This new edition, published by Rhino Records, has quite a few special features. First, the booklets are much more interesting now. We have a lot of photos, all the lyrics for every song, and special commentaries by The Doors’ original producer Bruce Botnick and, in every album, a different music-journalist/Doors’ fan. The commentaries by Botnick are quite insightful and help the listener to notice the changes, and the words by the journalists are always good pieces of music history and information.

 

But the most special new feature is, of course, the sound. All the albums have been remixed with the participation of the band’s remaining members (Densmore, Krieger, Manzarek) and taken directly from the original analog tapes. The sound is crisp, detailed and better than ever. There are also enhancements like the possibility to hear sounds and details that weren’t available in the original LP’s and in the older CD versions. A few guitar chords here, a few keyboard effects there, a lot of minor things make their appearance for the first time. In the vocal department, we finally get the original, full version of all songs, like in “Break on through”, where we can at last hear Morrison singing “she gets high, she gets high” instead of “she gets, she gets” due to original censorship (or fear thereof). In “The End”, near the end, we can hear Morrison singing rhythmical “Kill Kill, f**k f**k” while the band is playing the faster section, a feature that could originally be heard in the soundtrack of APOCALYPSE NOW, that masterpiece of Cinema by Francis Ford Coppola. The final, and probably the most important change, is in the <b>speed</b> of the album. Botnick in his introduction announces that, after musicological research, it was determined that the music in the LP’s and CD’s that we have loved for the last 40 years since THE DOORS was originally recorded a notch faster, thus altering some chords and harmonies. From the booklet: “the verse chords in ‘Light My Fire’ should be an alternation of A minor and F-sharp minor. (…) in the original releases, the chords are A-flat minor and F-minor” (Botnick, 2006). The difference is not strikingly noticeable except maybe for “Light My Fire”, where you can easily detect that the song now sounds, to use a word Morrison loved, <i>higher</i>. The song clocks in at 6:50 minutes, the intended length of the original track as played by The Doors, as opposed to the 7:05 minute-version we have been listening since the album was published.

 

Check it out!!!!!

 

 

 

I only had a compilation before, but I plan on getting all remaining four reissues.

 

I am somehow satisfied with the sound of the rest five albums. So, the question is -- to buy the new remasters or not? If I hadn't those CDs I'd buy the new serie, without any doubts. The Doors is one of my favourite groups. And I am a person who does buy remasters (well, some of them). But I think I'll refrain from this.

 

Anyway, however, the very fact of the new serie of remasters with an improved sound and with bonus tracks (in case they do bring some additional information -- is this really the case?) is great, especially when we're speaking about such a band like The Doors, which seems not to be too popular, to say the least, in these days.

 

Eugene

Only two missing now, The Soft Parade and Morisson Hotel.

 

They're really cheap, prices range from 6,99 canadian dollars for The Soft Parade to 9,99$ for most of the rest.  And they are really worth it, not only because of the bonus tracks, but mostly because of the sound and the addition of parts that didn't make the final mix of the album back then(pianos, etc.), which add a lot to the songs that were given this treatment (not too many though) while not crashing with the version you might have in your cranial jukebox.