The show was much better than I anticipated last night. I had low expectations after hearing some samples of the new lead singer (Brett Scallions [ex-Fuel] replaced Ian Astbury [The Cult] in 2007) on YouTube and elsewhere. The crowd was very much into the show and very loud, burying Scallions's vocals a bit. I have some suspicions that his vocals were also buried a bit in the mix according to Manzarek's instructions (he definitely seems to be in charge of the venture) - but of course I can't prove that. The venue's doors opened at 7:30, so people had about an hour and forty minutes of the access to the bar before the show even started at 9:10 or so. That may have helped the general impression as well. Ray Manzarek played up his Southside Chicago roots throughout the night, and even had members of his elementary school (Everett) in attendance at the side of the stage (they all had earplugs in, and some looked happier than others during the performance - some nodded their heads and tapped their feet, while others obviously yearned for stronger hearing protection, crossed their arms, and stared at the audience).
As for the individual songs - Love Me Two Times and Break On Through were solid, although Scallions especially seemed a little timid - perhaps cautious about the crowd's reaction to him. When The Music's Over was excellent for the most part, until the mood was broken a bit in the "I hear a very gentle sound..." section with some humor between Ray and Brett, but I suppose that's the moment when Jim Morrison regularly chose to burp into the microphone during Doors shows - so perhaps it was by design.
Peace Frog was a little shaky, but one of my favorite tracks, so I'm glad they played it. Predictably, a big cheer went up for the "Blood on the streets in the town of Chicago" lines.
I thought Waiting For The Sun was quite strong - it sounded really heavy, just like it should. Alabama Song was never one of my favorites, but the converted old German song had a lot of positive feedback from the Manzarek elementary school contingent...
Gloria (G-L-O-R-I-A) was something that a girl in the audience had apparently begged the singer to play while talking with him before the show. The Van Morrison/Them track used to be a regular in The Doors' sets.
Krieger's intro to Spanish Caravan and the song itself were done pretty well, but one of the real highlights was Soft Parade. They even repeated the ending portion ("...calling on the dogs...") after the conclusion of the song, to the delight of those in the audience. This was one of the songs that benefitted from having an actual bass player as opposed to the Fender Rhodes keyboard bass that Ray used to employ (in the classic Doors lineup, he played the Fender with his left hand and a Vox organ with his right).
Touch Me had a kind of odd "Sex Machine" (James Brown) introduction, but it was one of the better tracks on the night once it got underway.
The regular set ended with a pretty decent rendition L.A. Woman and the band left the stage, Mr. Mojo Risin' having risen again. They re-entered to the sounds of rolling thunder, and one guy in front of me was already writing 'Riders on...' when the first tinkling keyboard came in. Manzarek made a big show of being indecisive on whether to wrap things up after that, but of course they stayed. After a Morrison-like "whaddaya guys wanna hear?" - the crowd coalesced behind a chant of "Light - My - Fire, LIGHT - MY - FIRE" and that's exactly what they played. Ray did his customary right-foot-on-the-keyboard move as part of his time in the spotlight and the call-and-response keyboard-guitar battle with Robby. The only weird part came during the long instrumental middle section when bassist Phil Chen took a solo, which seemed out of place. This was very un-Doors-like, due to their never having a bass player on stage.
Manzarek brought his cheering section out into the middle of the stage after Light My Fire. It was kind of cute to see a bunch of old people (who aren't rock stars) waving to the crowd. Not sure if Ray wanted to hang out with them afterward, since many of them looked ready to get to bed.
Ray was in good spirits most of the evening, but he didn't do as much talking as I've seen/heard him do; he was very cognizant of the boisterous crowd and sensed that they just wanted to hear the hits, and he made sure they heard most of them. The setlists for the band change from night to night, but last night's crowd didn't seem to want to hear things like My Eyes Have Seen You, Love Street, The Spy, or other songs like that, so I suppose considering that, the set was fitting.
Robby moved around the stage quite a bit and really soaked up energy from the crowd. The guy's 62 (although he looks about ten years older), but he definitely seemed to be enjoying himself and moved around a lot. He came to our side of the stage (we were in front of Ray on the left side, about 3-4 rows back) quite often. Krieger is still very fluid and fluent on his Gibson SG. The classical/flamenco guitar on an acoustic/electric as an introduction to Spanish Caravan is a nice touch. (see a similar performance here, from Edmonton last year)
It was difficult for me to evaluate Brett Scallions. He has unquestionable charisma and rockstar-type moves, but as I indicated above, his vocals were hard to make out much of the time. I saw him grimace one time when his voice cracked (either WTMO or Peace Frog - can't remember now), looking upset with himself, but other than that he seemed to sing well. His voice is simply different from what I'm used to on Doors tracks (I even got used to Astbury by watching their L.A. Woman DVD from a few years ago, during which the band played that album [minus Crawling King Snake, which can be heard only during the end credits]). From what I could judge, he did fairly well. He's got a tough job, and I'm sure there will be many that are critical of him.
Of course, that assumes that any critics are really evaluating these shows. I would guess that the band has been written off, grouped by most into that cadre of bands like Lynyrd Skynyrd and Foghat that might tour extensively behind an established name but have few members from the classic core lineup. I had a great time though, and I think most of the audience did as well. In the end, I guess that's what matters.
As you can see from the picture, there was a bit of a struggle over the setlist after the show. Laura and I were actually competing with some other guy without knowing we were competing against each other. I believe they opened with Love Me Two Times and Break on Through, so the full setlist would be:
Love Me Two Times
Break On Through
When The Music's Over
Peace Frog
Waiting For The Sun
Alabama Song
Gloria
-Robby's Flamenco Introduction-
Spanish Caravan
The Soft Parade
Touch Me
L.A. Woman
-Encore Break-
Riders On The Storm
Light My Fire
*(Roadhouse Blues was not played, despite being on the list)
Unfortunately, there are no pictures of Ray (or anyone other than Robby, for that matter). The ticket clearly stated "No Cameras" but there were times when I believed I was the only one without one. The pictures you see were taken with my phone (a practice I normally loathe, but we were close enough to the stage for these moderately shitty images). The only one I took of Ray was very blurry and soon after that, my battery was basically dead.
Some background on the current lineup of musicians:
I had seen Manzarek and Krieger as part of 'The Doors of the 21st Century' (or D21C, as they were sometimes called) at the third show of their D21C incarnation in Fall of '02 in Barrie, Ontario at Molson Park on September 29, 2002. A few 'deeper cuts' were heard at that show (in contrast to last night's).
Apparently Manzarek was originally keen to tour simply as The Doors, but was sued by John Densmore (drummer for The Doors), as well as the estate of Jim Morrison... thus the first change of name. Back then, they had Stewart Copeland on drums (from The Police), Ian Astbury on vocals (of The Cult), and a bass player named Angelo Barbera, who played with Krieger's band. The lineup has changed quite a bit since that time. Stewart Copeland was out by early 2003 after breaking an arm. He promptly sued the band for breach of contract and the parties eventually reached a settlement. The original suit (brought by Densmore and the Morrison estate) eventually resulted in no damages awarded, but a ruling that Manzarek and Krieger cannot use The Doors logo, name, or images of Jim Morrison to promote their new band.
Changes since that day in 2002:
Ty Dennis (formerly of the Robby Krieger Band) assumed the drum stool immediately from Copeland and has been with the group since early 2003. Angelo Barbera is out, replaced by Phil Chen (who has worked with Rod Stewart and others) in 2005. Ian Astbury left the band in early 2007 to re-join The Cult full-time. Astbury was replaced by Brett Scallions, formerly of the band Fuel. While the British-born Astbury was definitely channeling Morrison at certain times (not to mention growing out his hair and wearing Morrison-esque shades), Scallions is decidedly not much of a Morrison clone. Astbury seemed to be chosen with the specific intent of having stoned audience members squint and see The Lizard King. When Scallions joined the band, he had blond spiky hair. He has since grown it out a bit, but his voice is certainly further away from Jim's voice than Astbury's ever was - which isn't necessarily a bad thing if these guys ever decide on trying to create new music. However, it doesn't seem like that's the objective right now.
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