PROTO-PROG

Released in the same year as Shazam but what a difference. No more 60's psychedelia and pop, this is heavier and more adventureous output. On one hand, the addition of Lynne to the line-up and increase of brass instrumentation strongly attracts my attention here, on the other hand, high number of proto rock'n'roll'/metal numbers puts me off. The attempt to blend cello/oboe/wind instruments with ultra-heavy rock'n'roll tracks doesn't blend well. "What" used to be my favourite track although it is a bit repetitive, but the first track, then Brontosaurus and the second Lynne's number are also worth the admission. If you are into ELO and/or progressive side of the Move, you should start here.

A powerful funky acid drenched record, Band Of Gypsys may eclipse the three studio albums for me, the album wastes no time with it starting off with a funky grove that progressively gets more acid drenched eventually turning into a song that could easily fit on a Funkadelic record with it's wild vocals and I must say the drumming on not only this song but the whole album is just amazing and definitely gives Mitch Mitchell a run for his money (although I love both haha) the next track is the infamous Machine Gun, and wow I'm completely blown away by it, easily one of the greatest achievements in rock music, Hendrix makes the guitar just wail and wail and the bass is so good its kind of bouncy and fills in the spaces perfectly and the drumming is again just something else then near the eight minute mark there's these background vocals that complement the song so so much and then near the ten minute mark there's Billy Cox's amazing vocals there's so many different parts of the song where I'm like "thats my favorite wait no thats my favorite" and honestly Machine Gun has taken the spot as my favorite Hendrix song. While the first side of the album is essentially acid funk rock, the second side is more R&B oriented the next song is a Buddy Miles cut its very much an R&B song which I love (I grew up listening to that kind of music after all) again the drumming is just on point it's so good and Jimi's guitar just dances with the wah pedal on this one. Power To Love is a rocking tune it opens with an amazing guitar solo, the album ends with Message To Love and We Gotta Live Together, not my favorite songs off the album but still amazing nonetheless, again they blend R&B with acid rock and the instrumentation is phenomenal overall this is an ESSENTIAL addition to any music collection in general

Perhaps overall the best Move album. It has the right balance of accessibility and experimentation to stay radio friendly. The album rocks harder than their debut album but doesn't have the rock'n'roll excesses of "Looking on". "Hello Susie" is a pleasant psychedelic hard rocker followed by a more conventional very British "Beautiful daughter". "Cherry Blossom Clinic Revisited" has experimental instrumentation but gets a bit far-fetched with a classical music rip-off. "Fields of people" is a great psychedelia filled epics. The last two original album tracks are still lengthy but pale a bit in comparison with the first half. The bonus tracks are not that good and because it's all covers, they spoil the cohesiveness of the album. This is to the recommended Move album to start with.

"Magical Mystery Tour" was a slight return to more accessible Beatles music even though it remained rooted in psychedelia and some studio trickery. It is mainly McCartney who penned more conventional pop tunes. Melody was in the forefront, no matter how distant from rock'n'roll his output has gotten by 1968. Clever arrangements, brilliant songwriting seconded by fantastic vocals mark his contribution. Lennon balances McCartney's commercialism and warmth by some of the most experimental music ever created by the Beatles. The tandem clearly elevates the album to meet the standard exceptional quality by Beatles totally overshadowing the undistinguished Harrison and Starr. Harrison guitar was never as buried as on "Magical Mystery Tour" with keyboards, brass instruments being more dominant. Starr's drumming appears uninspired to me and it merely supports his colleagues. The title track is filled with McCartney's enthusiasm, sunny chorus and brilliant coda. Perhaps the only song which can be attributed "rock music".

The poignant "The fool on the hill" is one of the most melancholic McCartney's numbers ever and it is will coupled with the returning flute solo. "Flying" is a curious if not very memorable piece witch rock'n'n'roll chord structure but really untypical vocal harmonies, perhaps heavily mixed in the recording panel. "Blue jay way" is a retreat from typical Indian influenced Harrison material instead focusing on heavy psychedelia and Hammond organ. I like the chord sequence untypical for pop/rock songs. "Your mother should know" is a well balanced pop track (neither melancholic neither sunny to me) with a strong piano addition, particularly during the instrumental intermezzo. "I am the walrus" (together with "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane") belongs to the top 3 album tracks. It's untypical melody put me off in the past and I had wished for better and less conventional drumming. However, the accomplished is still breathtaking with loops. "Strawberry Fields Forever" should be in every top 20 UK psychedelia track compilation. Brilliant melody and songwriting, revolutionary structure and dynamics, no less than 15 musicians participating in its record created this masterpiece. No wonder Lennon considered this his best Beatles composition. "Penny Lane" balances "Strawberry Fields Forever" on the single in its melody, relative simplicity and a stunning trumpet solo a la classical music. The remaining two tracks are alright but do not reach the previous heights. The band would take a definitive down to Earth direction after this album.

I found Morrison Hotel a bit overrated. To me, it's a classic rock album lacking a bit of the adventure of previous albums. It does have a stronger blues feel therefore providing a relief from both fans and critics. Fans and critics didn't like how The Soft Parade was swamped in strings and horns, and had a loungey approach (to be fair, actually most of the album isn't that bad and I liked about 80% of the album with "Tell All the People" easily my least favorite). But I really did miss the more adventurous material on previous albums, it's almost like on Morrison Hotel they were playing it safe to get more radio airplay and get the rock critics back on their side. L.A. Woman is the final Doors album as far as fans (and even the press) are concerned (although if you view the two post-Morrison albums as more Ray Manzarek/Robbie Krieger albums they're not that bad). L.A. Woman could be seen like the Double Fantasy (John Lennon) or Blackstar (Bowie) of The Doors knowing that Morrison will no longer be with us shortly after the release of L.A. Woman. Like Morrison Hotel I found it rather overrated. In this case a stronger blues presence and I have never been much of a blues fan, and it sounds like blues I've heard millions of times, with Jim Morrison naturally adopting a more bluesy voice. Half the album is blues-dominated, and I find them rather boring. It's when the album moves away from blues and more into pop and psych realms is where this album really shines. "Love Her Madly" is the most pop-oriented piece on the album and naturally a hit. Even Ray brings out his old Vox, so it sounds like The Doors everyone can recognize. "L'America" is a really weird psych piece, to say the least. "Hyacinth House" is also a nice pop-oriented number, but there's no doubt the highlights for me are the title track and "Riders on the Storm". "Riders on the Storm" is nothing short of a classic. Even as a kid I really dug the tune and that ominous tone, not to mention that wonderful electric piano solo Ray Manzarek gives us along with the sound of thunder. The title track is also a great adventurous number but no need explaining it, classic FM rock plays that one constantly along with "Riders on the Storm". "WASP (Texas Radio and the Big Beat)" is one of the better blues numbers on this album and I do enjoy it, but I really think they should have gone back to what they have done on their first two albums although with an updated sound. L.A. Woman won back the fans and the critics, but I felt too much of the blues bogged it down. To me an overrated album but has some great stuff (usually the stuff that moves away from the blues).

A very average album, not quite good enough to be a good one, but also good enough to be okay. This is a loaded album, a very heavy rock sound. Each song does have a cool(not good or great) solo, but they are not enough to make the songs rise. They do however help to keep them from mediocrity. Who could possibly give this album anything higher than a three star rating? They could have trimmed the album to forty minutes and it would have fared better. The music is very uninspired and sixty minutes of this is too much. Hopefully "Woosh" and "=1" are better than this, but I won't be holding my breath.

Last Stand

I really wasn't expecting much when I stumbled on this video. It had a rather low-budget look about it coming from such a high profile band. Turns out, this is an excellent document of the band at the end of their period of peak ability and relevance. Just around the corner, Moon's decline and Pete's apathy towards the band would render them far less vital in my opinion, but that is not yet an issue here in Houston in November, 1975. Moonie is still working magic and Pete is still very much engaged, both appearing to be delightfully sober and in good spirits, although Pete has a few moments where one detects that moodiness. This is very much an exciting and powerful and well-rounded performance of a variety of their material.

The presentation and visual of this show is going to divide people. What you are going to see here is remarkably bare-bones, nuthin' fancy, basically zero "stage show." You will see four men standing on a stage that is no more extravagant than a high school gymnasium. It feels like it was filmed by a high school theater group using their cameras from a perch in maybe the 10th row. Almost zero lighting, almost zero fast-edit shifts, almost zero....everything, except music. For some viewers who are used to concerts having to be huge "events" with a big show and lots of excitement from things beyond music, this show may turn them off or bore them silly. If you *need* a show, you will be bored. For those of us who don't give two sh-ts about the stage show nonsense, this is exactly what a concert should be, a document of musicians playing together. The focus is the music, the quality of interplay, and to a lesser extent, how much you relate or connect with the band.

So having established that this is an old school, no-nonsense gig that is only about music, the question becomes how well do they deliver. Quite well, actually. The reviews of the tour were mostly positive, and Entwistle noted that "Moon and the Who reached their live performance peak during the tour." This film pretty much proves that to me: gutsy, aggressive, emotional, raw, and even playful at times. There are some nice moments captured here where Keith playfully badgers John, jokes around, and where Pete gives his "little speech" announcing the end of his drinking career. Sadly, while Keith was very good and behaved on this night, the wheels would begin coming off the wagon as the next year went on. His behavior became more erratic and dangerous, and his final public concert was less than a year away. They should have hung it up when Keith died and moved on, as Zeppelin had the class to do when Bonham died. Instead, Townshend/Daltrey chose to keep milking the name in a situation they've admitted wasn't very enjoyable. This wasn't the Grateful Dead where all of the members enjoyed each other and enjoyed jamming for their fans each night in a positive communal setting that made sense to continue. Anything but, yet they chose to continue the charade.

All that said, this last stand on film transcends such criticisms as they clearly deliver the goods, a well-chosen mix of material dating back to the '60s right up through the current album. In my view, there's too much Tommy, my least favorite, and not enough Quadrophenia and By Numbers, but that's just a taste thing. I love the chunky punch that Pete gives the old '60s hits, and I loved the reserved yet committed performance John gives to "Boris the Spider." I loved the defiant embellishment they still managed to find on material they've played a million times. I truly was surprised at how good this video ended up being given that it flies below the radar of some of their other projects. If you are a Who fan and you don't mind the lack of a "stage show," then this really is an essential title to own.

None of this makes sense to me. The Beatles are undoubtedly the biggest band in history, no argument there, but I guess, being late to the Beatlemania party, I just can't comprehend how big they really were, and just how big of a deal it was when they made it over to the States. And looking by the audiences in a lot of these clips, the American people were absolutely rabid for the British quartet.

How much you enjoy this ultimately comes down to how much you enjoy the Beatles. I like them, and I have all their studio albums on CD, but watching them perform live for 90 minutes while thousands of people lose their minds? No thanks. Not for me. Decent enough addition to the collection, but not something I think I'll come back to.

Sign #14 that a DVD will suck: when it states on the packaging that this is the artists' story "in their own words".

Like many unofficial DVD's, this is a quick cash-grab, compiling whatever tacky footage the producers could get the rights to, and cramming it on DVD, weirdly, in some horrendous monochrome colours. By horrendous, I mean, legitimately ugly and painful to look at. Imagine every black and white clip with a different coloured hue. Absolutely hideous. On top of that, most of the footage has a backing track of a band, The Overtures, I believe (who?), playing Beatles covers.

Thankfully, they included all these life-changing covers on a bonus CD! Life doesn't get any better!

Review nº 847

The Doors was an American band formed in 1965 in Los Angeles, California, with vocalist Jim Morrison, keyboardist Ray Manzarek, guitarist Robby Krieger and drummer John Densmore. The origins of The Doors emerged from a meeting between two UCLA film school students Morrison and Manzarek on the Venice Beach, California in July 1965. Morrison told Manzarek he had been writing songs and at a request of Manzarek, he sang "Moonlight Drive", a song that would appear on "Strange Days". Impressed by Morrison's lyrics, Manzarek suggested they could form a band.

"The Best Of The Doors (1973)" is a compilation of The Doors. It was released in 1973 and has eleven tracks. It features tracks from five of their six studio albums when Morrison was member of The Doors. It has three tracks from "The Doors" of 1967, three tracks from "Strange Days" also of 1967, one track from "Waiting For The Sun" of 1968, one track from "The Soft Parade" of 1969 and two tracks from "L.A. Woman" of 1971. Thus, it hasn't any tracks from their fifth studio album "Morrison Hotel". So, "Soul Kitchen", "Take It As It Comes" and "Light My Fire" are from "The Doors". "People Are Strange", "Love Me Two Times" and "Moonlight Drive" are from "Strange Days". "Hello, I Love You" is from "Waiting For The Sun". "Touch Me" is from "The Soft Parade". "Riders On The Storm" and "Love Her Madly" are from "L.A. Woman". But, it has also a track that never was released in any studio album of them, "Who Do You Love".

"Who Do You Love" appears for the first time on their live album "Absolutely Live", of 1970. It's a cover from an original song recorded in 1965 by Bo Diddley. This is a good song with a nice Krieger's slide guitar work. It sounds pretty, actually. "Soul Kitchen" is a tribute to the soul food restaurant "Olivia's" in the Venice Beach, Los Angeles, California, where Morrison and Manzarek met for the first time and represents the place where all began. It's a nice rock song played with energy. "Hello, I Love You" was a big commercial success. Despite be considered one of the most pop songs by The Doors and be frequently criticized, it's a great and catchy song. I never understood the dislike of many fans of the band about it. "People Are Strange" is about the alienation and be an outsider and a very loner person. This is another good and enjoyable song, but it's also at the same time a sad song with a dark musical atmosphere. It's a song with simple lyrics, ironic and sarcastic. "Riders On The Storm" represents, one of the greatest highlights of the band. This is a legendary track, which seems to be the last song recorded by The Doors, as well as Morrison's last recorded song to be released. It seems that it have been played live only once, on The Doors last public performance with Morrison, on the "L.A.Woman" tour at The Warehouse, in New Orleans, USA in 1970. "Touch Me" is a notable song for the extensive use of the brass and string instruments and also because the use of a saxophone solo by Curtis Amy. The orchestral arrangements work perfectly well and they accent Jim Morrison's vocals, even more. "Love Her Madly" became as one of the highest charting hits of The Doors. It's an interesting rock song with good lyrics, very good performances by all band's members, especially the guitar performance of Krieger is really amazing. "Love Me Two Times" is about a sailor and his last day with his girlfriend before shipping out to the Vietnam War. It's one of the most normal and typical rock songs made by the band. It has a slight touch of blues, which is a very normal common thing with many songs of The Doors. "Take It As It Comes" is a beautiful pop rock song, well made, highly attractive and which still sounds fresh and young in our days. We can say this song is so well written that sounds much better than many of the songs on the pop scene today. "Moonlight Drive" is known by fans as being one of the first songs written by Morrison, the song that started all. It's the song that Morrison sung to Manzarek in the Venice Beach. In many ways, this is the song that helped to form The Doors. It's a good song with a nice rhythm. "Light My Fire" was the first great success of them. It has brought the world fame and recognition to the band in the summer of 1967, bringing The Doors to the top of the charts and a symbol of that generation of the late 60's. It's one of the songs that immortalized the band.

Conclusion: "The Best Of The Doors (1973)", is really one of the best compilations released by The Doors. Seven of the eleven songs chosen to be part of it were taken from their three best studio albums "The Doors", "Strange Days" and "L.A. Woman". Only one was taken From "Waiting For The Sun" and one other from "The Soft Parade". None was chosen from "Morrison Hotel" and, fortunately, none was chosen from "Other Voices" and "Full Circle", the two albums released without Jim Morrison. Sincerely, I never got used to of hearing The Doors, without Morrison. Still, if you don't know The Doors very well and you need to by a compilation of the band, I sincerely advise you to buy "The Best Of The Doors", released in 1985, or the double CD compilation "The Very Best Of The Doors", released in 2007, because they're better and more representative from the career of the band when Jim Morrison was a member of The Doors.

Prog is my Ferrari. Jem Godfrey (Frost*)