13 [B&N Exclusive] [Blue and White Inks Spot Effect Vinyl] in Bloomington, MN

The success and continued popularity of
13
over the years was a perfect illustration of the way in which
the Doors
(and their record label) successfully manipulated the group's image in two distinctly different directions.
presented
' most accessible, AM radio-friendly music, even bypassing their rather daring debut single,
"Break On Through,"
in favor of the much more popular
"Light My Fire"
-- anyone hearing this stuff would perceive the band as an edgy
pop/rock
outfit with the most intensely brooding vocals this side of
Elvis Presley
and lots of great tunes and better playing. The reality was a lot more complicated --
were a challenging, often disturbing, and very serious musical entity, and a big chunk of their work, especially in concert (which was arguably what they were really about), was much more R-rated than the material on
would lead you to expect, trading in fierce sexual imagery, sophisticated philosophical ideas, and coarse, even ribald sensibilities worthy of the best bluesmen, all wrapped around a unique blend of
poetry
and
blues
,
R&B
, and
jazz
-inspired
rock
. Indeed, one begins to fully appreciate, listening to what almost amounts to the "
Doors
-lite" sensibilities of this collection, just how much of the group's success, commercial and artistic, was predicated on this split, with a certain percentage of those millions of listeners of the singles making the leap, crossing over to the more serious side of their work and taking in those albums as well as the concerts. Subsequent compilations would mix the two sides more freely, and, ironically enough, later in the same year as the release of
Elektra
offered the first formal glimpse of that more serious side of
' music with the concert album
Absolutely Live
; the latter, even with its carefully airbrushed cover shot of lead singer
Jim Morrison
-- by then very scruffy looking with his beard -- would totally miss the mass appeal enjoyed by
, with its focus on
pieces and decidedly adult works such as
"Build Me a Woman."
The latter quickly started turning up in cutout bins, while
remained popular for almost two decades, and became -- along with the group's self-titled debut album -- the most common first
album purchased by fans, this despite the fact that it was released too early to contain their last two singles,
"Love Her Madly"
"Riders on the Storm"
(which made it onto the more FM-oriented
Weird Scenes Inside the Gold Mine
two years later). ~ Bruce Eder