CoronaVinyl Day 305 (D): The Doors by The Doors

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Today's CoronaVinyl category is "D," and I don't have any "D" artists left that I haven't already featured, so I'm going with one of my favorite bands and albums, The Doors' 1967 self-titled debut.

I consider The Doors one of, if not the, best American rock and roll bands ever.  There is only one band who I have honored with permanent place on my body, and that's The Doors.  Within about three days of being at college, I got the lizard from the inner sleeve of the Waiting For the Sun album tattooed on my back, though in color (the lizard on the album is in black and white).  The Doors' dark and delightful music helped me through a rough patch, and it seemed like a worthy "thank you" (and still does).

Released only four days into 1967, The Doors (the album) was groundbreaking.  Here, the world got its first taste of the dark side of rock and roll.  To expound on a line from the great Oliver Stone 1991 biopic The Doors, you had Herman's Hermits singing quaint songs like "Mrs. Brown You've Got a Lovely Daughter," while The Doors had an 11+-minute Oedipal nightmarish drama of a song, "The End."  And in Jim Morrison, rock and roll got what I consider its first true tormented genius, larger-than-life rock star -- a booze-and-mescaline-fueled poet who could shriek like a banshee while writing intense, introspective lyrics, just as comfortable belting out blues songs as he was singing pop songs as he was hanging off hotel balconies to get a rise out of people as he as whipping his dick out on stage (allegedly).  Morrison was complemented by his band mates and their varied musical influences: keyboardist and Chicagoan Ray Manzarek, who loved the blues and played a double keyboard so that the band didn't need a bassist; guitarist Robby Krieger, who had been taught flamenco guitar; and drummer John Densmore, whose drumming was very much jazz- and Latin-influenced.

Their combination was magic, and their flame burned white hot for the six albums they made together in four years before Morrison's death.  Their debut album was an instant success, reaching #2 on the Billboard album chart and eventually going quadruple platinum in the U.S.  It features several of their best-known songs, like "Light My Fire" -- which was their first of the band's two songs to top the Billboard Hot 100 -- the album opener "Break on Through (To The Other Side)," an unabashed invitation to experiment with hallucinogenic drugs from which the record company had to erase the word "high" in the "she gets high" repeating lyric that, on recordings, was the stuttered "she gets" until the last 10-15 years, and their wailing cover of Howlin' Wolf's "Back Door Man."

The album has rightly received various accolades over the years, including being ranked #42 on Rolling Stone's initial 500 Greatest Albums of All-Time List (it was #86 on the most recent list, in 2020).  If you only own one Doors album, I think this should be the one, and if you're looking to get into The Doors, start with this.  I love every song on the album, so choosing my favorite on each side was tough, but dammit, I managed.

Favorite song from Side 1:  "Soul Kitchen"
"Soul Kitchen" is one of my favorite Doors songs, apparently inspired by a soul food restaurant in Venice Beach that Morrison frequented.  It starts off with a catchy organ riff by Manzarek (not unlike the organ riff in "When The Music's Over") and that repeats throughout the song, and a meandering guitar line from Krieger.  The verses are kind of low-key, with the aforementioned organ riff and a James Brown-esque jangly guitar.  But then, everyone turns up the energy for the chorus.  As the band bashes away on their respective instruments, Morrison belts out: "Let me sleep all night in your soul kitchen / Warm my mind near your gentle stove / Turn me out and I'll wander baby / Stumblin' in the neon groves."  I had always assumed this song was about sex (or at least a giant vagina), but I guess it's actually about a soul kitchen.

Favorite song from Side 2:  "I Looked At You"
I could have gone with "Back Door Man" for Side 2, given Morrison's lively yet dark take on the song, but I gave the nod to "I Looked At You," a jazzy psychedelic pop song that kind of predicted the band's rise to success:  "And we're on our way / And we can't turn back."