Absolutely Live

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  • Artist: The Doors
  • Rating: StarStarHalf Star
  • Release Date: 1970 09
  • Total Time: 77:09
  • Type: Live
  • Genre: Rock

Review

While this double disc (later combined with Alive, She Cried and Live at the Hollywood Bowl for CD release under the title In Concert) is valuable in that it contains material the Doors didn't release on their studio albums, it's also tilted toward some of their more boorish aspects. Recorded at concerts in 1969 and 1970, this was an era in which Jim Morrison was becoming increasingly dissolute and increasingly disinterested in the whole rock machine. During much of this set, he seems not to be taking himself or the songs too seriously, tossing flippant asides to the audience that seem to treat the whole exercise as a charade. As for the music, the haunting "Universal Mind" and the basic blues-rocker "Build Me a Woman" are originals that are not found on their proper albums; "Close to You" is a dull Muddy Waters cover sung by Ray Manzarek; "Who Do You Love" is a fair cover of the Bo Diddley standard; and the controversial "The Celebration of the Lizard" is a drawn-out opus that is as much poetry recitation as music. There are also extended versions of "Soul Kitchen," "Break On Through," and "When the Music's Over" that flag considerably in comparison to the sleeker studio versions. ~ Richie Unterberger, Rovi

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Wikipedia on Answers.com:

Absolutely Live (The Doors album)

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Absolutely Live
Live album by The Doors
Released July 1970
Recorded July 1969–May 1970
Genre Psychedelic rock, acid rock, blues-rock
Length 77:00
Label Elektra
Producer Paul A. Rothchild
The Doors chronology
Morrison Hotel
(1970)
Absolutely Live
(1970)
13
(1970)
CD Reissue cover
Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
Allmusic 2/5 stars[1]
Robert Christgau B[2]
Rolling Stone 2.5/5 stars[3]

Absolutely Live is the first live album released by American rock band The Doors in July 1970. Many shows were recorded during the 1970 tour to create the "Absolutely Live" album. The Doors producer, and long time collaborator Paul Rothchild painstakingly edited the album from many different shows to create one cohesive concert. For example, the best part of a song from the Detroit show may have been spliced together with another part of the same song from the Boston show, again trying to create "the ultimate concert". It can become very difficult to identify what parts are from what shows. Rothchild has said "I couldn't get complete takes of a lot of songs, so sometimes I'd cut from Detroit to Philadelphia in midsong. There must be 2,000 edits on that album".[citation needed]

Absolutely Live and 1983's Alive, She Cried were both repackaged and released as a two-disc set in 1991 entitled In Concert. Absolutely Live was subsequently issued by itself as a one-CD set by Elektra in 1996, with all tracks in their original sequence, but with a new artwork, different from the original LP.

Contents

Track listing

Side one

  1. "House Announcer" – 2:40
  2. "Who Do You Love?" (McDaniel) – 6:02
  3. "Alabama Song (Whisky Bar)" (Brecht, Weill) – 1:51
  4. "Back Door Man" (Dixon) – 2:22
  5. "Love Hides" (Dixon) – 1:48
  6. "Five to One" (The Doors) – 4:34

Side two

  1. "Build Me a Woman" (Jim Morrison) – 3:33
  2. "When the Music's Over" (The Doors) – 16:16

Side three

  1. "Close to You" (Dixon)[4] – 4:04
  2. "Universal Mind" (The Doors) – 4:54
  3. "Petition the Lord with Prayer" (The Doors) – 0:52
  4. "Dead Cats, Dead Rats" (The Doors) – 1:57
  5. "Break On Through (to the Other Side) No. 2" (The Doors) – 4:41

Side four

  1. "Celebration of the Lizard" – 14:25
    • "Lions in the Street" (The Doors) – 1:14
    • "Wake Up" (The Doors) – 1:21
    • "A Little Game" (The Doors) – 1:12
    • "The Hill Dwellers" (The Doors) – 2:35
    • "Not To Touch The Earth" (The Doors) – 4:15
    • "Names of the Kingdom" (The Doors) – 1:29
    • "The Palace of Exile" (The Doors) – 2:20
  2. "Soul Kitchen" (The Doors) – 7:15

Personnel

References

  1. ^ Unterberger, Richie (2011 [last update]). "Absolutely Live – The Doors | AllMusic". allmusic.com. http://www.allmusic.com/album/r6221/review. Retrieved 2 July 2011. 
  2. ^ Christgau, Robert (2011 [last update]). "Robert Christgau: Album: The Doors: Absolutely Live!". robertchristgau.com. Archived from the original on 6 June 2011. http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_album.php?id=6744. Retrieved 2 July 2011. 
  3. ^ "The Doors: Album Guide | Rolling Stone Music". rollingstone.com. 2011 [last update]. http://www.rollingstone.com/music/artists/the-doors/albumguide. Retrieved 2 July 2011. 
  4. ^ Absolutely Live The Doors Allmusic.com, Richie Unterberger

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Mentioned in

Live in Hollywood/Absolutely Live (2003 Album by The Doors)
In Concert (1991 Album by The Doors)
Live at the Hollywood Bowl (1987 Album by The Doors)
Critique (Album by The Doors)
Alive, She Cried (1983 Album by The Doors)