Some additional thoughts/corrections: 1) Go watch Matt's video! ua-cam.com/video/br-Ed3NxjN4/v-deo.html 2) I forgot to include it in the script but Krieger is definitely bending the G in the walkdown up to something resembling a neutral third. Not all the way there, but sharper than a basic G natural. I talk about blue notes later on, but that's another example of one right at the start of the song. 3) Probably could've just said shuffle tresillo and let y'all work out the rest, but I wanted to dive into the math a bit to make clear just how interesting a rhythm it actually is underneath the surface, even if it's really just a combination of two relatively straightforward ideas. 4) To be clear, when I say the B is "pretty much impossible to hear", I don't mean it's literally impossible. Now that I know it's there, if I really listen really carefully, I can hear it. It just would never occur to me to listen for it if I hadn't been poking around with the stems. 5) Another thing that hidden B does is it makes the high G pop a bit more: In the first bar it blends into the existing chord voicing, but in the second, the discontinuity of the supporting harmony makes it feel more prominent. But I think that's also because he has to drop the high A to hit it, and also it sounds like he's just plucking it harder, so there's a lot of factors there. 6) Call me pretentious if you want, but axis theory genuinely was my first thought when looking at those chords. I think it's probably easier to explain that the Imi and bIII have similar functions, but given how much of the explanation about V-I resolutions centers around the leading tone, just saying that didn't feel sufficient. I had to get to "B7 can resolve to G major", and that's not all that intuitive without some more advanced models. (It's also probably true that the simpler Axis Theory explanation would be "G is a secondary tonic on an alternate branch", but this way let me tie back to better-known theories in regards to dominant substitutions.) Was it necessary? No, but it's nice to be able to talk about these things sometimes. I'm excited to see what happens to my viewer retention graph at that point. 7) The D# Morrison sings in the stopping bar I played is actually pretty good, pitch-wise. My comment on him being between D and D# is more an observation of the general pattern, because he is wildly inconsistent in that space. 8) So, about the cross-stick thing. Like I said, I think I screwed up the picture and implied something incorrect, so to clarify, a cross-stick is when you lay a drumstick across a drumhead (typically on a snare) and then tap the end of it onto the rim of the drum. It's a way of playing chiller snare hits that emphasize the initial strike while still getting a somewhat snare-like sound. Apologies for any confusion. 9) I should note that I wouldn't actually describe the bass here as a walking bass, for various technical and stylistic reasons. My point was that it was reminiscent of one, not that it was identical. 10) Fun fact that I didn't know what to do with: Krieger starts his solo on the same note that Morrison ends the preceding verse on. 11) Another observation: In both the second half of the chorus and the guitar solo, Manzarek must play multiple consecutive bars of B7, and while he starts both off the same way, the differences in development are fascinating: In the chorus, he wants to emphasize the start-stop vibe, so he just loops his first-bar pattern over and over, while under the solo it's supposed to feel more continuous, so he evolves the pattern slightly, adjusting the rhythm to create a genuine two-bar phrase.
I want to address how cool it is when Morrison introduces Manzarek's solo by moaning "alright yeah." One of the classic examples of a classic blues/rock move.
See also I believe in a thing called love by the darkness, where the singer squeals "Guitar!" Before the guitar solo. Or, even better, in Superfreak when the singer goes "Blow, daddy!"
@@bloodysmurf i guess it stemed from Morrison being into the beat poets from that era. And that the fact that morrison was not the most sober state of mind. In those early years.
That's the magic of The Doors. By any ordinary technical standard, Jim Morrison was a terrible singer -- range of an octave or so, often badly flat on high notes, and so on. Yet somehow, that voice works perfectly as part of the band's music.
@@isomemeThat's why the technical aspect of singing is the least important one. The singer is the agent for our feelings in a song, it's his job to convey them. It may not always be pretty, but feelings are often not pretty, so technical proficiency could work against you.
I went to check the runtime right as he said it shouldn't take long to analyze, cuz I felt he was lying, and then he said not to and drew a puppy and I got distracted.
I listened to a lot of the Doors in the late 90's and early 2000's. That wasn't the time when it came out and it probably meant something different to me than it meant to the people who first heard it in the 60's. It meant something else to you and it will mean something else to someone discovering it today. I think that is what makes it great and sort of timeless when new generations discover it and what it means for them.
You don't have to be an "EXPERT". Personally, I'm glad you aren't. Remember, you are 12Tone, and that is why we keep coming back. Just do your thing. Thank you for taking the time to explain the Tritone sub/backdoor var/secondary dom relationship resolving B to G. I've never felt I understood their relationship, and why it works (beyond G being the relative major to Em). This made a lot of sense to me.
I think When the Music’s Over might be their best song. Jim’s vocal is so good and his screams are ridiculous. He, along with the rest of the band do so many different, unusual things in that song. It’s complex and unique.
I first heard the doors on a record player from my dad's collection. It was the late 80s, so it still wasn't that distant from the period when it was made, and the 60s still were having an influence on the world were grew up in, so I found it easy to connect to
I think my first Doors song was in the Intro Montage for Tony Hawks Underground 2. What a game, and with such a wide range of music. Really kicked off my musical journey at 10 years old.
The "conversations" Between different members of the band/instruments have always stood out to me. It makes me think of the stranger character walking through crowds of people talking. The pauses/stabs feel like the conversations stopping as people around pause and look at our character judging him silently before making their decision on how to react.
Morrison had a huge range actually, he could hit bartione notes and also very high even above tenor range with whistle tones in some live stuff. That being said he was often off exact pitch due to his substance abuse but to say he said a somewhat limited vocal range is not right to me. B7 to G is basically like a backwards deceptive cadence. Instead of D7 to Em instead of G, it's B7 to G instead of Em.
I have a huge appreciation for the Doors. I don’t care how big your house is, if you dont have a door, you are either homeless or in prison, no other way about it.
I have 0 musical skills or talent. I sing like a cat in heat that's trying to hit all the notes at once, and sheet music might as well be the Riemann hypothesis... that said, your channel has made me appreciate the art, beauty, psychology, and science that is music. Thank you!!! It will never not blow my mind that this channel doesn't have 10 million followers.
I think Jim had a higher range than you are giving him credit for. He just didn’t sing high that often, but listening to his amazing screams he could definitely hit high notes and I think could have gotten pretty great at it had he cared to, or wanted to. He loved Elvis and Sinatra. He loved singing in a deep baritone.
Jim's voice breaks. I doubt he would have been able to sing in that falsetto range, maybe dub doubtful. It seems it's a common baritone thing. Patrick Warburton the voice actor is a good example when he demonstrates his range. They start to sound like when you lose your voice almost or it just comes back and is breaking. Nevertheless, it sounds absolutely incredible!
I love the doors!! In my early teens I didn't own any of their records... I was 100% into the Beatles. My cousin who's just 3 weeks younger than me loved the doors. He had all the cassettes. We would spend hours listening to either bands and swapping tapes. As we grew older we added a lot to our musical pallets and he still has some great stuff I don't really listen to and vice-versa... The Beatles and the doors are dear to my heart as gateway bands I listened to and learning about the bands they got influenced by and expanding what I listened to!! Great video!!!
I've away loved this song since I was little like 3 or 4. I saw the movie 'lost boys' & was instantly obsessed. Even though its a cover in the movie, my father had the Doors CD so I would listen to it on repeat lol I'm not kidding. Now I'm 35 and still love the song! Thank you for this tribute to an amazingly unique song
I'm very slowly learning both piano and music theory; you have been one of my main teachers of the latter. After watching this video and thinking a bit about your analysis, I was struck with the urge to sit down at the keyboard and try to play the song. What resulted was simpler (and slower) than Manzarek, but captured enough of the key elements to reproduce some of the flavor of the original. I was ecstatic. Thank you for all you have done, and for all that you will do, to help me on this beautiful journey. I greatly appreciate your help. 💜🎵
Im not a musician, I dont really understand music theory, and I cant sing very well at all. But, I love listening to you break it all down, provide insight, and help tell the story of the artist and the music.
Damn jim morrison out here catching strays. At it's heart it's just a song with a catchy melody that swings, and sometimes that's enough. Starting the solo with the last note the singer sung is an old jazz trick and I think they all (well they all sound like they) listened to jazz
Not only did I get to see and chat with you at MAGFest, but your first video afterwards is one of my favorite songs of all time. All in all, a good start to the year.
Great vid as always I'd love to watch you analising anything by Swans but preferably anything from their newer albums I think you'd find a lof interesting stuff going on in their compositions
I was born in '73, so missed The Doors proper, but listened to them a lot. "The Best of..." cassette was in the regular rotation of my Walkman in high school (along with all sorts of things, from Kate Bush to SLAYER!!! (they always need all caps) to Miles Davis to Vivaldi). Really interesting analysis, and I will check out Matt's video. I think my favourite The Doors song is "Touch Me"; it's wild all the way through to "STRONGER THAN DIRT!", and I am a sucker for brass.
As usual, great analysis. People are Strange and When the Music's Over are two of my favorite songs from The Doors. I did not know Robby Krieger gave a guitar lesson for this song, so thanks for pointing that out
Thank you, excellent video. I voted for this one as the most musically interesting off the for options on the poll. However, had it been there, I would probably have voted for Riders on the Storm. There's a fascinating Ray Manzarek interview where he talks about the writing of that, including the difficulties a session bass player had with the perfectly simple bass line he'd come up with on a Fender Rhodes key bass.
I don’t think the album cover is about celebrating collective uniqueness. In fact, I don’t think it’s of celebratory tone at all. It features performers demonstrating their conspicuous strangeness for the entertainment or a crowd that isn’t there (or at least isn’t visible). This creates a feeling of vanity due to the ostensible absurdity of the situation, and then hits you with a haunting realization that the performers don’t realize the crowd for whom they’re performing isn’t real. They are performing for the projections of their mind and are thus lost in themselves without realizing it. Exploration of that irony acts as a creative direction for the entire album, and in the case of People are Strange comes in a form of retrospection on the fact that living in your head makes you feel estranged from reality. Reality begins to appear strange and hostile, and is perpetually haunted by the absurdity of your predicament.
I have to admit I went into this video thinking “best Doors song” is like “least deadly poison,” but I definitely have a better appreciation for this song now. Thanks!
Love your stuff really gives some cool perspective in easy to understand ways! I tend to analyze songs in more metaphorical ways too. P.S you should see if Sharpie will sponsor you, be the poster guy! the sheer amount of sharpie ink you use is prob crazy
25:20 When you talked about the chorus and how it supports the lyrics, as we are all strange, I found myself agreeing wholeheartedly. Also, the name of the song isn't "Some People Are Strange." :) Growing up, The Doors were my favorite band (despite Morrison having died shortly after I was born) and People Are Strange is one of my very favorite songs of theirs, so I was thrilled to see you analyze it.
0:50 lmao that pause made it seem like he was gonna say another song out of the blue: "I immediately knew which song I wanted to talk about... The End, obviously."
Wholly Cow!! How interesting was THIS?!?! I'm a Doors fan...and this was amazing, even to a person that doesn't know much at all about music theory. LOL...in the middle part, when you were trying to figure the complex inversions, etc....the thought dawned on me that "HEY...maybe they were just stoned". And said "hey..go with that". :) Thank you for your great videos. I don't know much about music, but I'm slowly catching on watching your amazing presentations. Thank you! CC
I love the doors. People Are Strange as a good song, but they have so much in their repertoire. Wild child, the changeling, other tunes like that that really bop. Much more solid songs than People Are Strange, and in my opinion, much more impactful.
"Don't lay out the whole thing right away, drop a thing or two, wait a cycle or two, then add it back in" never freakin gets old but it's always nice to notice when it happens.
The entire lp has a Haunted vibe in 67 I was 14 and playing in a band we were even playing at the whiskey a go go because we were pretty good kind of a novelty act to the hippies etc we played many songs from this lp the doors were kinda different from the others cheers ! The Crystal ship is even wielder 😊
The best way I can describe the spooky, almost ethereal vibe of this song is that it would be the song played on the carousel in the novel "Something Wicked This Way Comes"
Great video! I forgot about this song. Given all that you like about this song, I think you might find you enjoy the song Love Her Madly by The Doors as well if you spend some time with it.
Loved this song breakdown! I'd love to see a vid on a Muse song someday, Glorious and Animals come to mind. Not the most popular songs, but they're both super interesting!
I first listened to this as a kid from my dad and it always made me like it. Have you ever listened to Cristina's Is That All There Is? I know it's not the original but that version of the song and People are Strange have always been linked in my head
I spent like the first five minutes trying to place where I've heard this melody before, since this was my first time hearing the song, and I eventually realized that Billie Eilish used something similar in "bury a friend".
I do hope you'll get to Riders on the Storm, it being one of the most popular but I am also very curious; having seen a small documentary on the creation I wonder what the end product looks like from music theory point of view and simple things are the hardest to untangle with that
I liked the Doors as I was growing up. And then my daughter loved the Doors. I did not discourage her from listening to them. Did I say I really liked this video?
The tack piano and the shuffle 12/8 remind me of nothing so much as silent-era cinema. A Pathé news reel is running; Charlie Chaplin is dancing to this. On the principle of "the past is another country," Morrison's narrator is evoking the sound of the generation *before* his parents' generation to say how much he's a stranger in the present. A lot of bands at the time are responding to the divergence between the trajectory their cohort was expected to be at, and where they really are, but this song is doing it in a way that's paradoxically unique, by putting it in a liminal space between generations. Which is probably why it's still accessible to succeeding generations, mine, and then yours.
Like, thinking further about this, you could compare this song on these lines to "Eleanor Rigby" -- they even have similar melodies to go with the similar generational-conflict themes, but the approaches are widely different, and so are the approaches we take to them in this period of time. There's probably a paper in that...but I won't write it, heh.
This song is a big part of why I think "Strange Days" is the Doors' best album, despite the consensus being that it's mostly a bunch of outtakes from the first. They lean into their strengths, avoid most of the aspects of the group that have aged poorly, have more non-blues-based weirdness in there, and end up making a solid hunk of 60s proto-goth carnival music.
![The Dead South - People Are Strange [Official Music Video]](/img/n.gif)
Some additional thoughts/corrections:
1) Go watch Matt's video! ua-cam.com/video/br-Ed3NxjN4/v-deo.html
2) I forgot to include it in the script but Krieger is definitely bending the G in the walkdown up to something resembling a neutral third. Not all the way there, but sharper than a basic G natural. I talk about blue notes later on, but that's another example of one right at the start of the song.
3) Probably could've just said shuffle tresillo and let y'all work out the rest, but I wanted to dive into the math a bit to make clear just how interesting a rhythm it actually is underneath the surface, even if it's really just a combination of two relatively straightforward ideas.
4) To be clear, when I say the B is "pretty much impossible to hear", I don't mean it's literally impossible. Now that I know it's there, if I really listen really carefully, I can hear it. It just would never occur to me to listen for it if I hadn't been poking around with the stems.
5) Another thing that hidden B does is it makes the high G pop a bit more: In the first bar it blends into the existing chord voicing, but in the second, the discontinuity of the supporting harmony makes it feel more prominent. But I think that's also because he has to drop the high A to hit it, and also it sounds like he's just plucking it harder, so there's a lot of factors there.
6) Call me pretentious if you want, but axis theory genuinely was my first thought when looking at those chords. I think it's probably easier to explain that the Imi and bIII have similar functions, but given how much of the explanation about V-I resolutions centers around the leading tone, just saying that didn't feel sufficient. I had to get to "B7 can resolve to G major", and that's not all that intuitive without some more advanced models. (It's also probably true that the simpler Axis Theory explanation would be "G is a secondary tonic on an alternate branch", but this way let me tie back to better-known theories in regards to dominant substitutions.) Was it necessary? No, but it's nice to be able to talk about these things sometimes. I'm excited to see what happens to my viewer retention graph at that point.
7) The D# Morrison sings in the stopping bar I played is actually pretty good, pitch-wise. My comment on him being between D and D# is more an observation of the general pattern, because he is wildly inconsistent in that space.
8) So, about the cross-stick thing. Like I said, I think I screwed up the picture and implied something incorrect, so to clarify, a cross-stick is when you lay a drumstick across a drumhead (typically on a snare) and then tap the end of it onto the rim of the drum. It's a way of playing chiller snare hits that emphasize the initial strike while still getting a somewhat snare-like sound. Apologies for any confusion.
9) I should note that I wouldn't actually describe the bass here as a walking bass, for various technical and stylistic reasons. My point was that it was reminiscent of one, not that it was identical.
10) Fun fact that I didn't know what to do with: Krieger starts his solo on the same note that Morrison ends the preceding verse on.
11) Another observation: In both the second half of the chorus and the guitar solo, Manzarek must play multiple consecutive bars of B7, and while he starts both off the same way, the differences in development are fascinating: In the chorus, he wants to emphasize the start-stop vibe, so he just loops his first-bar pattern over and over, while under the solo it's supposed to feel more continuous, so he evolves the pattern slightly, adjusting the rhythm to create a genuine two-bar phrase.
Please Breakdown music for Poor Things film. I dig stuff. Dude.
I always knew people were strange, but I never realized just how strange this song was. :)
It was an honor to collaborate with you!
I came here from your video on The Doors. Another brilliant one.
Just watched your video. Great job!
mr breast give me music
How do you guys know each other?
Hi Mr. Beat!
Morrison adjusting his vocal range to follow Krieger isn't real. It cant hurt you.
Morrison adjusting his vocal range: 8:14
The Doors' music has always had a _haunted_ quality for me, sense of something surreal and otherworldly. This song exemplifies that perfectly.
Like dark carnival music at an old circus where they still had sideshow freaks and the carnies all had criminal records
I want to address how cool it is when Morrison introduces Manzarek's solo by moaning "alright yeah." One of the classic examples of a classic blues/rock move.
See also I believe in a thing called love by the darkness, where the singer squeals "Guitar!" Before the guitar solo. Or, even better, in Superfreak when the singer goes "Blow, daddy!"
@@noviatoria2436but was he asking danny to play the saxophone, or was he asking danny for more coke, the solo just being a coincidence?
Eddie Vedder famously said both, “fuck it up” and “make me cry” before two of my favorite rock solos ever
In Garbage Man by the Cramps, Lux goes "awww dump it on the ground" before a very noisy messy solo. Always thought it was cool asf
Always said. The band played around Morrisons singing/talking. Rather then the singer following the band beat.
Spot on, and it contributes immensely to their vibe.
@@bloodysmurf i guess it stemed from Morrison being into the beat poets from that era. And that the fact that morrison was not the most sober state of mind.
In those early years.
I'd say that's pretty accurate since a lot of their songs started as Morrisons poems
That's the magic of The Doors. By any ordinary technical standard, Jim Morrison was a terrible singer -- range of an octave or so, often badly flat on high notes, and so on. Yet somehow, that voice works perfectly as part of the band's music.
@@isomemeThat's why the technical aspect of singing is the least important one. The singer is the agent for our feelings in a song, it's his job to convey them. It may not always be pretty, but feelings are often not pretty, so technical proficiency could work against you.
"Don't look at the runtime"
Me, a fool: *Immediately looks at the runtime*
If that doesn't work for Hbomberguy, it's not gonna work for 12Tone!
and shouts YES because I love long videos :D
I went to check the runtime right as he said it shouldn't take long to analyze, cuz I felt he was lying, and then he said not to and drew a puppy and I got distracted.
Thanks for this! I have a special place for the Doors. They were my Mom's favorite band. She called Jim Morrison, "Jimbo". She saw them live. RIP Mom!
My parents also saw them live in LA at the Whisky a Go Go...
12Tone: "I never really got the Doors"
Also 12Tone: makes this video
That intro isolated guitar part sounded like it was going into Don't Fear the Reaper. I never heard that in the original.
Ahah I thought the same.
One of the best songs by one of my favorite bands. Great to get a double feature for The Doors
The Doors == "Haunted Cabaret music." I love them.
imagine Primus and the Doors collab
The Echo and the Bunnymen cover was produced by Doors' keyboardist, Ray Manzarek.
I listened to a lot of the Doors in the late 90's and early 2000's. That wasn't the time when it came out and it probably meant something different to me than it meant to the people who first heard it in the 60's. It meant something else to you and it will mean something else to someone discovering it today. I think that is what makes it great and sort of timeless when new generations discover it and what it means for them.
You don't have to be an "EXPERT". Personally, I'm glad you aren't.
Remember, you are 12Tone, and that is why we keep coming back. Just do your thing.
Thank you for taking the time to explain the Tritone sub/backdoor var/secondary dom relationship resolving B to G. I've never felt I understood their relationship, and why it works (beyond G being the relative major to Em). This made a lot of sense to me.
I appreciate that you figured out how to get the cover in there.
I think When the Music’s Over might be their best song. Jim’s vocal is so good and his screams are ridiculous. He, along with the rest of the band do so many different, unusual things in that song. It’s complex and unique.
Is that the MBTA logo you drew at 15:40 to represent "this uneven start-stop pattern"? 10/10. Your drawings are, as always, perfectly on point.
that is definitely our reliably unreliable mbta
I first heard the doors on a record player from my dad's collection. It was the late 80s, so it still wasn't that distant from the period when it was made, and the 60s still were having an influence on the world were grew up in, so I found it easy to connect to
I think my first Doors song was in the Intro Montage for Tony Hawks Underground 2. What a game, and with such a wide range of music. Really kicked off my musical journey at 10 years old.
"Aggressively unstable" is a perfect description of most Doors songs and probably the band too. Great video.
Wait, you like it because it has "a dark, complex soundscape, driving beat and cryptic story...? That's *every* frickin Doors song!
Literally lol
The "conversations" Between different members of the band/instruments have always stood out to me. It makes me think of the stranger character walking through crowds of people talking. The pauses/stabs feel like the conversations stopping as people around pause and look at our character judging him silently before making their decision on how to react.
Morrison had a huge range actually, he could hit bartione notes and also very high even above tenor range with whistle tones in some live stuff. That being said he was often off exact pitch due to his substance abuse but to say he said a somewhat limited vocal range is not right to me.
B7 to G is basically like a backwards deceptive cadence. Instead of D7 to Em instead of G, it's B7 to G instead of Em.
Yup. That annoyed me. Just not true.
This was well explained and shows your thorough appreciations and love for this song
I'm a bass player, and I love playing the bassline to this song. It always reminds me of a fairground steam organ.
I have a huge appreciation for the Doors. I don’t care how big your house is, if you dont have a door, you are either homeless or in prison, no other way about it.
Great video. Would like to see Joy Division's Disorder. 100% there are some things you'll love to get into
I have 0 musical skills or talent.
I sing like a cat in heat that's trying to hit all the notes at once, and sheet music might as well be the Riemann hypothesis... that said, your channel has made me appreciate the art, beauty, psychology, and science that is music.
Thank you!!!
It will never not blow my mind that this channel doesn't have 10 million followers.
I think Jim had a higher range than you are giving him credit for. He just didn’t sing high that often, but listening to his amazing screams he could definitely hit high notes and I think could have gotten pretty great at it had he cared to, or wanted to. He loved Elvis and Sinatra. He loved singing in a deep baritone.
Jim's voice breaks. I doubt he would have been able to sing in that falsetto range, maybe dub doubtful. It seems it's a common baritone thing. Patrick Warburton the voice actor is a good example when he demonstrates his range.
They start to sound like when you lose your voice almost or it just comes back and is breaking.
Nevertheless, it sounds absolutely incredible!
I love the doors!! In my early teens I didn't own any of their records... I was 100% into the Beatles. My cousin who's just 3 weeks younger than me loved the doors. He had all the cassettes. We would spend hours listening to either bands and swapping tapes. As we grew older we added a lot to our musical pallets and he still has some great stuff I don't really listen to and vice-versa... The Beatles and the doors are dear to my heart as gateway bands I listened to and learning about the bands they got influenced by and expanding what I listened to!!
Great video!!!
I've away loved this song since I was little like 3 or 4.
I saw the movie 'lost boys'
& was instantly obsessed.
Even though its a cover in the movie, my father had the Doors CD so I would listen to it on repeat lol
I'm not kidding.
Now I'm 35 and still love the song!
Thank you for this tribute to an amazingly unique song
Echo and the Bunnymen. Not a bad version and actually produced by Manzarek.
@@fnjesusfreak Thats a great movie!
I'm very slowly learning both piano and music theory; you have been one of my main teachers of the latter. After watching this video and thinking a bit about your analysis, I was struck with the urge to sit down at the keyboard and try to play the song. What resulted was simpler (and slower) than Manzarek, but captured enough of the key elements to reproduce some of the flavor of the original. I was ecstatic.
Thank you for all you have done, and for all that you will do, to help me on this beautiful journey. I greatly appreciate your help. 💜🎵
Im not a musician, I dont really understand music theory, and I cant sing very well at all. But, I love listening to you break it all down, provide insight, and help tell the story of the artist and the music.
Damn jim morrison out here catching strays.
At it's heart it's just a song with a catchy melody that swings, and sometimes that's enough.
Starting the solo with the last note the singer sung is an old jazz trick and I think they all (well they all sound like they) listened to jazz
I forgot to add: good video great analysis
3/4 of them anyway
Not only did I get to see and chat with you at MAGFest, but your first video afterwards is one of my favorite songs of all time. All in all, a good start to the year.
Your videos are so good at addressing my thoughts and questions as they occur to me while watching your videos
The song that made me start loving this band, great vid.
The first band I ever really became obsessed with. Love Her Madly is my favourite.. love everything by them. 4 genius musicians.. Love this ❤
One of my favorite songs by one of my favorite bands. So glad you covered it!
this video rlly got it all. the echo&the bunnymen shout, the mimikyu drawing. i love it
praying for an Ocean Rain video🙏🙏🙏
Great vid as always I'd love to watch you analising anything by Swans but preferably anything from their newer albums I think you'd find a lof interesting stuff going on in their compositions
I was born in '73, so missed The Doors proper, but listened to them a lot. "The Best of..." cassette was in the regular rotation of my Walkman in high school (along with all sorts of things, from Kate Bush to SLAYER!!! (they always need all caps) to Miles Davis to Vivaldi). Really interesting analysis, and I will check out Matt's video. I think my favourite The Doors song is "Touch Me"; it's wild all the way through to "STRONGER THAN DIRT!", and I am a sucker for brass.
As usual, great analysis. People are Strange and When the Music's Over are two of my favorite songs from The Doors. I did not know Robby Krieger gave a guitar lesson for this song, so thanks for pointing that out
Yoo, another 12tone video!
I'd love you to review a Muse song.
I was randomly thinking about the Doors the other day. I liked them a lot as a teenager, got several of their CDs. Very unique band.
Thank you, excellent video.
I voted for this one as the most musically interesting off the for options on the poll. However, had it been there, I would probably have voted for Riders on the Storm. There's a fascinating Ray Manzarek interview where he talks about the writing of that, including the difficulties a session bass player had with the perfectly simple bass line he'd come up with on a Fender Rhodes key bass.
I love this song! Nice to learn some new about an old favorite
I was at MAGFest and your panel on Halo Theme was absolutely amazing; I think it would be worth making a video about it
You and Mr. Beat collaborating is awesome
I don’t think the album cover is about celebrating collective uniqueness. In fact, I don’t think it’s of celebratory tone at all. It features performers demonstrating their conspicuous strangeness for the entertainment or a crowd that isn’t there (or at least isn’t visible). This creates a feeling of vanity due to the ostensible absurdity of the situation, and then hits you with a haunting realization that the performers don’t realize the crowd for whom they’re performing isn’t real. They are performing for the projections of their mind and are thus lost in themselves without realizing it. Exploration of that irony acts as a creative direction for the entire album, and in the case of People are Strange comes in a form of retrospection on the fact that living in your head makes you feel estranged from reality. Reality begins to appear strange and hostile, and is perpetually haunted by the absurdity of your predicament.
I have to admit I went into this video thinking “best Doors song” is like “least deadly poison,” but I definitely have a better appreciation for this song now. Thanks!
Hell yeah! Great to see the captions are back.
Cheers from MAG and thanks again for coming!
Loved the Wishbone cameo!
Could you do an analysis of Kashmir by Led Zeppelin?
Love your stuff really gives some cool perspective in easy to understand ways! I tend to analyze songs in more metaphorical ways too.
P.S you should see if Sharpie will sponsor you, be the poster guy! the sheer amount of sharpie ink you use is prob crazy
I absolutely love your content. Great job on this one.
25:20 When you talked about the chorus and how it supports the lyrics, as we are all strange, I found myself agreeing wholeheartedly. Also, the name of the song isn't "Some People Are Strange." :) Growing up, The Doors were my favorite band (despite Morrison having died shortly after I was born) and People Are Strange is one of my very favorite songs of theirs, so I was thrilled to see you analyze it.
Thanks for your analysis, and introducing me to such a cool song! ❤
0:50 lmao that pause made it seem like he was gonna say another song out of the blue: "I immediately knew which song I wanted to talk about... The End, obviously."
Wholly Cow!! How interesting was THIS?!?! I'm a Doors fan...and this was amazing, even to a person that doesn't know much at all about music theory.
LOL...in the middle part, when you were trying to figure the complex inversions, etc....the thought dawned on me that "HEY...maybe they were just stoned".
And said "hey..go with that".
:)
Thank you for your great videos. I don't know much about music, but I'm slowly catching on watching your amazing presentations.
Thank you!
CC
I love the doors. People Are Strange as a good song, but they have so much in their repertoire. Wild child, the changeling, other tunes like that that really bop. Much more solid songs than People Are Strange, and in my opinion, much more impactful.
I can't understand half the things you talk about but regardless it makes me think more about the actual sound of the songs I listen to
"Don't lay out the whole thing right away, drop a thing or two, wait a cycle or two, then add it back in" never freakin gets old but it's always nice to notice when it happens.
Great video! This is one of my favorite Doors song.
Always I watch this kind of analisys I want to write a song. Ty.
I didnt even know this song! Now I am hooked!! Such a cool sound and such interesting lyrics ^-^
The entire lp has a Haunted vibe in 67 I was 14 and playing in a band we were even playing at the whiskey a go go because we were pretty good kind of a novelty act to the hippies etc we played many songs from this lp the doors were kinda different from the others cheers ! The Crystal ship is even wielder 😊
i had a really bad day today, but seeing this video in my feed made me feel at least a bit better
it's cheesy but true
okay, the choice of wile e coyote for the 'not very technical' line is genius
I think RM would sometimes use a Rhodes piano bass live. (Rhodes piano with range E1 -> B3, IIRC)
The best way I can describe the spooky, almost ethereal vibe of this song is that it would be the song played on the carousel in the novel "Something Wicked This Way Comes"
Do Strange Days next
The interrupted walk down is actually the same pentatonic melody as the second phrase of the verse, like on "when _you're a stranger."_
8:18 god damn you
17:35 He would normally use a Fender Rhodes Bass on his left hand. I don't know if the Continental was ever used for bass...
Not only this song, but The Doors' first, second and last album are actually very amazing
Great video! I forgot about this song. Given all that you like about this song, I think you might find you enjoy the song Love Her Madly by The Doors as well if you spend some time with it.
I'm also not a big Doors fan, and I also love this song.
Loved this song breakdown! I'd love to see a vid on a Muse song someday, Glorious and Animals come to mind. Not the most popular songs, but they're both super interesting!
I first listened to this as a kid from my dad and it always made me like it.
Have you ever listened to Cristina's Is That All There Is? I know it's not the original but that version of the song and People are Strange have always been linked in my head
I spent like the first five minutes trying to place where I've heard this melody before, since this was my first time hearing the song, and I eventually realized that Billie Eilish used something similar in "bury a friend".
My favorite part of the song has always been the backing vocals which is unusual in the Doors canon
Love the doors - love your videos - more Doors!
I do hope you'll get to Riders on the Storm, it being one of the most popular but I am also very curious; having seen a small documentary on the creation I wonder what the end product looks like from music theory point of view and simple things are the hardest to untangle with that
This and Strange Days are my favorite doors songs
Weird request I know, but PLEASE analyze 'when the sun hits' by slowdive
Ok, this clarifies what I'll be doing the next *checks runtime* 28 minutes.
I liked the Doors as I was growing up. And then my daughter loved the Doors. I did not discourage her from listening to them. Did I say I really liked this video?
The Doors' best song? Debatable. My favorite Doors song? Definitely. Thank you.
The tack piano and the shuffle 12/8 remind me of nothing so much as silent-era cinema. A Pathé news reel is running; Charlie Chaplin is dancing to this. On the principle of "the past is another country," Morrison's narrator is evoking the sound of the generation *before* his parents' generation to say how much he's a stranger in the present. A lot of bands at the time are responding to the divergence between the trajectory their cohort was expected to be at, and where they really are, but this song is doing it in a way that's paradoxically unique, by putting it in a liminal space between generations. Which is probably why it's still accessible to succeeding generations, mine, and then yours.
Like, thinking further about this, you could compare this song on these lines to "Eleanor Rigby" -- they even have similar melodies to go with the similar generational-conflict themes, but the approaches are widely different, and so are the approaches we take to them in this period of time. There's probably a paper in that...but I won't write it, heh.
Hello Mr. Tone. Would you consider a video on "For a Dancer" by Jackson Browne?
Has anyone also noticed that this song gives a lot of influence to Dexter Main Title, Rolfe Kent's opening theme for the TV show Dexter?
Love to see a video on..Not To Touch The Earth..not that I’d understand it..
Manzarek used a Fender Rhodes bass keyboard live, not his lower organ notes
Thanks 12Tone.
This song is a big part of why I think "Strange Days" is the Doors' best album, despite the consensus being that it's mostly a bunch of outtakes from the first. They lean into their strengths, avoid most of the aspects of the group that have aged poorly, have more non-blues-based weirdness in there, and end up making a solid hunk of 60s proto-goth carnival music.
That whammy bar ending is... ominous
Sick Sideways cameo at 15:46
If you saw an Emil(from Nier Replicant) cosplay with a big plastic head at Magfest, I did a bunch of the work on that head existing!😊