The Doors – The Doors (1967)

I guess I picked this up in a sale round about 2000, along with a couple of other Doors albums. They passed me by at the time, and even by the end of teenage years, I was probably only aware of Riders On The Storm, and barely aware of Morrison's dead pop star cult hero status.

So, what of the band's 1967 debut, which started the legend?

In case you didn't know, it's a great album. It hits you between the eyes from the beginning, with the powerful Break On Through, it has the much covered classic Light My Fire, and a couple of fine covers - Willie Dixon's Back Door Man, and Kurt Weill's Alabama Song.

But the lesser known tracks are just as compelling. Soul Kitchen is a decent song, and Twentieth Century Fox a fine late 1960s song. I Looked At You has a feel of Dave Clark's Glad All Over, while End Of The Night feels to me like CA Quintet's Trip Thru Hell condensed into two and a half minutes, leaving the grandiose eleven minute rambling masterpiece The End to take us to the album's climax.

Part garage band, part psychedelic 60s, with Robby Krieger's guitar and Ray Manzarek's unmistakable organ (ooer, Mrs!), The Doors were much more than Morrison's charisma, and this debut is impressive.

Link to full album

4* - a classic piece of 1960s psychedelia