Jim Morrison's life was filled with the events of which legends are made. No mere rock singer, he was both godlike and pompous, sensual and piggish, never existing on a middle ground. Seven years have passed since his death, and time is notorious for making what once seemed shattering, merely quaint. An album of accompanied Morrison recitations, some feared, would sound so dated it could tarnish the Doors legacy. But An American Prayer … remains decisive, possessing the ability to operate outside of time while making the listener painfully aware of Morrison's irrevocable departure.

No matter that [Martin Scorsese's] Taxi Driver, Patti Smith and the Son of Sam have all made headlines since Morrison recited these poems on his last birthday in 1970. They only point out how much was learned from the Doors and Jim Morrison, how doomed life casts its unique unhealthy glow. Morrison's epic of plunder and...