L.A. WOMAN

The album opens with "Changeling", the song that is lovely and silly in the same time; the main bass sequence is very similar to Lipstick's "Funkytown", but this one is much more serious, and, thanks goodness, much less annoying. There are some very weird organ sounds here. Chorus is excellent, with simple drum-driven rhythm. "Love Her Madly" is O.K. rock song with good lyrics (hmm, is this redundant to say?), but apart from that, nothing special, nothing demanding.

"Been Down So Long", "Cars Hiss By My Window" and "Crawling King Snake" are three blues-pieces included on the album, "Been Down So Long" being the best of them simply because the groove. "Cars Hiss By My Window" sound undeveloped, but it's utilising Jim's vocal interpretations of high-pitched electric guitar, but it ends almost abruptly, with three jazzy chords. "Crawling King Snake" is just slow and boring blues number, showing us Morrison's obsessions with reptiles and amphibians again.

"L.A. Woman" was never very appealing to me, although it's undoubtedly proto-prog. Few nice guitar and keyboard parts here and there, but that's about it.

"L' America" is a masterpiece itself. Excellent, scary, ultra psychedelic, military, flamenco, whatever - in one word - good tune. Breathtaking atmosphere, and the same trick used in the "Riders On The Storm" - Manzarek's emphasizing of Morrison's lyrics using his electric piano to describe the drops of rain.

"The Wasp" is a typical doors-like lyrical bravurosity surrounded by a great tune with excellent parts played on organ.

"Riders On The Storm" is a timeless masterpiece, and it doesn't need to be introduce to a wider audience. I'm just curious to know were there any previous attempts by any rock band to combine sounds of nature (rain) through the whole song?

In conclusion, there are only two average and one bad numbers to distant this record from the masterpiece status. The rest of the tracks are clever, good-produced, good-played songs with a palette of different styles, perhaps a palette not wide as we used to concern in the prog music, but it's diversity nonetheless. A well-deserved four stars. Right, from the prog rock point of view.

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