Strange Days (album)

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Strange Days is the second studio album by the American rock band The Doors, released in September 1967. It was a commercial success, initially earning a gold record and reaching No. 3 on the Billboard 200 albums chart. The album also yielded two top 30 hit singles, "People Are Strange" and "Love Me Two Times", and eventually a platinum certification.

Background

Strange Days consists of songs that were written in 1965–66 but which did not make it onto The Doors, such as "Moonlight Drive", which was one of the first songs written by lead singer Jim Morrison. A demo of the song was recorded in 1965 and a proper studio version was recorded for their debut album but was not used. In 1967, a final version was recorded and released on this album.

Release

Strange Days was released on September 25, 1967 by Elektra Records. It reached No. 3 in the US in November 1967, while The Doors' debut was still sitting in the top ten over ten months since its release. Despite its success, the album's producer Paul Rothchild considered it a commercial failure: "We all thought it was the best album. Significantly, it was also the one with the weakest sales. We were confident it was going to be bigger than anything The Beatles had done. But there was no single. The record died on us."[1]

"People Are Strange" reached No. 12 on the US chart, and "Love Me Two Times" followed, going to No. 25, thus proving the band's staying power after the runaway success of their debut. In the UK, they had yet to score a big hit single, and Strange Days became one of two Doors studio albums not to chart, despite subsequent strong sales. The album has sold over 9 million copies to date.[citation needed]

Reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
AllMusic 3.5/5 stars[2]
Down Beat 4/5 stars[3]
MusicHound 3.5/5[4]
Q 3/5 stars[3]
Rolling Stone (favorable)[5]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide 3.5/5 stars[6]
Slant Magazine 4.5/5 stars[7]
Virgin Encyclopedia of Popular Music 4/5 stars[8]

Music critic Robert Christgau called the album "muscular but misshapen" in a May 1968 column for Esquire, but went on to write that The Doors had come "from nowhere to reign as America's heaviest group".[9] In 2003, Strange Days ranked at number 407 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. In 2007, Rolling Stone included it on their list "The 40 Essential Albums of 1967".[10]

Artwork

The album cover of Strange Days, photographed by Joel Brodsky, depicts a group of street performers in New York. The location of the photograph is at Sniffen Court, a residential alley off of East 36th Street between Lexington and Third Avenue in Manhattan. The availability of such performers pictured was low, so Brodsky's assistant stood in as a juggler while a random cab driver was paid $5 to pose playing the trumpet. Twin dwarfs were hired, with one appearing on the front cover and one appearing on the back cover, which is the other half of the same photo on the front cover. However, a group shot of the band does appear on a poster in the background of both covers, bearing captions of the band and album name. (The same photograph previously appeared on the back cover of the band's debut album.) Because of the subtlety of the artist and album title, most record stores put stickers across the cover to help customers identify it more clearly.[11]

Track listing

All songs written and composed by The Doors (Jim Morrison, Ray Manzarek, Robby Krieger, and John Densmore) with the original writers noted as such. 

Side A
No. Title Length
1. "Strange Days" (written by Jim Morrison) 3:11
2. "You're Lost Little Girl" (written by Robby Krieger) 3:03
3. "Love Me Two Times" (written by Krieger) 3:18
4. "Unhappy Girl" (written by Morrison) 2:02
5. "Horse Latitudes" (written by Morrison) 1:37
6. "Moonlight Drive" (written by Morrison) 3:05
Side B
No. Title Length
7. "People Are Strange" (written by Morrison and Krieger) 2:13
8. "My Eyes Have Seen You" (written by Morrison) 2:32
9. "I Can't See Your Face in My Mind" (written by Morrison) 3:26
10. "When the Music's Over"   10:58

Personnel

The Doors
Additional musicians
Technical

Chart positions

Album

Year Chart Position
1967 Pop Albums 3

Singles

Year Single Chart Position
1967 "People Are Strange"
B-side: "Unhappy Girl"		 Pop Singles 12
1967 "Love Me Two Times"
B-side: "Moonlight Drive"		 Pop Singles 25

Certifications

Region Certification Sales/shipments
United States (RIAA)[12] Platinum 1,000,000
Canada (Music Canada)[13] Platinum 100,000
France (SNEP)[14] 2× Gold 200,000
Germany (BVMI)[15] Gold 250,000
United Kingdom (BPI)[16] Gold 100,000

*sales figures based on certification alone
^shipments figures based on certification alone
xunspecified figures based on certification alone

References

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External links

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  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. Enter Strange Days in the field Keywords. Select Title in the field Search by. Select album in the field By Format. Select Gold in the field By Award. Click Search
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