Customer Reviews

When You're Strange (Songs From The Motion Picture)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

When You're Strange: Songs From The Motion Picture is a mixture of readings of Jim Morrison's poems and non-sequiturs, interviews from all the members of The Doors, and, the music of The Doors. At first a CD which incorporates the poetry of Jim Morrison and the music of The Doors may seem like a sequel to An American Prayer, but the soundtrack to When You're Strange is quite unlike anything The Doors have released before. The soundtrack comes out Tuesday April 6th, and is the companion piece to the forthcoming release of the film the following Friday on April 9th.

The soundtrack includes the classic album versions of the songs such as Moonlight Drive, Hello, I Love You, Soul Kitchen, live performances, Light My Fire from The Ed Sullivan show where Morrison famously refused to leave out the word `higher` as requested by the censors, When The Music's Over from the Danish television broadcast, and Break On Through from the Isle of Wight.

Jim Morrison's poetry is read by Johnny Depp who is reputed to have recorded the pieces on his boat in a darkened candlelit room. At first I thought the inclusion of having Depp read Morrison's poetry was a nod to increase the commercial potential of the soundtrack, Depp being one of the biggest contemporary actors, even though he brings his own hip cache and was drawn to the project by allure and legend of The Doors (he's a fan). Depp's understated readings may not have the full dramatic weight in the reading that Morrison used when recording his poems, for the birthday recording sessions that were later used in An American Prayer. Anyone who has heard Morrison reading his poems find his voice compelling even without music. Depp's candlelit reading works, it sets the tone, his reading of the poems has a sultry almost dusky tone to it, you can almost hear the smoke of those black cigarettes Depp smokes curling around Morrison`s words.

The soundtrack of When You're Strange has a different feeling and tone from other Doors albums, CD's or previous anthologies. First of all it doesn't rely on the usual chronological placement of songs or necessarily including all "the hits," but aims more for giving the listener a sense of what The Doors were about, a fusion and interweaving of poetry with the music, the poetry segues very smoothly into the songs. The poems don't seem to have been picked to add any context to the songs, or compliment the songs, or even the reverse, the songs adding context to the poems, but they seem to naturally fit together, Morrison`s poetry and the music of The Doors has always seemed to fit together as if they were always meant to be there. There's a couple clips of interviews where the band speaks for itself following the film's agenda of using only period clips and quotes from the band, some of which may not be all that well known, Morrison`s "Dead Serious" gives you a bit of an idea of where their heads were at.

This one disc CD, includes a booklet with pictures of the band, quotes from the movie's director Tom DiCillo, Johnny Depp, and producer Dick Wolf. The booklet opens up into a mini-sized print of the movie poster. When You're Strange: Songs From The Motion Picture creates an aural documentary of the film that can either compliment the viewing of the film or as a stand alone piece that provides some of the documentary elements giving the listener a feel for the film.

The Doors have spent years finding new ways to re-package and re-sell the same basic songs from their six studio albums. Now they have a new excuse for yet another release, a documentary about the history of the band which of course opens the door for a "soundtrack."

The album for "When You're Strange" is basically the same recordings a Doors fanatic or casual classic rock listener probably already has in earlier releases, such as the much superior "The Very Best Of The Doors" and of course, the albums themselves. For die hard members of the Jim Morrison cult the only noteworthy new material here are the poetry readings by actor Johnny Depp (who narrates the film), most of them only last a few seconds, but does that matter to Morrison's disciples? It is a shame though, how short the poetry tracks are, because Depp's voice adds a nice, dark atmosphere to the words, like a fellow literary rebel reciting strange visions and ideas.

The other "new" material here are "live tracks" basically lifted from TV performances such as the notorious "Light My Fire" performance from the Ed Sullivan Show and a scorching "When The Music's Over" from European TV. But the quality of these tracks is so scratchy and fuzzy that you're better off with the actual performance footage found in Doors DVD releases which have much cleaner audio. The Doors fanatic will no doubt want to get them just for the sake of having them but the casual listener will find little reason for adding the recordings to their iPods. The same goes for the "interview clips" featuring the band, short clips which, again, are simply lifted from video sources most fans purchased long ago.

The music of The Doors is of course classic, powerful and timeless. Songs like "Moonlight Drive" and "People Are Strane" retain their dark, poetic power while "Break On Through" and "Soul Kitchen" are exciting numbers with killer rhythms. The beautiful "The Crystal Ship" is here as well with its wonderous visions and lush melodies and "The End" remains the band's epic masterpiece. But of course anyone who loves The Doors already knows all this. And those who loved 2007's remixed albums will find the original recordings which of course, they probably already own.

Some are saying that criticisms of this release are unfounded because hey, it is a SOUNDTRACK to a film after all. True, but reviewed as a product, it has little to offer Doors fans and for the newly initiated, they are better off getting the band's albums which are the true testament of any musical group. Wouldn't a new fan prefer the actual studio versions of "Light My Fire" and "When The Music's Over" anyway? "When You're Strange" is no doubt a fascinating film, but as a soundtrack, it's just more recycled product which you probably already have sitting somewhere in your CD collection or downloaded into your iPod.

This isn't a CD that you will want to hear over and over. The sound quality is not as good as other Doors remasters and what's worse, having Johnny Depp recite Jim Morrison's poetry was a mistake. Depp's voice is too soft and it doesn't project the wild, dynamic spirit of Jim Morrison. I did enjoy the live version of "Break On Through (To The Other Side)" that was included on this CD. Your money would be better spent on the Doors studio albums or the many Live CDs. I've always believed that the Doors were one of the greatest American bands but this CD feels like somewhat of a ripoff. This type of fluff is definitely not what the Doors were about.

I have been an avid doors fan since my early teens (now in my mid-40s). Over the years, I have purchased just about everthing Doors that I could get my hands on (all official Electra releases, bootlegs, VHS/DVDs, the Bright Midnight releases (including the much-maligned Matrix release) and the innumerable 'Best Of' releases. I have em' all but this one confuses me. Don't get me wrong, I can't wait to see the movie and will be purchasing the DVD when it is released (hopefully with some bonus material) but this soundtrack escapes me. What we have here is YET another sampling of studio cuts that we all have heard, a couple live cuts that most (even casual) fans have seen/heard, and Johnny Depp reading Morrison poetry that is easily available from the man himself on American Prayer. So what is the point in this release? Who is it for? Can anyone tell me? Because I just don't get it...

It's been nearly 40 years (yes, 40 years!) since Jim Morrison's death. Yet, despite that, I am amazed at the various ways the surviving members of the band and Elektra Records repackage and market the same music over and over.

Here, there are snippets of poetry read by Johnny Depp and assorted studio and live recordings.

Don't get me wrong. I love the Doors. I've got every one of their studio releases and, yes, even a couple of "greatest hits" compilations. I have most of the live releases, as well as a bunch of bootlegs of performances. So, I'm a fan, not a critic of the band.

But enough is enough. This is just another effort to squeeze a few dollars out of the passion that fans like me have for The Doors. I played the snippets that Amazon will let you listen to and, sad to say, there's just nothing here to justify spending even $4.99 (it's a daily special today -- I wonder what the regular price is?).

Morrison's long gone, but not forgotten. But enough is enough. As he sang so many years ago: "When the music's over turn out the lights. Turn out the lights. Turn out the lights." So, turn out the lights!

Depp is silly at best.Big deal some mono recordings get dragged out to squeeze one more dollar outta Jim.There is nothing here which will further the magic of Morrison and the ghouls his band mates have become.
Waste of time.

When You're Strange / soundtrack + from the Movie: Johnny Depp is reading most of Jim's poetry here and there are some excellent Doors cuts along the way (some very familiar, some bits we are are less familiar with). No, this is not a `true' Doors album but what it IS, is very good. This is a very entertaining piece of poetic audio documentary and as such, it's worth listening to and it rates a solid four stars.

as a huge doors fan like everyone else, i was so into the documentary of "when your strange" when i saw it on television just a few weeks ago and then i saw that there was an accompaning CD to this documentary. based on loving the documentary i bought it as well as the CD, however.... my negative response is on not the poetry or the music itself of course, but the use of johnny depp?

i thought he worked as a voice over in the documentary but i was totally put off by him being used on this CD to recite morrison's poetry? didn't morrison himself record his poetry and i'm thinking there was awhile back a CD that did indeed have morrison reading his poetry on it? i'm sure i'm not mistaken on this account.

just don't think they should have used depp or anyone for that matter to read and vocalize morrisons' poetry. if they had used val kilmer it would have been even worse!

so the CD is great with the music and the poetry, but if you have all the other Doors Cd's and/or greatest hits and believe in morrisons' talent as a poet, i think you might be disappointed to know it's not morrison reciting the poetry.

so that's is my only negative thoughts on this CD!

I can't get enough info on Jim Morrison and the Doors. I just added this to my collection.
I think the three "J"s are the greatest of their time.
Jimmi ,Jim, and Janis.
Bet you didn't even have to know their last names!

I truly don't understand the negative reviews of this CD; it gives us everything from the music of the Doors, to interviews, to poetry by Jim himself (though read aloud by Depp). I'm tired of generic CD's with just the music and nothing but music, and "When You're Strange" frees me from that redundancy. This is the perfect mix which can allow the listener to get a closer glimpse of who Jim really was both as a member of a hugely popular band and as an introspective human being. I recommend this CD to any Doors fan because of its unparalleled genius, which is presented on each and every track.