared You" to The Soft Parade would have improved things somewhat — but not nearly enough.

 

Yes he did.

 

Plugging my old thread here which seems relevant to this side discussion:

"Who Scared You"--where would you have sequenced this Doors song?