“Morrison Hotel” by The Doors - album review

features in: Album Chart of 1970Album Chart of the Decade: 1970s1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die external-link.png

TJR says

The ever-brilliant quartet opened the 70s with “Morrison Hotel”, their most muscular set to date. The album is divided in a titular fashion, side 1 being labelled “Hard Rock Café” and side 2 bearing the front-cover title “Morrison Hotel”. The suggestion is that the outright rockers dominate the first half, and the second side is a tad more artful, although that doesn’t bear up in reality; the artfulness seems omnipresent to me. The storming “Roadhouse Blues” gets things off to a surprising start, with Lonnie Mack being drafted in to provide an insistent bass guitar part (unusual for the Doors), the prominence of which proves to be the making of the classic piece. The dramatic “Waiting For The Sun” immediately follows, and recalls psychedelic glories of ’67. The super-funky “Peace Frog” emerges as the killer highlight in every way; musically and poetically brilliant. By the end, I’m as traumatized as the 4 year-old Jim by those Native American ghosts. Well, maybe not quite – but his imagery is potent. “Land Ho” gets side 2 off to a flyer; it’s quintessentially Doors, packed to the hilt with action and adventure; rhythms that ebb and flow, instrumentation that swirls around your head like a rush, and a commanding vocal from the charismatic front man. Almost making a mockery of the “Hard Rock Café” title of side 1, “Maggie M'Gill” ends side 2 with the hardest blues rocker yet, bringing the album full circle from “Roadhouse Blues”. It was a sure pointer that they were ready to fully embrace blues rock as the Doors sound of the 70s.

The Jukebox Rebel
18–Apr–2007

Tracklist
A1 [04:04] 10.0.png The Doors - Roadhouse Blues (Jim Morrison, Ray Manzarek, Robby Krieger, John Densmore) Blues Rock / Soul Rock
A2 [04:00] 8.9.png The Doors - Waiting For The Sun (Jim Morrison) Psychedelia
A3 [02:53] 7.9.png The Doors - You Make Me Real (Jim Morrison) Blues Rock / Soul Rock
A4 [02:50] 10.0.png The Doors - Peace Frog (Jim Morrison, Robby Krieger) Cerebral Pop
A5 [02:12] 6.1.png The Doors - Blue Sunday (Jim Morrison) Pop Ballad
A6 [03:08] 7.8.png The Doors - Ship Of Fools (Jim Morrison, Robby Krieger) Cerebral Pop
B1 [04:06] 8.3.png The Doors - Land Ho! (Jim Morrison, Robby Krieger) Cerebral Pop
B2 [04:17] 8.1.png The Doors - The Spy (Jim Morrison) Blues / Rhythm n Blues
B3 [02:47] 6.7.png The Doors - Queen Of The Highway (Jim Morrison, Robby Krieger) Blues Rock / Soul Rock
B4 [02:35] 8.2.png The Doors - Indian Summer (Jim Morrison, Robby Krieger) Psychedelia
B5 [04:24] 8.8.png The Doors - Maggie M’Gill (Jim Morrison, Ray Manzarek, Robby Krieger, John Densmore) Blues Rock / Soul Rock

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