The Doors Dolby Atmos Mixes

[TheWallsScreamedPoetry]

The Doors were always at the forefront of new technology from 8 & 4 Track to Quadrophonic
but now this Dolby Atmos is surely the pinnacle of The Doors sound.

A DVD/Blu-ray of the bands biggest selling album The Best Of The Doors is the main release followed by the full 6 Morrison albums
available only on various streaming platforms.

I have only heard The Soft Parade album and it certainly (even with my primitive means to listen) has some interesting moments.
Notably Do It which now reveals why that song was called Do It.

Is it worth purchasing?
Not really the 40 & 50 year TSP albums are fine and apart from Do It there is nothing there to be worth actually buying TSP again.

Obviously I can't speak for the other 5 albums but have heard LMF & ROTS with its extended more immersive weather sound and can't say that
is anything that I would bother paying money for.
Eventually all 6 will be released on DVDs as The Doors never are shy selling stuff you already have several times.
I'm sure collectors will buy it by the train load but the rest of us should stick to the 40/50 albums which are enough of a pinnacle
for us ordinary fan.

The Best Of The Doors

[TheWallsScreamedPoetry]

[TheWallsScreamedPoetry]

The Doors Entire Studio Collection









Obviously it isn't as once again Full Circle & Other Voices are forgotten.

[zaval80]

Atmos is the latest trick of capitalists in deflecting the working class from the thoughts of revolution, comrade.

I am about serious. Atmos and its predecessor, 5.1, provided the gimmick to give the fans something new, short of giving them the multitrack master tapes.

What I have no idea of, is where this road will take us. Like, the more adventurous and audio-skillful fans are playing George Martin, Rothchild and Botnick, deconstructing this stuff and then making their own remixes. AI separation and spectral audio software allows this at this very moment, and in a couple of years every dummy and his dog would be able to do this, to a decent result.

Of course I cannot help liking it. I wasn't too impressed with 5.1, just because when Botnick did Perception, there were no means to split vocal and instruments apart to a satisfactory result. Atmos is just another iteration of 5.1, more cleanly mixed - the crucial difference is, we have it at the "right" moment, as the advances in AI and spectral separation happen almost on a daily basis now. So the possibilities to enjoy the details of the favorite group's sound, to get lost in those - are about limitless.

As for the value of Atmos or 5.1 remixes on their own - The Doors music was produced by Rothchild and Botnick, highly skilled professionals. IMO it does not need remixing to make it sound more "modern", or "better". Basically, what Bruce did - he fiddled with the stuff here and there when he made 5.1, and when he did Atmos, he did more of the same. IMO there's no value in this, it was just an exercise to make things sound different.

There was another approach for remixing The Doors. Steve Hoffman remixed "Light My Fire" and "Take It As It Comes" - his mixes are faithful to the originals, yet they are made from the original multitracks. Here, we have about the same, but sounding a tad more cleanly. I think the rest of the first album and the "Strange Days" song would gain from this approach, and the rest IMO is OK as it is.

Who knows what other format they'll think up in the years to come after Atmos, but I think they'll do for a novelty factor, to sell it again to us.

[TheWallsScreamedPoetry]

I agree totally. They reached the peak with the 40 year mixes.
All they have done since as you say is tweak it a bit more to milk us sheep.

If they want to do something special then Other Voices and Full Circle would be worth giving a revamp to.
They claim they have lost the master tapes but that is probably another of their many lies.
And it is probably in the same box as all that 60th anniversary stuff they will find next year for the 60th or 58th if you use the 40/50 anniversary timeline.

OV is a good album and I would love a 40 year style edition.
Full Circle is vocally and lyrically shit but the music is good.
It is possible Ray burned that master after the reception it got.

I have to admit I liked it when I got it in 1972. But then OV was the 2nd Doors album I bought so had no hang ups with the Doors trio and loved OV.
Still do.

By the mid 70s FC had worn out its welcome and I began to change my position on the lyric/vocals side.
Still like a lot of the music.
But some of the worst material associated with The Doors is on this disc.

I bought the official 2CD when it came out and still rate OV as the 7th best Doors LP.
With FC the worst.
I don't include American Prayer as a Doors album.

I'm not an audiophile and was quite happy listening to my old vinyl but I'm no Luddite either and have enjoyed the rise of CD and up to the 40th discs.
Some worthwhile audio has been released but I don't think that they have improved much since.
Obviously there are exceptions such as Do It which I find fascinating but it is all about the money with todays Doors which was not what I signed up to back in the 60s.

[zaval80]

I don't know why OV and FC are so unloved by them. IMO that was the worthy direction of "CCR meets Santana and Mahavishnu" kind, nothing wrong with such music, though yes, the last album is more to the sucking side. But even when Ray wrote his book, it looked from there he did not appreciate the band's history after the first two to three albums. I know problems with Jim started in the beginning of 1968, so there was less joy for Ray in this all, but still the music was worthy, so a pity his book wasn't more evenly paced. Only Robby did the right thing, speaking a bit on OV and FC.

What buggers me most about the "complete studio collection" on Atmos - the criminal absence of "Who Scared You". ("You Need Meat" would have been also nice to have.)