I don't have one, I have several (I've been a Doors fan for a long time), but "Five To One" used to make it onto a lot of the mixtapes I made for people, when I was a kid.
I remember an interview with a band member recalling a time where the cops were stacked up , waiting to bust the band for profanity, with the band playing the music's over and hoping nothing would happen, but then , when Jim got to his mothers room part of the song, he said, "the Word" and things just went crazy
this is a master piece of a album. to have a dark song like "the end" in 1967 is pretty monumental by itself. no one sounded like the doors. all 4 members were meant to be in a band together, they had that perfect synergy every band hopes to achieve.
The fact Jim Morrison was "difficult" makes the superb music the Doors created even more astounding. Light My Fire is a sublime masterpiece. Perhaps better albums were to follow but this debut album was a sign of what was to be created during their career. Great video. Regards from England.
Do wonder where his bust is! That the crooks maybe gave, sold or just let their kids inherit it. For that matter did the fella just bring a hacksaw and saw off the bolt I guess? At his grave there was the bolts remnants where you could tell it was, on the top. Eventually in zomer hands heh heh
@@abigaildevoe Totally disagree. Jim had a concert in his head and wrote and inspired the majority of the Doors songs via his vocal melodies and lyrics. Those melodies dictated the vast majority of The Doors music. If he was an unhinged lunatic that never would've happened.
Manzarek’s playing was a huge contribution and the jazz reference is dead on. The Doors came from a time and place heavily influenced by Latin music; Getz/Gilberto, Sergio Mendes, Tijuana Brass and others were big then (though more so with our parents), and Mexican garage rock was also pervasive here in SoCal. Manzarek lent these influences and killer left-hand bass lines to Doors material. Densmore was also amazing…his airy, jazzy beats often made Morrison’s poetic hallucinations more profound.
No one mentions the Tijuana Brass anymore but I remember as a child they were HUGE in the Sixties and on the radio constantly. It's really amazing how few Rock acts or songs were even nominated for Grammys in the 60s
As Densmore said in his biography and Krieger recently said in an interview: The most important thing is Jim Morrison's natural talent for composing melodies in his head. Jim used to say he wrote lyrics just to remember the melodies, but the people is obsessed with seeing him as a poet and a singer when really the difference is his melodies. Even Krieger admitted that Jim changed the melody of Light My Fire to improve it: you can hear Krieger's original melody in the rehearsal scene in the Oliver Stone movie because Krieger played it that way for the actor.
interesting! i never gave that element much thought. i always thought jim's strength was his presence and delivery: even if the lyrics weren't the best, he made you believe them
Yes of course. But The Beatles are The Beatles because of their melodies and The Doors are The Doors because of their melodies (mostly arising from Jim's unconscious). By the way, I love your channel: You are totally on my wavelength, and I love your sense of humor. A loud applause.@@abigaildevoe
💯Great comment. Jim had a concert in his head according to the other band members and his melodies and lyrics were the backbone of the majority of the Doors music. Jim was a genius and I hate when he's not given his proper due. I hate that awful Oliver Stone Doors movie. It's a total insult to Jim's memory.
One of the best "late night" albums ever made by one of the best ever groups. Jim seemed to have everything---intelligence, charisma, sex appeal, and vision. . . . and he was unhinged. That last part is what made the Doors exceptional---Jim could channel that crazed element of his personality and put it into the songs, supercharging them with it.
Indeed. This album is definitely a nighttime album. ESPECIALLY a chilly fall night. I can't get into listening to Crystal Ship, End Of The Night or The End outside on a bright sunny warm afternoon day. Just doesn't work.
@@jimfiscus1248 Almost all of the songs on this album (and all the other Doors albums) have a bass guitar track, either played by a session bassist or overdubbed by Robbie.
Not just Densmore but Ian Paice, John Bonham, Ginger Baker, Mitch Mitchell even Bill Ward were all taught by jazz drummers and had jazz chops, I think swing is an important part of all their playing
Indeed, as jazz is the hardest type of music to play! If you can play jazz, you can play anything. Sometimes jazz is more "rock" than rock music. Haha!
This was another delight from you. While LA WOMAN is my personal favorite, your video essay here, makes me want to go back and compare all of them again. Your work is quite rewatchable. There’s so much there. I often feel like I need to take notes. Thank you for all the great work you do.
The way you talk about this album is so regal, it makes it feel like you're taking us on a tour through an art gallery of sound. Nobody talks about modern music like this, treating each track as a piece of history. Although there's probably a reason for that.
Growing up my mom had an old hippie friend that lived in Haight-Ashbury in the mid to late 60’s, she had stories galore, the Lizard King was often featured in them. As a teenager in the early 80’s I was amazed at that period and loved every discussion with her, most involved some “substance” to start the conversation.
I really love this album. As much as I love all of The Door’s discography, this album has always stuck out to me. It has such an almost supernatural quality to it that it’s really impossible to focus on anything else but the album itself.
I've listened to this album for so many years ingrained into my soul since junior high in the late early 90s, that it's weird to me when people say it's flawed. That's like claiming the Mona Lisa is flawed.
Light My Fire was the first "Song of the Summer" I know that became a thing later but that was a time when music was just bigger in everyone's life. Even parents knew every word of the song they hated.
I really appreciate what you’re doing with this site. The Production value, your personality, and the delivery - as well as the extensive Research, honesty, and genuine love of the music. And the schtick is wonderful!
Four or five years ago, I was lucky enough to find The Doors' first record album, 'The Doors', at my local Value Village for only $2.00 along with some other great albums that particular thrift-hunting day. I had bought the CD many years earlier in my college days as well as a still-sealed vinyl record, but to find a very gently used, pristine record album from my local Value Village was a great score indeed. :)
I bought The Doors' debut LP when it hit the record store shelves. As with albums by The Beatles, Cream, Love, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, and The Pink Floyd, I never left it behind in the 1960s. Even my Ma and Grandma loved "Light My Fire."
My favorite band! Love everything about them! The sound, the vibe, the kind of dark sense of foreboding that seemed to come to the band so effortlessly. Strange Days is their best, but the debut is undeniable.
The Doors remain in my top 5 bands of all time. After 50+ years, they still sound fresh and different from anything else. When you hear them, you immediately know it's them, and even their weakest numbers are still better than a lot of bands' best.
One of my favorite bands, and first musical influences. I love this album in particular, you know 1967 was a wonderful year for music. The first songs I heard and saw on video from them were the two obvious ones "Light My Fire", and "Break On Through (To The Other Side)" and a live version of "The End". The wonderful thing about this band was that at the time, along with The Velvet Underground (another of my favorites from the 1960's), they were the only two bands that spoke outside the box of the Hippie movement, that spoke about the darkest aspects of the mind, and human behavior, and about the misery of humanity itself. The first album I heard from them was the compilation "The Best Of The Doors" (1985) on vinyl, thanks to my parents' record collection, then I got it for myself on that classic Double Fat Box CD, also one of my first 10 CDs in life. I still have it and keep it as a nice memory of when music began to be my favorite hobby, and when I became a musician. I have always thought that the popularity of Jim Morrison's image and person overshadows the talent of the other three guys. John Densmore is a very good drummer with his Jazz, R&B and Blues touch. Robby Krieger makes some very interesting licks and riffs, direct and appropriate for the songs. Ray Manzarek for me was the genius behind the band's music, he was the musical director, the visionary, his sound and style gave the unique atmosphere that the band had.
A debut masterpiece. Faves on this lp: The Crystal Ship, Back Door Man, The End, End of The Night, with Break on Through seeming to sum up what the counter culture was all about, breaking societal boundaries ("to the other side").
70's FM Radio...the only way I learned of the Doors. Late to the party for sure, Summer of '71 Jim passed away. I still did not really appreciate the Doors until 1977. And did not know ALL their past albums until cd box set 1998. They set a high mark for Studio sounding perfect. The band members and Jim seemed to have very DIFFERENT goals in mind. The Doors were a Power House! 50th Anniversary Albums now too!
Forever Changes and now The Doors! Two favourites. You can't underestimate the weight and force of the breakthrough of this album. I bought this on release on holiday and 4 of us lay around listening to it on a sunny afternoon in a Jersey guest house, the stunned landlady walking in as The End played! The guitar break in Light My Fire still sends a tingle down the spine. A great 6 album ride ending with the superb Riders On the Storm. Another great review Abigail.
Of course, one of the finest debut albums ever but “ The End “ for me will always be the ultimate Doors song, thanks to its appropriate use in Apocalypse Now. From one masterpiece to another. And you hit the nail on the head with Ray. He was more valuable to the success of the Doors than most people ever gave him credit for.
Having been in my prime teenage years when this album was released, I can tell you the Doors and this album was so new and fresh sounding in a time when so many bands had their own fresh sound. When I hear this album I hear the soundtrack to my life an the world around me.
Growing up as a kid in the '70s, the Doors were the favored band among the blue collar teens I knew, the guys who wore a lot of denim, leather and bandanas and the girls in tight jeans and tube tops. They seemed to dig whatever head trip the music and lyrics -- "the poetry" -- the band offered, and Jim Morrison was at that point a legend, a poster on your wall above the incense and drum cigarettes and wine bottle candle. When I finally got into the band as a teen in the 80's, I read No One Here Gets Out Alive, and listened to this album incessantly. I think my Doors fixation lasted until Oliver Stone killed it when his ridiculous biopic came out in my freshman year in college. At some point in the 90s it was not cool to like The Doors, but I always insisted their counter cultural message was proto-punk.
when it became uncool I was even more motivated to embrace the band..... frequently mischaracterized but never forgotten.... theyve outlived nearly all their peers in the industry. morrison was a inconsistent wreckless indiv. But his genius & talents w were truly rarified.
The first door album is by favorite my favorite Doors lp. Sometimes I have problems with the whole deification of there output, and Jim Morrison in general, but this album definitely puts them in the canon. It's got to be the greatest debut album of all time!
This has to be my favourite doors album. They really nailed it on the first try although all their albums with Jim Morrison are great. Also I love the appreciation for Alabama song, one of my favourites on the album. That song always sounded pretty Halloween-ish to me. (Second edit) I disagree about take it as it comes. Obviously a very sexual song but I love the energy and the keyboard solo is among the best on the album, not forgettable to me. This is a personal 10/10 album
Oh my god, you are amazing, young lady! I am blown away by your knowledge! The Doors are the archetype of the band of the sinister and the seekers.The truth may be found in the Beatles and Dylan, but the unconventional discoveries will be made with the Doors.
actually morrison picked up the rock & revealed a dark deep truth most americans werent willing to face. he played the pouty troubled rockstar. but when he was dialed in & was playing for keeps, he had diamond eyes in re to the power stratification of our culture & what made it tick. he rivaled dylan in that regards & both had no peers in that regards.
The beauty of "Take It As It Comes" is that it's a perfect slice of '66 era go-go pop (worthy of a Nuggets compilation). It has all the authenticity of a regional garage hit, except written and recorded by the Doors. It could have been a less ambitious band's one hit.
I’m very fond of “Break on through “. I can see why they cut out the “she gets high” bit thou ! The Byrds couldn’t even get “Eight miles high” on the radio in 1966 ! Lol
Really, what was wrong with programmers back then? "Getting high" as a phrase doesn't sound obscene. If any self-appointed censor would see a problem with the phrase, I'd have to ask "President Reagan", "Mike Pence" or "Karen" if their children ever "got high" or if they themselves partook.
@@farrellmcnulty909reminds me of the huge uproar of Billy Boy talking about yes I used to smoke weed but didn't inhale it, and the Satanic panic ladies had tv ads like "and then, in front of our children , he said this" talk about blowin smoke
I have to say I grew up with The Doors. I got to see them in 69 when Soft Parade was the new thing. It's not as high on the general Doors fave list but I like Touch Me. But Light My Fire and Love Me Two Times are my favorites.
"Age 5". Are you sure about that?? My fave tune when I was five years old was "Nellie the Elephant". You must have been very advanced for your age. I feel so inadequate by comparison 😞
@@shelleylyme6402 .. and yet I know nothing of Nellie. My parents were in a west coast band in the 60s, so my soundtrack was questionable for children. I was reportedly singing Light My Fire along with the car radio, they asked me what it was about, and I let them know a guy was inviting a girl over for a BBQ. Rather than correct me, they nodded.
"That piano flickers like candlelight." Yeah, so I might have to weave that into one of my lyrics someday. If you don't mind. I'll be happy to thank you in the liner notes of my album. Whenever that thing manages to get done. And if it makes any money (🤞), you are so getting something in your UA-cam tip jar! 😃
I've been revisiting albums from your reviews that i haven't listened to for years. I've currently got Twentieth Century Fox running round my head. Keep up the good work
Morrison Hotel will always be my favorite Doors record, the others are probably all a tie for me. That said, I’ve loved everything they ever did (with Jim) since forever.
"Break on Through" was in a Tony Hawk's game which is how I fell in love with it. Years later I borrowed a compilation from my nephew's father, and it had the uncensored version on it with the full "she get HIGH!" line intact. My dad loves singing The Doors at karaoke or on open mic nights. This album in particular was one I fell in love with when I really started taking vinyl seriously
I can't remember what rock critic wrote this about the Doors first album, but it's perfect: "The Beatles and the Stones are for destroying your minds, the Doors are for afterward." The Doors debut is an obvious classic....and it lives up to its legend......but it's not my fave. That would go to the follow-up Strange Days......although for a while it was Morrison Hotel/Hard Rock Cafe. Light My Fire and The End are still epic.....and there are soooooooo many great deep cuts like Take it As it Comes, Soul Kitchen and especially Twentieth Century Fox. That cover of Back Door Man is also spine-tingling. Great video once again!
I don't think it's the "If you listen to the Doors you're uncool" but more of a "if you're uncool listen to the Doors". In a way they made music for introverts, rejected, lonely, those types of people. Similarly how decades later The Smiths were music for uncool of the 80s
Between 60s comeback of the 80s and the one of the 90s at least how I remember. Hippie stuff sucked and everybody would be like "the 60s are over!" then got big again for stoner kids, The Doots with the other top 60s legends, teens at 90s Grateful Dead shows, you could sometimes get bell bottoms new at the store before that quit bein a big deal etc. I purposely embraced 60s/70s for blatant social subversion but then very soon after a buncha the high school kids thought I was one of em
gosh we really are in spooky season... i have never seen the eye in the letter d at 3:25. My favourite doors song is 'When The Music's Over'. Love your videos, Layla!!!
Oh my GAWD I’m sorry, but this will be a longer-ish response. I’m bursting at the seams here. Hopefully I won’t bore you. The Doors pretty much saved my life in high school. They were my cornermen in that helllish world, where I I was an outcast like Jim. “No One Here Gets Out Alive” had just been published. I read it three times back-to-back-to-back, and sometimes I’d just flip to a random page and take on that aspect of Jim for the day. My HS yearbooks (I made my own. I was such a rebel) are full of “You remind me of Jim Morrison, mannnnn.” The lasting legacy is that Jim made a writer out of me. He was/is an idol of mine but he also taught me how to be my own best iconoclast. Jim needed the Doors, and The Doors needed Jim. They set themselves up as a Diamond on stage, a configuration that they felt was sacred. I met both Jac Holzman and Robby Krieger on “The World Series of Doors Trivia.” It’s on UA-cam and worth watching, if only for the moment I playfully diss Robby Krieger. Whiskey Bar is THE song that turned Holzman on during that set at the Whisky. He thought it utterly audacious that a band would take on that song, and he loved their version. I do, too. It’s one of their finest moments. Live, they often did a medley of Whiskey Bar/Back Door Man/Five to One. Phenomenal when Jim was in the mood. The bold statement I’ll make that’s sure to get some eyes rolling is that I believe Jim to have been an authentic Shaman. Check out the live version of The End in Toronto, 1967. He betrayed the gift (was it really that the spirit of a dying Navajo jumped into his brain when he was five? Who knows, but what a great story). A true Shaman must go through a traumatic disorganization of the senses. That’s what Jim did on that rooftop in Venice, gobbling all that LSD and “taking notes at a fantastic rock concert in [his] head.” Jim came to California with his Junior College sweetheart Mary Werbelow. He loved her and was absolutely devastated that she left him. He claimed that the first two albums were about her. “The End” began life as a heartbroken goodbye to her and then morphed into the ever-changing masterpiece we know today. It doesn’t appear that Jim and Mary were as toxic together as Jim and Pamela, whom I think of as his woman by default. Ray saw the Shaman in Jim, moreso than the others, and it was Ray who stuck with him no matter what. He was the only one who remained on stage with him as the stage collapsed in Miami, and at the other concert (the name of the venue escapes me, but it’s the one that inspired Iggy, who was in the crowd). Jim was dead serious about his vision, right up until the time the other three sold “Light My Fire “ to Buick. He never got over that betrayal, and pretty much let the vision go at that point. If the Doors had only recorded the first two albums, we’d probably think of them as we do Joy Division. Jim was in actuality a big dork. It’s possible that he had an actual allergy to alcohol (due to the lack of a certain enzyme), as plenty of witnesses attest to him drinking a ridiculous amount of booze and being completely lucid, then all of a sudden turning into an absolute maniac when it hit him all at once. Jim liked rolling the dice that way, though. “Drugs are a bet with your mind.” So much more I’d like to say. I’m amassing info for a book I’m going to write about Jim as an artist inspired by The French Symbolist poets, reflecting on what it was like to discover The Doors in fake-as-f$#k Southern California in 1980. As is the case with most of the titles of Books about Jim, I’ll use a line of his poetry for mine: “To Come of Age in a Dry Place.” Be on the lookout. Thank you for consistently pulling off the miracle of making Mondays something to look forward to.
Being born in 1999 definitely qualifies you to be a 20th Century Fox, if you think it's too late, I implore you to reconsider, maybe nature was saving her best for last....
Great to hear a mention of William S Harvey, his beautiful record cover designs for Elektra are amazing. No wonder the british 80s band Felt did a tribute, Song For William S Harvey on their 1986 album Let The Snakes Crinkle Their Heads To Death.
For the first time, Lovely Lady, our favourite tracks align! Although people say The Beatles personified the 60s, to m the decade is best remembered for the Doors and Jimi. Loved the background info, as geeky usual. Your workload must be massive to turn these out weekly. So thanks.
One of my favourite albums; like many classic albums it has a rush and a spontaneity to it. The End is loaded and powerful and pre- empts Manson and Altamont; the dark side of the sixties. Robin Witting England
Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht composed Alabama song for the German stage in the late 1920s before they had to escape N**i persecution. In 1967 my friend Steve Hansen called me and said "get up here, now!" and I mounted my Schwinn Stingray (coolest bicycle on earth) and rode up the hill to see what my rich-kid friend was so excited about. We were 13 and 14. I wouldn't smoke weed for another two years however when the album played I was changed. It was like music from a dangerous planet full of poets and killers. I couldn't speak, I couldn't move. Light My Fire, the "radio version" (chopped down to three minutes) was climbing the charts in L.A. and brave DJs were playing the full seven minute version and we lost our shite when the long version (with all of the solos) came on. Now I had just experienced the whole album. I felt comatose. Our schoolbus driver, Mister O' Minor, had taped a transistor radio to his PA microphone and clicked on a local rock station. The timing was perfect. The rimshot and organ intro blasted throughout the bus speakers and Light My Fire came on. Most of the kids on the bus hadn't heard the album version with solos. As the yellow bus drifted around the banked curves of Sunset Boulevard we had entered another reality that I can't even begin to describe. The bus arrived at Paul Revere Junior High School (public) in Brentwood and many of the kids from the bus were changed forever. Magic School Bus, indeed. I saw Cream that year but oddly enough I never saw the Doors.
Yet another 'get out of my head!' experience watching/listening to this fantastic essay. A++. You nailed discussing the 3 musicians & their talents & depth. I used to play a fairly beat up 45rpm single of Light My Fire as a child a lot.. the B-side was The Crystal Ship... holy hell did that track mesmerize me. I literally LOL'd when you yelled out the "and walked on down the hall" bit 😂. You're doing 'God's' work & she would be proud.
Your copy of the LP is a late 1970s or early 1980s press. For it to be from '70, the "E" on the label would need to be huge. The smaller "E" is a later press.
Electra was called Love Land, but then became Doors Land. It helps to know that Jim and Ray were film students and knew the publicity game. 13th Floor Elevaters need a do over ❤ Great show
what’s your favorite doors song? comment below!
LA woman
Really like the riff and tinkly keys on The Spy.
I don't have one, I have several (I've been a Doors fan for a long time), but "Five To One" used to make it onto a lot of the mixtapes I made for people, when I was a kid.
When The Music's Over
Most often I say Not to Touch the Earth, but it varies over time.
Say what you want about Jim Morrison, but he made the catchiest rendition of the Oedipus Complex in rock music
I remember an interview with a band member recalling a time where the cops were stacked up , waiting to bust the band for profanity, with the band playing the music's over and hoping nothing would happen, but then , when Jim got to his mothers room part of the song, he said, "the Word" and things just went crazy
Somebody had to do it lol
There's always "Brown Shoes Don't Make It" by The Mothers.
Not rock, but ragtime: Tom Lehrer’ s contribution ua-cam.com/video/aff9sEYxxMM/v-deo.htmlsi=oRthn-MOV-0FyPNH
this is a master piece of a album. to have a dark song like "the end" in 1967 is pretty monumental by itself. no one sounded like the doors. all 4 members were meant to be in a band together, they had that perfect synergy every band hopes to achieve.
The fact Jim Morrison was "difficult" makes the superb music the Doors created even more astounding. Light My Fire is a sublime masterpiece. Perhaps better albums were to follow but this debut album was a sign of what was to be created during their career. Great video. Regards from England.
he wasn’t just difficult, he was UNHINGED. any level of efficiency from this lineup was a miracle
Do wonder where his bust is! That the crooks maybe gave, sold or just let their kids inherit it. For that matter did the fella just bring a hacksaw and saw off the bolt I guess? At his grave there was the bolts remnants where you could tell it was, on the top. Eventually in zomer hands heh heh
@@abigaildevoe Totally disagree. Jim had a concert in his head and wrote and inspired the majority of the Doors songs via his vocal melodies and lyrics. Those melodies dictated the vast majority of The Doors music. If he was an unhinged lunatic that never would've happened.
@@flannigan7956 Yeah that was shameful that his grave was defaced like that.
@abigaildevoe You had to be there at the times .Really experienced the middle to late 60s early 70s...maybe took a few trips and listened to them.
Manzarek’s playing was a huge contribution and the jazz reference is dead on. The Doors came from a time and place heavily influenced by Latin music; Getz/Gilberto, Sergio Mendes, Tijuana Brass and others were big then (though more so with our parents), and Mexican garage rock was also pervasive here in SoCal. Manzarek lent these influences and killer left-hand bass lines to Doors material. Densmore was also amazing…his airy, jazzy beats often made Morrison’s poetic hallucinations more profound.
No one mentions the Tijuana Brass anymore but I remember as a child they were HUGE in the Sixties and on the radio constantly. It's really amazing how few Rock acts or songs were even nominated for Grammys in the 60s
As Densmore said in his biography and Krieger recently said in an interview: The most important thing is Jim Morrison's natural talent for composing melodies in his head. Jim used to say he wrote lyrics just to remember the melodies, but the people is obsessed with seeing him as a poet and a singer when really the difference is his melodies. Even Krieger admitted that Jim changed the melody of Light My Fire to improve it: you can hear Krieger's original melody in the rehearsal scene in the Oliver Stone movie because Krieger played it that way for the actor.
interesting! i never gave that element much thought. i always thought jim's strength was his presence and delivery: even if the lyrics weren't the best, he made you believe them
Yes of course. But The Beatles are The Beatles because of their melodies and The Doors are The Doors because of their melodies (mostly arising from Jim's unconscious). By the way, I love your channel: You are totally on my wavelength, and I love your sense of humor. A loud applause.@@abigaildevoe
💯Great comment. Jim had a concert in his head according to the other band members and his melodies and lyrics were the backbone of the majority of the Doors music. Jim was a genius and I hate when he's not given his proper due. I hate that awful Oliver Stone Doors movie. It's a total insult to Jim's memory.
One of the best "late night" albums ever made by one of the best ever groups.
Jim seemed to have everything---intelligence, charisma, sex appeal, and vision. . . . and he was unhinged. That last part is what made the Doors exceptional---Jim could channel that crazed element of his personality and put it into the songs, supercharging them with it.
Indeed. This album is definitely a nighttime album. ESPECIALLY a chilly fall night. I can't get into listening to Crystal Ship, End Of The Night or The End outside on a bright sunny warm afternoon day. Just doesn't work.
Hi Abbey you are doing a great thing for classic rock n roll and introducing the youth to great Iconic music
I agree 100%. Thx Abby, you Rock!
Yes. Love this channel. Really makes me think about the music I love and the music I don't love.
That Doors 1967 album is still, to my mind, the greatest debut album of all time (and their best). Great music - and timeless; as good today as then.
Well and anything 1966 that was that fresh, dark and plain rockin' is bad as hell
I think it would be a improvement to have a bass player playing rather than Ray's bass keyboard.
@@jimfiscus1248 Almost all of the songs on this album (and all the other Doors albums) have a bass guitar track, either played by a session bassist or overdubbed by Robbie.
Not just Densmore but Ian Paice, John Bonham, Ginger Baker, Mitch Mitchell even Bill Ward were all taught by jazz drummers and had jazz chops, I think swing is an important part of all their playing
that’s a good chunk of my list of favorite drummers right there!
Indeed, as jazz is the hardest type of music to play! If you can play jazz, you can play anything. Sometimes jazz is more "rock" than rock music. Haha!
Alex Van Halen, too. His dad was a jazz musician. Oh and he also had this little brother who could play a mean trumpet, and then some guitar.
Don’t forget about Jimmy Chamberlin
Bonzo never took a drum lesson on his life. He was self taught but surely influenced by Jazz too!!
This was another delight from you. While LA WOMAN is my personal favorite, your video essay here, makes me want to go back and compare all of them again. Your work is quite rewatchable. There’s so much there. I often feel like I need to take notes. Thank you for all the great work you do.
I feel like I could listen to you talk about The Doors forever.
"He'd literally take a nap" that one got me 😂😂😂
The way you talk about this album is so regal, it makes it feel like you're taking us on a tour through an art gallery of sound. Nobody talks about modern music like this, treating each track as a piece of history. Although there's probably a reason for that.
Former fat kid here. Totally get it. Dropped 55lbs and now don't recognize myself lol
Growing up my mom had an old hippie friend that lived in Haight-Ashbury in the mid to late 60’s, she had stories galore, the Lizard King was often featured in them. As a teenager in the early 80’s I was amazed at that period and loved every discussion with her, most involved some “substance” to start the conversation.
I really love this album. As much as I love all of The Door’s discography, this album has always stuck out to me. It has such an almost supernatural quality to it that it’s really impossible to focus on anything else but the album itself.
I've listened to this album for so many years ingrained into my soul since junior high in the late early 90s, that it's weird to me when people say it's flawed. That's like claiming the Mona Lisa is flawed.
Light My Fire was the first "Song of the Summer" I know that became a thing later but that was a time when music was just bigger in everyone's life. Even parents knew every word of the song they hated.
When the musics over is a total masterpiece ! The End is really kind of a jam.
I think of Jim as the psychedelic Frank Sinatra..his voice was really beautiful..
You got gorgeous eyes. Oh yeah, and The Doors were great too.
The door's debut is a timeless classic and what an introduction for this legendary band to kick off an amazing discography
I really appreciate what you’re doing with this site. The Production value, your personality, and the delivery - as well as the extensive Research, honesty, and genuine love of the music. And the schtick is wonderful!
Four or five years ago, I was lucky enough to find The Doors' first record album, 'The Doors', at my local Value Village for only $2.00 along with some other great albums that particular thrift-hunting day.
I had bought the CD many years earlier in my college days as well as a still-sealed vinyl record, but to find a very gently used, pristine record album from my local Value Village was a great score indeed. :)
I bought The Doors' debut LP when it hit the record store shelves. As with albums by The Beatles, Cream, Love, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, and The Pink Floyd, I never left it behind in the 1960s. Even my Ma and Grandma loved "Light My Fire."
Don't forget Blue Cheer....
It’s not music for uncool people, it’s music for the uninvited
My favorite band! Love everything about them! The sound, the vibe, the kind of dark sense of foreboding that seemed to come to the band so effortlessly. Strange Days is their best, but the debut is undeniable.
The Doors remain in my top 5 bands of all time. After 50+ years, they still sound fresh and different from anything else. When you hear them, you immediately know it's them, and even their weakest numbers are still better than a lot of bands' best.
One of my favorite bands, and first musical influences. I love this album in particular, you know 1967 was a wonderful year for music. The first songs I heard and saw on video from them were the two obvious ones "Light My Fire", and "Break On Through (To The Other Side)" and a live version of "The End".
The wonderful thing about this band was that at the time, along with The Velvet Underground (another of my favorites from the 1960's), they were the only two bands that spoke outside the box of the Hippie movement, that spoke about the darkest aspects of the mind, and human behavior, and about the misery of humanity itself.
The first album I heard from them was the compilation "The Best Of The Doors" (1985) on vinyl, thanks to my parents' record collection, then I got it for myself on that classic Double Fat Box CD, also one of my first 10 CDs in life. I still have it and keep it as a nice memory of when music began to be my favorite hobby, and when I became a musician.
I have always thought that the popularity of Jim Morrison's image and person overshadows the talent of the other three guys. John Densmore is a very good drummer with his Jazz, R&B and Blues touch. Robby Krieger makes some very interesting licks and riffs, direct and appropriate for the songs. Ray Manzarek for me was the genius behind the band's music, he was the musical director, the visionary, his sound and style gave the unique atmosphere that the band had.
Ray was the greatest OMG that organ is wayyyyy out there:)
A debut masterpiece. Faves on this lp: The Crystal Ship, Back Door Man, The End, End of The Night, with Break on Through seeming to sum up what the counter culture was all about, breaking societal boundaries ("to the other side").
70's FM Radio...the only way I learned of the Doors. Late to the party for sure, Summer of '71 Jim passed away. I still did not really appreciate the Doors until 1977. And did not know ALL their past albums until cd box set 1998. They set a high mark for Studio sounding perfect. The band members and Jim seemed to have very DIFFERENT goals in mind. The Doors were a Power House! 50th Anniversary Albums now too!
Forever Changes and now The Doors! Two favourites. You can't underestimate the weight and force of the breakthrough of this album. I bought this on release on holiday and 4 of us lay around listening to it on a sunny afternoon in a Jersey guest house, the stunned landlady walking in as The End played! The guitar break in Light My Fire still sends a tingle down the spine. A great 6 album ride ending with the superb Riders On the Storm. Another great review Abigail.
Break on Thru is one of the best opening tracks of all time---saw them at Absolutely Live at the Garden--absolutely transcendent !
Absolutely great track to open the album
Of course, one of the finest debut albums ever but “ The End “ for me will always be the ultimate Doors song, thanks to its appropriate use in Apocalypse Now. From one masterpiece to another. And you hit the nail on the head with Ray. He was more valuable to the success of the Doors than most people ever gave him credit for.
What did you think of Muad'dib playing Ray in the Oliver stone, I still don't knoe how to feel about
The End is the Doors masterwork!
@@JustFortheRecord66 feel like you just volunteered to turn out the light
@@flannigan7956lmao!!!! I had to re-read your comment twice before I caught your reference! Muad'dib! 😂
@@sugadelicsavagesoul8623 "just a bigger picture"
Doors' Morrison Hotel is one of the greatest rock albums in history. Period! From that flawless record, Peace Frog and You Make Me Real are gems
Having been in my prime teenage years when this album was released, I can tell you the Doors and this album was so new and fresh sounding in a time when so many bands had their own fresh sound. When I hear this album I hear the soundtrack to my life an the world around me.
The Doors debut album is a great classic,one of the greatest albums of all time and one of my favorite bands.Great review.
"The End" never fails to entrance me, literally. It's a spiritual experience for me.
Growing up as a kid in the '70s, the Doors were the favored band among the blue collar teens I knew, the guys who wore a lot of denim, leather and bandanas and the girls in tight jeans and tube tops. They seemed to dig whatever head trip the music and lyrics -- "the poetry" -- the band offered, and Jim Morrison was at that point a legend, a poster on your wall above the incense and drum cigarettes and wine bottle candle. When I finally got into the band as a teen in the 80's, I read No One Here Gets Out Alive, and listened to this album incessantly. I think my Doors fixation lasted until Oliver Stone killed it when his ridiculous biopic came out in my freshman year in college. At some point in the 90s it was not cool to like The Doors, but I always insisted their counter cultural message was proto-punk.
when it became uncool I was even more motivated to embrace the band..... frequently mischaracterized but never forgotten.... theyve outlived nearly all their peers in the industry. morrison was a inconsistent wreckless indiv. But his genius & talents w were truly rarified.
Huge love for the shout out to Eve Babitz! What a fantastic book, and a document to a time and a place.
One of the best vinyl Monday ever!!!! I looooove the debut Doors album.... So unique and all the songs are amazing, one and one... Nice work Abby!!!!
just got this album off ebay.. had it once when i was sixteen way back in 1987, love the track.. Take It As It Comes!
The first door album is by favorite my favorite Doors lp. Sometimes I have problems with the whole deification of there output, and Jim Morrison in general, but this album definitely puts them in the canon. It's got to be the greatest debut album of all time!
Don’t ask why, but Alabama Song has been a favourite since I was a young teen. Reminds me of a crazy circus carnival with those amazing Manzarek keys.
Your a riot sweety..i came from that time an still live in it..nothing but the best!!😎
This has to be my favourite doors album. They really nailed it on the first try although all their albums with Jim Morrison are great. Also I love the appreciation for Alabama song, one of my favourites on the album. That song always sounded pretty Halloween-ish to me. (Second edit) I disagree about take it as it comes. Obviously a very sexual song but I love the energy and the keyboard solo is among the best on the album, not forgettable to me. This is a personal 10/10 album
I might be the only one who loves and appreciates the way "Alabama Song" was used in the Oliver Stone movie. 👍🏽
@@sugadelicsavagesoul8623 Not the only one.
Oh my god, you are amazing, young lady! I am blown away by your knowledge! The Doors are the archetype of the band of the sinister and the seekers.The truth may be found in the Beatles and Dylan, but the unconventional discoveries will be made with the Doors.
actually morrison picked up the rock & revealed a dark deep truth most americans werent willing to face. he played the pouty troubled rockstar. but when he was dialed in & was playing for keeps, he had diamond eyes in re to the power stratification of our culture & what made it tick. he rivaled dylan in that regards & both had no peers in that regards.
The beauty of "Take It As It Comes" is that it's a perfect slice of '66 era go-go pop (worthy of a Nuggets compilation). It has all the authenticity of a regional garage hit, except written and recorded by the Doors. It could have been a less ambitious band's one hit.
None of them were. Until they were together. Awesome channel AD.
I’m very fond of “Break on through “. I can see why they cut out the “she gets high” bit thou ! The Byrds couldn’t even get “Eight miles high” on the radio in 1966 ! Lol
Really, what was wrong with programmers back then? "Getting high" as a phrase doesn't sound obscene. If any self-appointed censor would see a problem with the phrase, I'd have to ask "President Reagan", "Mike Pence" or "Karen" if their children ever "got high" or if they themselves partook.
@@farrellmcnulty909reminds me of the huge uproar of Billy Boy talking about yes I used to smoke weed but didn't inhale it, and the Satanic panic ladies had tv ads like "and then, in front of our children , he said this" talk about blowin smoke
@@flannigan7956 Who did the Satanic Panic Ladies blow?
Clicked new to you and you came up. So for that I’ll say Hello, I Love you.
I have to say I grew up with The Doors. I got to see them in 69 when Soft Parade was the new thing. It's not as high on the general Doors fave list but I like Touch Me. But Light My Fire and Love Me Two Times are my favorites.
Soft Parade is probably my favorite! 👍🏽
I love the Doors
Bravo! Loved it (age 5) when new, and live, 35 yrs later (Manzarek, Kreiger, Astbury). This album was an agent of change.
"Age 5". Are you sure about that??
My fave tune when I was five years old was "Nellie the Elephant". You must have been very advanced for your age. I feel so inadequate by comparison 😞
@@shelleylyme6402 .. and yet I know nothing of Nellie. My parents were in a west coast band in the 60s, so my soundtrack was questionable for children. I was reportedly singing Light My Fire along with the car radio, they asked me what it was about, and I let them know a guy was inviting a girl over for a BBQ. Rather than correct me, they nodded.
"That piano flickers like candlelight." Yeah, so I might have to weave that into one of my lyrics someday. If you don't mind. I'll be happy to thank you in the liner notes of my album. Whenever that thing manages to get done. And if it makes any money (🤞), you are so getting something in your UA-cam tip jar! 😃
MORRISON HOTEL is the best Doors Album. I said it and stand by it
I've been revisiting albums from your reviews that i haven't listened to for years. I've currently got Twentieth Century Fox running round my head. Keep up the good work
This is one of my favorite albums of all time
watching this after the mc5 video came out and seeing all the little hints was so fun! didn't think this video could get any better :)
My favorite reason to wake up on mondays!
Morrison Hotel will always be my favorite Doors record, the others are probably all a tie for me. That said, I’ve loved everything they ever did (with Jim) since forever.
"Break on Through" was in a Tony Hawk's game which is how I fell in love with it. Years later I borrowed a compilation from my nephew's father, and it had the uncensored version on it with the full "she get HIGH!" line intact.
My dad loves singing The Doors at karaoke or on open mic nights.
This album in particular was one I fell in love with when I really started taking vinyl seriously
Took over 24 hours for a notice to post on my feed. But thanks for all of your good work
It’s absolutely wild and wonderful that they already had “The End” by the first album. I mean come on. That’s a a progressively killer song.
The doors are brilliant
Break on through is probably the best song 🎵 on a debut album ❤🎉
We all broke through to the other side.
i love Alabama Song and Waiting for the Sun
I can't remember what rock critic wrote this about the Doors first album, but it's perfect: "The Beatles and the Stones are for destroying your minds, the Doors are for afterward." The Doors debut is an obvious classic....and it lives up to its legend......but it's not my fave. That would go to the follow-up Strange Days......although for a while it was Morrison Hotel/Hard Rock Cafe.
Light My Fire and The End are still epic.....and there are soooooooo many great deep cuts like Take it As it Comes, Soul Kitchen and especially Twentieth Century Fox. That cover of Back Door Man is also spine-tingling.
Great video once again!
When the doors of perception are cleansed, things will appear as they truly are, infinite. Aldous Huxley.
YES! Love the "Lizard King" and the Doors!!! "I am the lizard king, I can do anything!" 🤘☮ Thanks for this deep dive.
i can't believe i forgot to edit in the lisa simpson I AM THE LIZARD QUEEN clip!!
When did the Doors become uncool? They were the coolest band when I discovered them in the early 80s. They still sounded so contemporary at the time!
I don't think it's the "If you listen to the Doors you're uncool" but more of a "if you're uncool listen to the Doors". In a way they made music for introverts, rejected, lonely, those types of people. Similarly how decades later The Smiths were music for uncool of the 80s
Don't forget Devo. They were "through being cool" and proud of it.
exactly!
The Doors were somewhat uncool in the seventies then they finally had a big revival with Apocalypse Now and the book No One Here Gets Out Alive.
Between 60s comeback of the 80s and the one of the 90s at least how I remember. Hippie stuff sucked and everybody would be like "the 60s are over!" then got big again for stoner kids, The Doots with the other top 60s legends, teens at 90s Grateful Dead shows, you could sometimes get bell bottoms new at the store before that quit bein a big deal etc. I purposely embraced 60s/70s for blatant social subversion but then very soon after a buncha the high school kids thought I was one of em
I'm an old fella now, but this is still one of the greatest albums of all time, IMHO. Thanks Abs!
Never bought into the Doors, but I do love your videos.
This is the first LP record I bought as a 15 year old and I still love it. Also dug Paul butterfield band
great video! One of my favorite bands!
Thank you for doing Jim and the band some justice, brought me to tears. Xo Soul Sister
Love when you play the "Intermission" excerpt
thanks it’s the elevator music in my brain
Excellent Delivery & Content !
L A Women LP is Amazing ! My Fav
Live Gloria Hits the SPOT !
Another banger video! One of my fav albums of all time fasho
thanks! you have one hell of a username there and i'm mad i didn't come up with it
gosh we really are in spooky season... i have never seen the eye in the letter d at 3:25. My favourite doors song is 'When The Music's Over'. Love your videos, Layla!!!
Oh my GAWD
I’m sorry, but this will be a longer-ish response. I’m bursting at the seams here. Hopefully I won’t bore you.
The Doors pretty much saved my life in high school. They were my cornermen in that helllish world, where I I was an outcast like Jim. “No One Here Gets Out Alive” had just been published. I read it three times back-to-back-to-back, and sometimes I’d just flip to a random page and take on that aspect of Jim for the day. My HS yearbooks (I made my own. I was such a rebel) are full of “You remind me of Jim Morrison, mannnnn.” The lasting legacy is that Jim made a writer out of me. He was/is an idol of mine but he also taught me how to be my own best iconoclast. Jim needed the Doors, and The Doors needed Jim. They set themselves up as a Diamond on stage, a configuration that they felt was sacred.
I met both Jac Holzman and Robby Krieger on “The World Series of Doors Trivia.” It’s on UA-cam and worth watching, if only for the moment I playfully diss Robby Krieger. Whiskey Bar is THE song that turned Holzman on during that set at the Whisky. He thought it utterly audacious that a band would take on that song, and he loved their version. I do, too. It’s one of their finest moments. Live, they often did a medley of Whiskey Bar/Back Door Man/Five to One. Phenomenal when Jim was in the mood.
The bold statement I’ll make that’s sure to get some eyes rolling is that I believe Jim to have been an authentic Shaman. Check out the live version of The End in Toronto, 1967. He betrayed the gift (was it really that the spirit of a dying Navajo jumped into his brain when he was five? Who knows, but what a great story). A true Shaman must go through a traumatic disorganization of the senses. That’s what Jim did on that rooftop in Venice, gobbling all that LSD and “taking notes at a fantastic rock concert in [his] head.”
Jim came to California with his Junior College sweetheart Mary Werbelow. He loved her and was absolutely devastated that she left him. He claimed that the first two albums were about her. “The End” began life as a heartbroken goodbye to her and then morphed into the ever-changing masterpiece we know today. It doesn’t appear that Jim and Mary were as toxic together as Jim and Pamela, whom I think of as his woman by default.
Ray saw the Shaman in Jim, moreso than the others, and it was Ray who stuck with him no matter what. He was the only one who remained on stage with him as the stage collapsed in Miami, and at the other concert (the name of the venue escapes me, but it’s the one that inspired Iggy, who was in the crowd).
Jim was dead serious about his vision, right up until the time the other three sold “Light My Fire “ to Buick. He never got over that betrayal, and pretty much let the vision go at that point. If the Doors had only recorded the first two albums, we’d probably think of them as we do Joy Division.
Jim was in actuality a big dork. It’s possible that he had an actual allergy to alcohol (due to the lack of a certain enzyme), as plenty of witnesses attest to him drinking a ridiculous amount of booze and being completely lucid, then all of a sudden turning into an absolute maniac when it hit him all at once. Jim liked rolling the dice that way, though. “Drugs are a bet with your mind.”
So much more I’d like to say. I’m amassing info for a book I’m going to write about Jim as an artist inspired by The French Symbolist poets, reflecting on what it was like to discover The Doors in fake-as-f$#k Southern California in 1980. As is the case with most of the titles of Books about Jim, I’ll use a line of his poetry for mine: “To Come of Age in a Dry Place.” Be on the lookout.
Thank you for consistently pulling off the miracle of making Mondays something to look forward to.
Being born in 1999 definitely qualifies you to be a 20th Century Fox, if you think it's too late, I implore you to reconsider, maybe nature was saving her best for last....
Cruin shame she hasta worry about various time deadlines lol
Great to hear a mention of William S Harvey, his beautiful record cover designs for Elektra are amazing.
No wonder the british 80s band Felt did a tribute, Song For William S Harvey on their 1986 album Let The Snakes Crinkle Their Heads To Death.
It was interesting growing up in Los Angeles in the 60’s..saw the doors & love all over town..
For the first time, Lovely Lady, our favourite tracks align! Although people say The Beatles personified the 60s, to m the decade is best remembered for the Doors and Jimi. Loved the background info, as geeky usual. Your workload must be massive to turn these out weekly. So thanks.
the first time?? your constant dissent until now is impressive! re: the workload: dude you have no idea
One of my favourite albums; like many classic albums it has a rush and a spontaneity to it. The End is loaded and powerful and pre- empts Manson and Altamont; the dark side of the sixties. Robin Witting England
I like the waiting for the sun album a lot &much more than the soft parade
I've always loved "Alabama Song" too. It's like a big lump of hash in music form.
Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht composed Alabama song for the German stage in the late 1920s before they had to escape N**i persecution. In 1967 my friend Steve Hansen called me and said "get up here, now!" and I mounted my Schwinn Stingray (coolest bicycle on earth) and rode up the hill to see what my rich-kid friend was so excited about. We were 13 and 14. I wouldn't smoke weed for another two years however when the album played I was changed. It was like music from a dangerous planet full of poets and killers. I couldn't speak, I couldn't move. Light My Fire, the "radio version" (chopped down to three minutes) was climbing the charts in L.A. and brave DJs were playing the full seven minute version and we lost our shite when the long version (with all of the solos) came on. Now I had just experienced the whole album. I felt comatose.
Our schoolbus driver, Mister O' Minor, had taped a transistor radio to his PA microphone and clicked on a local rock station. The timing was perfect. The rimshot and organ intro blasted throughout the bus speakers and Light My Fire came on. Most of the kids on the bus hadn't heard the album version with solos. As the yellow bus drifted around the banked curves of Sunset Boulevard we had entered another reality that I can't even begin to describe. The bus arrived at Paul Revere Junior High School (public) in Brentwood and many of the kids from the bus were changed forever. Magic School Bus, indeed. I saw Cream that year but oddly enough I never saw the Doors.
Such a fun, funny, informative review of that great album. Blast from the past for me - I need to see if I still have my original copy.
Yet another 'get out of my head!' experience watching/listening to this fantastic essay. A++. You nailed discussing the 3 musicians & their talents & depth. I used to play a fairly beat up 45rpm single of Light My Fire as a child a lot.. the B-side was The Crystal Ship... holy hell did that track mesmerize me. I literally LOL'd when you yelled out the "and walked on down the hall" bit 😂. You're doing 'God's' work & she would be proud.
good show dear Abigail. you are def a 20th century fox!
Break on through to the other side is my favourite door song
Hi Abigail, it's so difficult to choose just one song, let's say Riders on the Storm, this is a monumental album, one of the best first albums ever
This was my favorite album for a while. I probably wouldn't be watching this channel if I didn't listen to it!
Your copy of the LP is a late 1970s or early 1980s press. For it to be from '70, the "E" on the label would need to be huge. The smaller "E" is a later press.
Electra was called Love Land, but then became Doors Land. It helps to know that Jim and Ray were film students and knew the publicity game. 13th Floor Elevaters need a do over ❤ Great show
Were the 13th Floor Elevators on Electra?
First album I bought myself (on cassette) and I still love it. I think it's fashionable to hate on the Doors but I love them.
Delightful review