I know it’s ghoulish, but my job in this feature gets easier whenever another aging rock star bites the dust. This week Ray Manzarek, a founder of the Doors, went to Rock and Roll Heaven, so I have an excuse to put up some Doors music. I didn’t even try to find stuff that featured Manzarek. Let’s face it, Jim Morrison was more central to his group than almost anyone else you can name in any other of the great sixties groups. The Stones might have been able to survive without Jagger even. Morrison was unique. Still, Manzarek’s keyboard work was a huge part of the Doors music, and if you watch these videos you’ll surely get an earful of it, if only a few glimpses of Manzarek himself.
There’s actually a treasure trove of Doors stuff on youtube. My first criteria was to avoid Light My Fire, since I’ve posted it before and that would be far too predictable. First up is Touch Me from the Smothers Brother show. I continue to be amazed at the great music that was on that show. I watched it religiously, so I saw it then, but at the time it didn’t seem like such a big deal. Now, if you want actual live clips of some of these groups, there’s the Smothers Brothers or nothing.
From what I gather from today’s wanderings, the only fully recorded live concert the Doors ever did was at the Hollywood Bowl in 1968, that storied year. The full concert is on youtube, whole and in bits and pieces. A great concert. Here’s a few clips; the first two comprising the whole of When the Music’s Over; the third being the whole of The End.
And, part 2:
Finally, The End:
Was Morrison just a trice obsessed with death?
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