The Soft Parade: How The Doors Walked A New Creative Path

“Our session looked like the one for ‘Sgt Pepper’”

Also in Riordan’s book, Elektra Records president, Jac Holzman, recalled that Rothchild’s quest for perfection, which often resulted in numerous retakes of songs, was “grinding them into the ground”, while the producer’s desire to coat a number of The Soft Parade’s songs in lavish arrangements ensured the studio bills quickly mounted. The sessions did, however, have their upsides – not least in terms of famous studio visitors.

“George Harrison was in town, so we got to meet a Beatle,” John Densmore enthused in his memoir, Riders On The Storm. “Alluding to all the extra musicians, he commented that our session looked like the one for Sgt Pepper. I guess that’s the kind of record we were trying to do. It was a thrill meeting him, although I found myself getting tongue-tied!”

In more recent decades, rock bands such as Echo And The Bunnymen and The Verve have been praised for their use of orchestration on landmark titles such as Ocean Rain and Urban Hymns, but The Doors’ integration of brass and strings wasn’t so readily understood at the time. And yet, four albums into their career, the sweeping strings added a fresh dimension to Robby Krieger-penned fare such as Wishful Sinful and the stirring Touch Me. A Billboard Top 5 hit, the latter song also benefitted from an expressive solo from saxophonist Curtis Amy, renowned for his work with soul icons Ray Charles, Marvin Gaye and Smokey Robinson.

“It was beautiful chaos”

Meanwhile, when Rothchild and his bandmates did get Morrison’s attention, the singer stepped up to the plate. Both Wild Child and the prowling Shaman’s Blues established themselves as contenders for a place among the best Doors songs, with Morrison’s visceral lyrics on the latter (“Cold, grinding grizzly bear jaws hot on your heels”) more than matching the music’s cyclical menace.

The Soft Parade’s tour de force, however, was its concluding title track: a suite-like affair which veered from folky introspection to surreal pop before settling into one of the band’s most hypnotic grooves as it played out across nine mesmerising minutes. Morrison was again fully engaged here, and the band later recalled how Paul Rothchild’s production took this otherworldly cut to an entirely new level.

“There were several vocals to choose from, and at the end of the song, just for fun, Paul turned them all on and it was beautiful chaos,” John Densmore enthused. “Jim’s vocals overlapped and commented on each other – one would say, ‘You gotta meet me at the crossroads,’ and another quickly retaliated, ‘Too late, too late,’ and so on. Schizophrenic multi-tracking. Rothchild and the studio had indeed become like the fifth Door.”

“Ray and I fulfilled our dream”

Released on 18 July 1969, The Soft Parade peaked at No.6 in the US, but The Doors’ experiments with a broader sonic palette were short-lived. By the time they returned, a mere seven months later, with Morrison Hotel, the group sounded leaner and considerably hungrier. The Soft Parade, however, had given them a welcome chance to bring their jazz inspirations further to the fore.

“The Soft Parade cost around $200,000 to make, which was a lot in 1969, and when Paul Rothchild arranged an orchestra or strings and horns for overdubs, we weren’t sure, but we thought, well why not – his intuition has paid off so far,” Densmore later recalled.

“After all, we got Curtis Amy, a West Coast jazz saxophonist, and George Bohanon, former trombonist with the Chico Hamilton Quartet, and told them to play like John Coltrane and Archie Shepp on Robby’s song Runnin’ Blue… so yeah, certainly Ray and I fulfilled our dream of having more of a jazz influence on The Soft Parade.”

Check out our best Doors songs to find out which ‘The Soft Parade’ tracks