The Doors in an Unusual Hue

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The Doors in an Unusual Hue
A six-CD set shows us the band's red-hot blues side
January 2, 2010
By JIM FUSILLI

Very few major bands of the '60s and '70s have an image today that's as far removed from the music they played back then as the Doors. The Los Angeles-based quartet is likely remembered as the group behind the dated though still-enjoyable hit singles "Light My Fire," "Hello, I Love You" and "Touch Me," as well as the FM radio staples "Riders on the Storm" and "L.A. Woman." Lead singer and lyricist Jim Morrison achieved rock immortality by dying before his decline, having established a public persona that was part Brando, part Lord Byron, part preacher and part shaman. Live recordings of his long-form pieces with the Doors—"The End," for example, which evolved onstage into an Oedipal drama with Morrison playing all the roles—give the impression the band alternated between pop hits and self-indulgence.

But, as the recently released six-CD set "Live in New York" (Rhino) illustrates, the Doors were a red-hot blues band too. At the time of Morrison's death in 1971 at age 27, about 18 months after the shows were recorded, the band was stripping back its sound and reconnecting to music that, before the Doors struck it big, had been in its repertoire.

"The Doors were a blues-based band with literary aspirations," said Ray Manzarek, the band's keyboard player, when we spoke recently by phone. In 1966, when they played their first shows at the London Fog, a club on L.A.'s Sunset Strip, "we had to do four sets a night, maybe five on the weekend," he told me. "That's a lot of time to kill. So we started to play the blues."

Mr. Manzarek, Morrison and their colleagues John Densmore, a drummer, and guitarist Robbie Krieger admired Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf and John Lee Hooker as well as groups like the Chicago-based Paul Butterfield Blues Band with guitarist Mike Bloomfield.

"I grew up on the South Side of Chicago, and Robbie is a country blues guy," Mr. Manzarek said. "When we were signed by Elektra, he was thrilled because they put out the Paul Butterfield band." Paul Rothschild, who produced Butterfield, was assigned to work with them.

In time, the Doors put away the blues. "We had our own material," Mr. Manzarek recalled. Willie Dixon's "Back Door Man" appears on their debut disc, but they recorded no other blues standards on their first four albums.

The blues slipped from their live shows too. "We played the Doors' greatest hits," Mr. Manzarek said. "If you came to see the Doors, paying all of $5, you'd better hear 'Light My Fire' and 'Hello, I Love You.'"

"Soft Parade," the Doors' fourth album, in which the band was backed by an orchestra, was "the obligatory horns-and-strings experimentation," Mr. Manzarek said. "And then we got back to the blues." The next album would be the band's grittiest studio recording, "Morrison Hotel," which is book-ended by two original blues works—"Roadhouse Blues," featuring John Sebastian on harmonica, and "Maggie M'Gill." Guitarist Lonnie Mack, who influenced Duane Allman and Stevie Ray Vaughn, sat in on bass on both.

When the band arrived in New York in January 1970 to do the four concerts that constitute "Live in New York," "Morrison Hotel" had yet to be released. Before the shows, the audience was probably unaware that the band was returning to its roots, though by agreeing to play two shows a night at the Felt Forum, rather than one at the much larger arena next door, Madison Square Garden, the Doors were simplifying. Mr. Manzarek said they were eager to play a smaller venue for a New York crowd.

"New York was our best audience," he told me. "They understood the musical references, the jazz, and Morrison's poetry."

But four shows over two nights would be a test for Morrison, whose addiction to alcohol made him an uneven performer. "That's a lot of work. That's tough," Mr. Manzarek said. Morrison, he added, "had done some ripping and tearing on the old vocal chords. But he held up."

The best set of the four, which are presented in their entirety in the box, is the kickoff. During each show, the band rips into Bo Diddley, Howlin' Wolf, John Lee Hooker and others as well as "Roadhouse Blues," which opens all the shows. They play the hits, of course, but with a fierce attack. The package recasts the Doors as a tight live act. Though Morrison commands the spotlight, the trio behind him is more than mere support. Mr. Manzarek, who filled the bottom by playing the Fender Rhodes Piano Bass with his left hand, creates a sinewy platform for Morrison with an electric organ, while Mr. Krieger's guitar has an appealing bite as he alternates between soloing and working off Mr. Manzarek. On drums, Mr. Densmore makes rock that swings.

"Of course, we nailed it," a cheerful Mr. Manzarek told me. "Ooh, that band is tight. When my left hand locked in with Densmore's kick drum, I could just feel it. I've said this before, but one of my biggest regrets was that I never got to see the Doors. I never got to experience that tightness from the audience."
—Mr. Fusilli is the Journal's rock and pop music critic. Email him at jfusilli@wsj.com or foll