The Doors - "L.A. Woman"

First, huge thanks to the hundreds of customers who visited us Saturday, our best and most fun Record Store Day yet! Vibes were positive, the place was rockin’! Grateful also for everyone on our staff, who handled the rush with good humor and ease; we appreciate everyone in our record store community for keeping this lil’ State Street music hub running for 43½ years.

55 years ago today, The Doors released “L.A. Woman.” It was their sixth and final album to include 26-year-old lyricist, singer Jim Morrison; he was gone less than three months later. Featuring Top 20 singles “Love Her Madly” + “Riders on the Storm,” this LP reached #9 Billboard (#28 UK) and is regarded as one of their best, ranked 364th Greatest Album of All Time by Rolling Stone. More in Comments.

April 19 Birthdays: Tommy Benford b.1905; Don Barbour (The Four Freshmen) b.1927; Alexis Korner b.1928; Dickie Goodman b.1934; Dudley Moore b.1935; Ruby Johnson b.1936; Larry Ramos (The Association) b.1942; Bernie Worrell (Parliament-Funkadelic) b.1944; Michael Stewart (We Five) b.1945; Mark 'Flo' Volman (The Turtles / The Mothers of Invention) b.1947; Genya Ravan is 86; Alan Price (The Animals) and Eddie Kramer are 84; Eve Graham (The New Seekers) is 83; Tim 'Frank-N-Furter' Curry (Rocky Horror Picture Show) is 80; Rod Morgenstein (Dixie Dregs / Winger) is 73; Andy Shernoff (The Dictators) is 71; Gary Langan (Art of Noise) is 70; Tony Martin (Black Sabbath) is 69; Stevie B is 68; Suge Knight is 61; Dar Williams is 59; Luis Miguel is 56; PinkPantheress is 25.

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Review by Richie Unterberger

The final album with Jim Morrison in the lineup is by far their most blues-oriented, and the singer's poetic ardor is undiminished, though his voice sounds increasingly worn and craggy on some numbers. Actually, some of the straight blues items sound kind of turgid, but that's more than made up for by several cuts that rate among their finest and most disturbing work. The seven-minute title track was a car-cruising classic that celebrated both the glamour and seediness of Los Angeles; the other long cut, the brooding, jazzy "Riders on the Storm," was the group at its most melodic and ominous. It and the far bouncier "Love Her Madly" were hit singles, and "The Changeling" and "L'America" count as some of their better little-heeded album tracks. An uneven but worthy finale from the original quartet.

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