- The Very Best of The Doors · 1967
- The Very Best of The Doors · 1967
- The Very Best of The Doors · 1971
- The Very Best of The Doors · 1967
- The Very Best of The Doors · 1970
- The Very Best of The Doors · 1971
- Strange Days (50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition) · 1967
- The Very Best of The Doors · 1967
- L.A. Woman · 1971
- The Very Best of The Doors · 1968
- The Soft Parade · 1967
- The Doors · 1967
- The Very Best of The Doors · 1967
Essential Albums
- 1971
- 1967
- There have been plenty of classic debut albums. But few first-attempt records have defined an era while simultaneously birthing an idol, as The Doors did upon its release in January 1967. The impact wasn’t immediate: The album’s first single, “Break On Through (To the Other Side),” failed to break into the Hot 100—meaning that, for a while, the most visible marker of The Doors’ success was limited to billboards on the Sunset Strip, which featured Morrison and his bandmates. The equal billing was appropriate, as The Doors was undoubtedly a group effort: The seeds of many of these 11 tracks had mostly been planted by Morrison, but the group’s eventual smash single, “Light My Fire,” had been originally composed by guitarist Robby Kreiger, with the song's iconic organ intro and the groovy bossa-nova-inspired rim clicks created by keyboardist Ray Manzerek and drummer John Densmore, respectively. But it was Morrison—with his tight leather pants, heavy eyelids, and booming baritone—who took center stage when the band performed “Light My Fire” on The Ed Sullivan Show that September. And it was Morrison who sang the controversial line “Girl, we couldn’t get much higher” over the protests of the show’s producers—and thus beamed the Southern California counterculture to 40 million American viewers. That wasn’t the only shock generated by Morrison and The Doors: The singer’s infamous soliloquy on “The End”—“Father/Yes, son?/I want to kill you/Mother, I want to…”—has been endlessly analyzed for its Oedipal assertions. And the haunting intro to “The End” captured a new generation of fans when it soundtracked the opening of Apocalypse Now in 1979, sparking a renaissance of sorts for the band into the 1980s.
Artist Playlists
- Meet the outlaw poets of '60s psychedelic rock.
- The dark '60s rockers were far ahead of their time.
- What musical mysteries lurk behind The Doors?
- Check out these other voices injecting new life into the band's discography.
- In hot pursuit of a stormy myth.
Singles & EPs
Live Albums
Compilations
Appears On
More To Hear
- Songs from artists influenced by the LA rockers.
- On Albert King, Phil Chen, Jim Morrison, and The Doors.
- The British duo join Josh to play Thin Lizzy and Ken Nordine.
- Spooky selections from The Cramps, The Misfits, and The Doors.
- The origins of the Monterey Pop Festival and Coachella FAQs.
- Playing the ghosts of music past.
More To See
About The Doors
One of the most wildly influential bands of the ’60s, The Doors molded a seductive brand of doomed psychedelic rock infused with brassy jazz and plodding blues and shot through with heady, hedonistic mantras howled by frontman Jim Morrison. In 1965, Morrison met keyboardist and fellow UCLA film student Ray Manzarek on Southern California’s Venice Beach, and after a few personnel shifts, drummer John Densmore and guitarist Robby Krieger joined them as The Doors—a reference to Aldous Huxley’s mescaline-fueled book The Doors of Perception. The L.A.-based quartet’s influences stretched well past psychedelia, though, as they approached rock music with the loose agility of jazz experimentalists and the indulgent romanticism of beat poets. The band began honing their sound—and Morrison’s bawdy onstage antics—on the Sunset Strip, which led to the release of their 1967 self-titled debut album. The perception-busting lead single, “Break On Through (To the Other Side),” arrived in sharp contrast to the hippie idealism of the time, but it was the incendiary organ-powered track, “Light My Fire,” that challenged listeners with the drug reference, “girl we couldn’t get much higher.” The band’s live shows became notorious as Morrison writhed suggestively on stage, taunted crowds, and provoked the police. But the band was also prolific. Over just five years, they released six albums, featuring a now-lofty stack of classic rock staples, including the raucous hits, “Love Me Two Times,” “Hello, I Love You,” and “Touch Me”; deeper cuts like the flamenco-flavored “Spanish Caravan”; and meaty, meandering epics like the nihilistic number, “The End.” After Morrison’s tragic death on July 3, 1971, at the age of 27, the remaining members trudged on for two more years, but they could never match the ever-growing myth of the Morrison-led Doors and all the influence—and innocence—lost in its wake.
- ORIGIN
- Los Angeles, CA, United States
- FORMED
- July 1965
- GENRE
- Rock