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| CD - Remastered / Special Edition / Bonus DVD | $59.99 |
| CD | $126.39 |
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Although the surviving members of the Doors have certainly explored the band's catalog broadly since the death of singer Jim Morrison, they've never dipped quite as deeply -- or with results quite as intriguing -- as on this all-encompassing box. Perception, which takes its title from the Aldous Huxley novel that gave the band its name in the first place, focuses on the studio recordings of the original lineup, with each of those six albums outfitted with fascinating bonus material that includes both studio banter and unreleased songs, all the better to fully open the Doors to outsiders. The archival material on earlier discs here tends to point up the band's pop instincts -- a surprisingly breezy alternate take on "Moonlight Drive" finds Ray Manzarek unspooling his best ? & the Mysterians organ riffs, and "Love Me Two Times" softens Robby Krieger's guitar palpably -- but, as fans might imagine, things get more intricate and more mysterious as time goes on. Waiting for the Sun offers up some of the meatiest material, notably the oft-bootlegged full version of "Celebration of the Lizard," which unfolds with a hypnotic inexorability, taking listeners on a trip that's by turns sensual and frightening. There's a decidedly more playful version of the previously unheard songs tagged onto The Soft Parade, from the surprisingly garage-styled "Push Push," a sex-crazed ditty that could've appeared on The Doors, to the woozy sea chantey "Whiskey, Mystics and Men," which finds Morrison going heavy on the first element, rather than the second -- a sharp contrast to most of his latter-day writing. The band follow their leader into Delta territory on Morrison Hotel, a disc that carries more of a whiff of the crossroads in this expanded edition -- thanks to multiple, subtly different versions of "Roadhouse Blues" as well as "Money Beats Soul," Morrison's sneering rejoinder to anyone who'd accuse him of selling out. L.A. Woman, which history has shown to be the singer's low ebb, still has some bright moments in its margins -- one of which, "You Need Meat," actually features Manzarek on lead vocals. Each of Perception's audio discs is paired with a DVD containing 5.1 audio mixes, photo galleries, lyrics, new liner notes, new producer's notes, and a pair of videos, making it a completist's dream and an unparalleled history lesson. David Sprague, Barnes & Noble