The Mojo Collection. Various Mojo Magazine
The Doors
The Doors
A great mess of an artist, Jim Morrison, captured in all his wild majesty.
Record label: Elektra
Produced: Paul A Rothchild
Recorded: Sunset Sound Recorders, Los Angeles; August–September 1966
Released: January 4, 1967
Chart peaks: 43 (UK) 2 (US)
Personnel: Jim Morrison (v); Ray Manzarek (o, p); Robby Krieger (g); John Densmore (d); Larry Knechtel (b); Bruce Botnick (e)
Track listing: Break On Through (S/US); Soul Kitchen; The Crystal Ship; Twentieth Century Fox; Alabama Song (Whisky Bar) (S); Light My Fire (S); Back Door Man; I Looked At You; End of the Night; Take It As It Comes; The End
Running time: 43.25
Current CD: Rhino 8122799983 adds: Moonlight Drive (Version 1); Moonlight Drive (Version 2); Indian Summer (8/19/66 Vocal)
Further listening: The Doors Box Set (1997); Waiting For The Sun (1968); LA Woman (1971)
Further reading: Break On Through: The Life and Death of Jim Morrison (James Riordan and Jerry Prochnicky, 1991); No One Here Gets Out Alive (Jerry Hopkins and Danny Sugerman, 1981); www.thedoors.com
Download: iTunes
Jim Morrison was the narcissistic stuff of rock legend. Shortly after graduating from the Theatre Arts department at UCLA in 1964, he met the classically-trained keyboard player Ray Manzarek. In July the following year they got together with Robby Krieger and John Densmore – the drummer had shared a Transcendental Meditation class with Manzarek. Significantly, they took their name from Aldous Huxley’s The Doors Of Perception, an account of a mescaline trip. They clicked immediately: Manzarek’s alternately jittery and flowing organ identified a sound punctuated by Krieger’s blues riffs, jazzy runs and Spanish finger-picking, and Densmore’s fluid sensitivity to the overarching personality of the frontman. Morrison was magnetic: wild, handsome and possessed of a rich baritone. When producer Paul Rothchild (who also recorded Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Janis Joplin and Love) saw The Doors live during a six-month residency at the Whisky A-Go-Go, Los Angeles, in July 1966, he was so impressed by their presence that, according to his engineer Bruce Botnick, he at once proposed making a studio album as an ‘aural documentary’ of their live set.
Remarkably, that is what he achieved with The Doors, capturing iconic songs propelled by an awe-inspiring sense of drama. Break On Through bounds in on Densmore’s double-time bossa nova cymbal ride, Manzarek’s charging organ bassline and Krieger’s unison guitar; Morrison delivers his sermon with an evangelist’s certain fervour. Light My Fire, a Krieger composition, rolls in on a majestic Manzarek organ line, stretches out on keyboard and guitar solos, but always returns to Morrison’s sonorous vocal and the addictive chorus.
But, of course, there were problems inherent in Morrison’s temperament, fuelled by his artistic wrestling bouts with the nature of order and chaos. His most extreme exploration occurred during the final session – appropriately, while working on The End. Comprehensively wrecked, the singer wound up lying on the floor mumbling the words to his Oedipal nightmare, ‘Fuck the mother, kill the father.’ Then, suddenly animated, he rose and threw a TV at the control room window. Sent home by Rothchild like a naughty schoolkid, he returned in the middle of the night, broke in, peeled off his clothes, yanked a fire extinguisher from the wall and drenched the studio. Alerted, Rothchild came back and persuaded the naked, foam-flecked Morrison to leave once more, advising the studio owner to charge the damage to Elektra; next day the band nailed the track in two takes. Morrison lived for only another five years.
The Lovin’ Spoonful
Hums Of The Lovin’ Spoonful
Much-loved ’60s hitmakers’ finest album, packed with classic songs by John Sebastian.
Record label: Kama Sutra
Produced: Eric Jacobsen
Recorded: Columbia Studios, New York; 1966
Released: January 1967
Chart peaks: None (UK) 14 (US)
Personnel: John Sebastian (g, v, hm); Zal Yanovsky (g, banjo, v); Steve Boone (b, k, v); Joe Butler (d, v); Roy Hallee (e)
Track listing: Sittin’ Here Lovin’ You; Bes’ Friends; Voodoo In My Basement; Darlin’ Companion; Henry Thomas; Full Measure (S/US); Rain On The Roof (S); Coconut Grove; Nashville Cats (S); 4 Eyes; Summer In The City (S)
Running time: 27.24
Current CD: Camden 74465997322 adds: Darlin’ Companion (John Sebastian Solo Demo); Rain On The Roof (Instrumental Version); 4 Eyes (Alternate Vocal/Extended Version); Full Measure (Instrumental Version); Voodoo In My Basement (Instrumental); Darlin’ Companion (Alternate Vocal/Mix)
Further listening: All four of the Sebastian-era non-film soundtrack Spoonful albums are worth buying, but Daydream (1966) probably runs Hums closest. The Very Best Of (1996) is a good budget-priced compilation.
Further reading: www.lovinspoonful.com
Download: HMV Digital
Nowadays the Spoonful’s chief songwriter, singer and all-round supremo John Sebastian plays in a jugband. And if he survives a gig without being constantly heckled to play Spoonful songs, he is prone to remarking, ‘Thank you for letting me outgrow my twenties’. But if ever a songwriter had no reason to feel embarrassed by his early work it is surely Sebastian. He always wrote with a wit and care for language exceptional in rock, and with The Lovin’ Spoonful he created jubilant music in a distinctive style influenced by rock’n’roll, country, blues and folk.
His admirers included Clive James, who, in 1972, argued that ‘Randy Newman is the only man who has outstripped his brilliant lyric technique’. The Los Angeles Times described Sebastian as ‘one of the very select group of songwriters, including also John Lennon, Ray Davies and Brian Wilson, for which the term genius doesn’t seem just a publicist’s wild notion.’
Listen, for example, to Nashville Cats, in which Sebastian declares, gloriously ungrammatically: ‘There’s 1,352 guitar pickers in Nashville and anyone who unpacks his guitar can play twice as better than I will!’ His lyrics were nonchalantly fun-filled and quirky and irresistibly amusing. Consider Darlin’ Companion, later covered by Johnny Cash, a virtuosic masterclass in rhyme, half-rhyme and assonance, or Summer In The City, a perfect evocation of New York, which Sebastian co-wrote with his brother Mark and bassist Steve Boone.
‘It was a collaboration and the extra strength came out of that,’ asserts Sebastian of his most famous song. ‘We were putting out singles that sounded different all the time,’ he adds, a claim fully justified by this album’s four diverse US hits, Summer In The City, the truly lovely and evocative Rain On The Roof, Nashville Cats and Full Measure.
Fred Neil
Fred Neil
Recluse comes out of hiding long enough to leave indelible footprint in the sands of pop history.
Record label: Capitol
Produced: Nick Venet
Recorded: Capitol Studios, Hollywood; autumn 1966
Released: January