THE DOORS

 

"When the music is your special friend, 

Dance on fire as it intends,

Music is your only friend…

Until the end..." 

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"B+" 

Main Decade: 60's

Main Ages:

Psychedelia (1966-1969)

Hard Rock (1968-???)

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Key Members:

Jim Morrison, Singer

Ray Manzarek, Keyboards And bass

Robbie Krieger, Guitar

John Densmore, Drums 

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Key Songs:

When The Music's Over, L.A. Woman, Riders On The Storm, Light My Fire, The End, Roadhouse Blues, Break On Through, Love Her Madly, Hello I Love You, Maggie McGill, People Are Strange, The Crystal Ship, Love Me Two Times, Alabama Song, Five To One, Backdoor Man, Touch Me, The Soft Parade, The Changeling, Spanish Caravan, Moonlight Drive , Strange Days, Not To Touch The Earth, Gloria, The Unknown Soldier, Wild Child, Waiting For The Sun, Peace Frog, Love Street, Tell All The People

 

 

Link to Spotify playlist The Cavern’s drñrction of  The Doors’ Best Songs 

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The Doors were the third band that shook me to my core. The first thing I heard was a greatest hits compilation from Electra, which contained the bare essentials, leaving out epic tracks like "The End" or "When the Music's Over." Even so, it was enough for me to discover their mystical and hypnotic sounds, the dark poetry of the lyrics, the furious voice that flirts with screaming, the psychedelic and acid-tinged atmospheres that never cease to have somber undertones, making The Doors a unique and unrepeatable sound in the history of rock.

 

The Doors remained one of the most popular bands until the early 2000s, despite having been without a frontman for so many years. When I first heard them, they seemed like a band that made music mostly for the sheer fun of it. And it's easy to fall for that impression; many of those early songs were among the most upbeat and had the most banal lyrics—ironically, the most well-known in their repertoire. Songs like "Light My Fire," "Love Me Two Times," and "Break On Through" are perfect for lifting spirits in any bar, and people sing along from beginning to end. But little by little, I realized that The Doors also took their work very seriously, creating excellent songs that, for the most part, weren't played on FM radio and that possess much greater depth and musical value.

 

The Doors burst onto the scene when the musical revolution was already in full swing, during that turbulent year of 1967. They weren't the originators, but they jumped on the bandwagon just in time and managed to position themselves at the forefront with their sound and their provocative lyrics, sometimes with clear sexual references, other times with philosophical content and paraphrases of the Defiant Poets. In any case, it wasn't merely inciting mayhem for the sake of mayhem. The Doors incited violence against the system and called for a rebellion with direction: an internal direction. Singing about drugs isn't merely an act of self-destruction, but a ritual for self-discovery, a search for something the environment couldn't provide, and a stark reflection of Jim: his anguish, rage, and dissatisfaction with life. The experience with drugs and the songs they sing about them are more akin to a shamanic ritual than a party at a trendy club. Their epic, six-minute-plus songs are mostly grand musical catharses, taking the listener through a range of emotions, from the unsettling tranquility of reality to the visceral explosion of rhythm and vocals.

 

On this point, I want to emphasize that The Doors are perhaps the greatest creators of musical tension in existence. They work on the songs from an apparent calm, carrying with an almost jazzy drumbeat, bluesy embellishments and riffs on the guitar, slow and hypnotic rhythms on the keyboards and a slow, clean and sometimes erotic voice… Without us realizing it, almost imperceptibly they begin a crescendo, forming that tension that makes the collapse in the chorus or in the solo unavoidable, in a great musical orgasm provoked by the instruments and Morrison's voice.

Musically speaking, the Doors are excellent on their instruments: Robby Krieger isn't Pete Townshend or Jimmy Page, and he doesn't play monstrous solos like Hendrix, but he's precise, he knows how to fit his bluesy soul into the band's style, and he can create memorable riffs when he wants to. Who doesn't have the first 20 notes of the "Light My Fire" solo tattooed on their brain? The guitar is an integral part of the Doors' sound. It's constantly adding embellishments, notes here and there, scales, arpeggios, very subtle mini-solos that often get lost in the background behind the keyboards and vocals, but are crucial to the overall sound. I firmly believe that if Krieger had been in any average band, he would have been the star player, but I much prefer him in his understated role behind Jim and Ray.

 

John Densmore brings the jazzy touch on drums. I don't know if he's a virtuoso (like Bonzo, Moon, or Peart), but he contributes a lot to the band's unmistakable sound. He's rather measured and seems to be the most moderate. However, after playing some of those songs in a band, I know that the drums in The Doors (unlike in other groups) are what sets the rhythm, what gives direction, what marks when it's calm and when it's stormy, guiding the rest of the instruments and the vocalist in creating that tension. The others respond to the rhythm that Densmore sets, and he's precise; he achieves changes in tempo, interweaves triplets and other jazz effects with superb accuracy when the songs seem to be psychedelic or bluesy, so he's NOT a dispensable element. Sometimes I think it's the kind of band Charlie Watts would have loved to be in to fully express himself. And that's a huge quality of The Doors; I still can't shake the feeling that they had an enormous amount of fun creating that music, and it's something that comes through. Despite how obscure some of the songs might be, each member operates with complete freedom and independence, even in entirely different styles that converge almost inexplicably. When I saw the Doors live in 2007, curiously, it wasn't Jim I missed the most, but Densmore.

 

Ray Manzarek is the brains, the genius of the band. The melodies flow through him, and he's the one who gives the group its mystical and psychedelic touch. He's perhaps the only virtuoso, not because he's incredibly fast on the keyboard, but because he knows how to create exquisite harmonies in a wide variety of styles, recreating sounds from the classics or being innovative to the extreme. What would "Light My Fire" be without that incredibly complex intro on his Farfisa keyboard, or "Riders in the Storm" without that tremendous coda? Ray managed to combine sequences of tones that seem impossible. At the same time, he's responsible for carrying the song's atmosphere on his shoulders: whether it will be dark, carnival-like, festive, subtle, jazzy, etc. In other words, if the drums are the foundation, and the guitar the soul, the keyboard provides the finishing touches. For me, Manzarek would indeed be a virtuoso because, as I've said before, quantity doesn't equal quality. Ray isn't as fast as some other keyboardists, but he's much more versatile, daring, precise, and effective. Moreover, he plays the vast majority of the bass lines in the songs on a Fender Rhodes keyboard, which he plays with his left hand. Although he can be quite repetitive in this aspect (I play bass and sometimes fall asleep playing The Doors), it's truly remarkable that he manages to pull off some figures that are far too complex for a standard bass, especially in the epic, unison songs, and even more so that he plays them while masterfully handling the rest of the keyboard parts. While they sometimes had a studio bassist, ultimately it was Ray Manzarek who designed the sequences for live performance. A somewhat well-known anecdote is that Jerry Scheff, Elvis's bassist in the 70s, commented that Ray was a mediocre bassist. Ray responded by challenging him to the recording session for "L.A. Woman," a song that's practically a single note, in which Scheff pours his heart and soul into playing like never before to prove Ray wrong. But this doesn't diminish Manzarek's value as a bassist. In fact, today's DJs owe him a great deal for being the first to create those kinds of sequences. Although he didn't sing on the early studio albums, he occasionally took the lead vocals on one or two songs live, and he would be the vocalist on the post-Morrison albums, without much success. I had the honor of seeing him live before his death in 2013.​

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Morrison is in a league of his own. He's the frontman, the face and voice of the band. A sex symbol in the sixties and one of the best voices rock has ever seen. But let's take it one step at a time. First of all, James Douglas Morrison supposedly considered himself a poet, quite well-read and influenced by the likes of Walt Whitman, Baudelaire, Poe, Rimbaud, and the whole generation of cursed poets, and more indirectly, by Wilde, Kerouac, Bukowski, of course Huxley, and some of the Greek myths. The guy was well-read, then, and many of his seemingly sexual and outrageous references have a literary origin in one of these authors; he either quotes them or paraphrases them. That's why he achieves a good lyrical effect overall, without necessarily plagiarizing them. He didn't talk about women the way the Beatles or the Beach Boys did on their early albums, in a timid, innocent, or indirect way. The lyrics were already mature on the Doors' early LPs, the result of years of pen work. Thus, each word seems far more calculated than the music itself, which sometimes gives the impression of being a sublime improvisation. The vocals, however, are not. Despite the improvisations and dialogues with the audience he displays live, Jim is essentially a shy guy who, in the beginning, would go on stage with his back to the audience so as not to be petrified by the thousand-headed monster. Later, he would be idolized, and this same self-importance led him to become overly calculating, needing to go on stage high to achieve the expected performance. Did it sometimes overwhelm him? Of course! Proof of this lies in his arrests for "indecency" during a concert in Florida and the heroin overdose (to which he was unaccustomed) that killed him. Morrison became a far stronger icon over time than Dylan, Jagger, or Hendrix, due in part to his tremendous presence and charisma (calculated or not), his powerful voice, his crushing message from the turntables or the stage, his sex symbol status, and because ultimately, the mythical figure he cultivated was precisely what the sixties were eagerly anticipating. It's all about being in the right place at the right time… Don't get me wrong, I'm not diminishing Morrison's vocal ability, lyrical skill, or frontmanship in any way, but it's very likely that if a similar figure emerged today, they wouldn't achieve the same deity-like status as Jim. Why? Because there's no longer a cause to champion; rock is no longer against the system, but rather in favor of it. The fight for sexual freedom that he championed so fiercely is gone. Morrison's place in history isn't because he was part of the "Los Club," but because he embodied almost every facet of the counterculture in 1967, delivering a political message without uttering a single political word, much like Dylan did. Morrison represented many of the ideals of the 1960s, the very same ideals that would lead to his immediate cancellation in the 2020s.

Ultimately, Morrison's voice alone is enough to make him one of rock's mythical figures. His voice, somewhere between baritone and tenor—that is, Jim's deep yet powerful range—makes it one of the best and most refined in history. I still can't believe he didn't dare sing in front of an audience at the beginning, but there's plenty of evidence to the contrary.

 

The Doors are a complete band, who know how to combine and play with styles, theories, and schools, both lyrical and musical, to create unique musical structures that evoke seemingly banal atmospheres while conveying something profoundly serious. The Doors are revered by ordinary people (I already mentioned that they're essential in any cover band) as well as by the most specialized critics. They aren't a group that has remained stuck in a message of mayhem; rather, in their time, and even now, their message remains highly relevant, managing to create a sense of introspection unlike anything Led Zeppelin, the Beatles, or the Rolling Stones achieved.

 

The Doors, ladies and gentlemen, are one of the greatest influences of our time, and if you can't resist the lesser-known songs as I did at first, if you let yourself be carried away by the range of figures, rhythms, and atmospheres they were able to deliver across six studio albums (not counting the two post-Morrison albums), you'll find a diversity of textures, sounds, and messages that is difficult to find in any other band from the distant days of '67 to the present. It's worth summarizing that since that time, you won't find such a wide range of contributions among the band members, a diversity so well blended that the overall result is UNIQUE!!! In my very personal opinion, they are the best American band in history.

 

Finally, if you haven't seen Oliver Stone's 1991 film, try to watch it. Manzarek would say it wasn't historically accurate because Stone invented or exaggerated many scenes, but I think overall it's very well done, and Val Kilmer gives an incredible performance as the Lizard King, singing all the songs himself. He immersed himself so deeply in the role and rehearsed the songs so much that even the surviving members of The Doors couldn't distinguish between his voice and Jim's. In short, it may certainly have historical inaccuracies, but the atmosphere and mood make it an essential biopic.

 

Lineup:

 

John Densmore: The jazzy soul on drums. Say what you will, and despite Jim being the generational guru, John was the band's musical guru, adding touches of elegance where you least expect it and creating that tension that is the soul of their music.

 

Robby Krieger: He's not spectacular, but he's perhaps even more essential than Densmore's sound. The band's bluesy stamp is essential to understanding their sound, especially on the last two albums with Jim. This is the only instance I know of where the guitar is masterful and indispensable, yet overshadowed by the keyboards.

 

Ray Manzarek: If it weren't for Jim's successful attempt to prove me wrong, even going so far as to kill himself, I'd say Ray is the essence of the Doors. One of the best keyboardists in rock, versatile, from understated piano to pivotal solos. In my very personal opinion, better than Keith Emerson and Rick Wakeman. Psychedelic at heart, but incredibly versatile and creative.

 

Jim Morrison: A devilish voice, the frontman and the soul of the Doors, the roar of the puma, the one who imprints his signature on the duality of lyrics and vocals. Occasionally harmonica, and more occasionally maracas or tambourine. A diva and guru of the '60s. One of the greatest voices in rock. His death, and the stubbornness of the rest of the group, proved that without personality, a band is dead, no matter how much talent it has.

Ladies and Gentleman, from Los Angeles California… THE DOOOOOOOOOOORS!!!

 

By Corvan  

Sep/15/2007

Edited: May/26/2026

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