10 Rock Bands That Wrote Songs In Different Genres

In the era when the Summer of Love was sweeping across California, The Doors seemed to occupy a bit of a different space entirely. Even though there were callbacks to the blues and even classical music in some of Ray Manzarak's keyboard lines, it all came to the magical energy of Jim Morrison, using his poetry and spoken word passages to create images in your mind that will never leave once you hear them for the first time. Ray and drummer John Desmore were cut from a different cloth though, and they wanted to see how well the Doors could swing on Touch Me.

Bringing in the horns and orchestral elements for the first time on a record, this entire track feels almost like a jazz pastiche being given the full rock and roll treatment, while Morrison hams it up on the vocals. From the way he articulates to his bombastic presence, Morrison almost ends up sounding like a rock and roll-ified version of someone like Frank Sinatra, having that kind of Vegas-esque showmanship that only Old Blue Eyes could have pulled off.

In between the verses though, Morrison takes a back seat on this song to the rest of the band, letting every section build and culminating in one of the greatest sax solos in rock history towards the end of the song. This was definitely a different look for people expecting Light My Fire Part 2, but the Doors didn't lose an ounce of their weirdness in the transition.