13

Despite the band said that they didn`t like that Elektra released compilation albums from them, I consider this "13" album ( titled by the number of songs included in the album) as a very good compilation, one of the best. Even the order of the songs was chosen very well. It has several of my favourite Doors`songs ("People Are Strange", "Moonlight Drive", "The Crystal Ship", "Touch Me", "You`re Lost Little Girl", "Wild Child" and "The Unknown Soldier") plus other songs which are good. I also liked the cover design, which also included in the first editions a inner sleeve with photos of the band taken during "the Miami concert incident", including some of Morrison carrying a lamb given to him by a friend.

This album was released in late 1970, when the band still was playing together, after the release of the "Absolutely Live" album and before the recording of the "L.A. Woman" album. So, this compilation doesn`t include songs from the "L.A. Woman" album, but still it is a very good compilation.

One of the best "greatest hits" collections ever. It contains literally all of the band's hit singles prior to 1970, and it shows nicely the essence of THE DOORS popularity and fame, that at one time matched only that of THE BEATLES. Of course, longer and arguably proggier tracks are missing, but that's not the point. "13" is every teenage kid's ticket to wonderful world of THE DOORS music and psychedelic rock in general. 3,5

Ah, memories...well, I started to listen to The Doors with the excellent compilation "The Best of The Doors" from 1985 (see entry), but this one is sort of a prehistorical value item for my music lover "career". I was attracted by this record while I was 5, it was in my father's collection and I clearly remember the lovely butterfly printed on a vinyl - publisher's logo. But then again, I see that the record was released by Elektra, not Chrysalis; so I my memories might be somewhat mixed. I asked myself why should anyone name a record after an unlucky number 13, and why should anyone name a band after such a silly name: doors. One of my first learned English words (I asked my father). Approximately ten years later, in my teens, the circle completed itself: I (re)discovered The Doors after getting into "The Best of The Doors" compilation, I discovered another one: 13, this time borrowed, home-taped copy from my friend (my father's broken turntable and his collection were long gone by the time).

And in my tender age of 16, I knew this compilation won't fail me. It didn't. It's an excellent selection of Doors' career - even without including any tracks from "L. A. Woman"; the albums was published later. Therefore, the selection is more...delicate, in a way. There are very few low points - boring "Roadhouse Blues" and boring "Hello, I Love You", and that's about it. (hm...I was thinking of those as of a flawless masterpieces back in my teens).

Compilation contains not the greatest hits, but the best works, really. Whoever was doing the selection, he (or she) didn't had any "progressiveness" on mind, but anyway this record is very consistent and focused (which is not often the case with compilations), it's sort of a mid-paced Doors, so to speak, without getting into any musical extremes, but on the other hand, not falling into the trap of collecting the bunch of overplayed pop hits. I'm very glad that "Land Ho" (an excellent song from a weak album), "The Crystal Ship" (underrated gem) and "Moonlight Drive" had found their place among the others.

Yes, this is a neat little record. I'm still loving it (although I don't posses it).

Get this one. Enjoy some good music. Then get everything else.

The greatest collection of early recordings under one sleeve.

Once again, I am not the biggest fan of collections, especially by bands that I know and understand. Well, this was at a yard sale for $0.50 USD, and I felt like it needed a home. I took it home and it showed me truly how awesome the Doors still were from where I left off. There are a lot of song choices here that one wouldn't normally see on a present-day Doors collection, such as "The Unknown Soldier", "You're Lost, Little Girl" and "Moonlight Drive". The main reason that these songs are on here is because this greatest hits compilation was assembled while the band was still at the top. OK, so what? So that means their album "L.A. Woman" came after this. Nowadays, songs like "L.A. Woman" and "Riders on The Storm" fillt he collections, which makes this an interesting piece to hear what the general consensus of Doors songs were before their groundbreaking "L.A. Woman" album.

As close to 5 stars as a compilation might ever get, very quirky and worth your while. "13" is an awesome compilation!

This is the first compilation of The Doors. When you look at the tracklist you can certainly not say that their best thirteen songs are featured. But intelligently, it is not called "Best Of", only "13". Most of the songs featured are good of course.

Half of them are even great : "Light My Fire", "People Are Strange", "Touch Me", "Love Me two Times", "Hello, I Love You" and "The Unknown Soldier". But this is only a total of six great songs.

Of course, the format of this compilation (one vinyl album) does not allow the anthems like "The End" or "When The Music's Over".

I guess that at the time, it was a good introduction to the band. Nowadays, I would only recommend "The Best Of Doors" in either the single or double CD packaging. It is truely their best compilation effort (in a compact and cheap format).

This one is useless in comparison. I do not own it as such and I doubt there is a CD version for it. Nonetheless, it is of course a good collection of songs from a very influential band. Four stars.

This is the first 'best of' edition by the Doors. It was released in late 1970. I, being the ardent fan that I was, just had to have it. Never mind that I already possessed those songs on other releases, I still had to have that album.

The selection is actually quite good for those who aren't too familiar with the band. I would imagine this release to be an attempt on the part of Electra Records, not only to make some big bucks, but to garner new fans for their "million dollar babies'' now and also for possible future releases by the boys.

I only listened to the record a few times. Like I said before, I had already purchased all their albums, so I had doubles on some of the tunes. I was disappointed that they didn't include such great epics as "The End" and "When the Music's Over" on the disc. This took away from the album in my opinion.

If you have never heard the Doors too much in the past, this is a good one to get. If you own their five previous studio albums, don't waste your money.

I give it four stars for content.

More often than not most telephone conversations with one of my bandmate friends back in the 60s would start with the phrase, "Wait till you hear this album I just bought." Discovering new music was what we lived for. The usual chain of events would be that one of us would've heard something fresh on what was at that time the burgeoning, untamed FM radio format where Top 40 was considered gauche and one was apt to find something radical or progressive, prompting the local word-of-mouth grapevine to sizzle with excitement. On this occasion it was my group's keyboard man, Rick Cramer, who informed me that his most recent discovery, "The Doors," were nothing short of phenomenal. I had learned to rely on his judgment and taste (he later turned me on to Jimi Hendrix) so I had no doubts. The passage of time has not only confirmed Rick's initial glowing assessment but has also cemented the band's place as one of the most influential American combos ever.

January, 1967. Four years had passed since Beatlemania exploded like a bomb and the long-haired, guitar-wielding armies of the British Invasion that followed them ashore had successfully routed our unarmed but bronze-tanned Beach Boy brigade, reclaiming the rebellious colonies of the Queen Mother's empire without a single shot being fired (musically speaking, of course). Four years had elapsed without we Yanks offering anything even close to a comparable counterpart. (And, no, The Monkees don't count. Davy was from Manchester.) Oh, we had the undeniably great Bob Dylan, for sure, but he was an enigmatic solo artist creating his own universe and he didn't belong to anybody, really. There were good east coast bands like The Young Rascals but they were solidly entrenched in traditional R&B sounds. The west coast had The Byrds but their obvious folk and C&W roots marginalized their impact. We had no viable answer. One big reason for this situation was a variation on the biblical adage about prophets being shunned on their own stomping grounds. Another was that, following the shady elimination of JFK, my generation had become so disgusted with the social climate in our homeland that we felt it much safer to trust in music, styles and ideas imported from distant realms, the UK in particular. One- or two-hit state-side wonders were fine and dandy as temporary diversions but we weren't willing to embrace an all-American ensemble as being worthy of unconditional adoration just yet. "Made in the USA" didn't carry much clout with us hippies. We still didn't trust anything homegrown. Not even ourselves.

The opening bang from John Densmore's snare on "Light My Fire" signaled more than just the emergence of yet another garage band with a record deal. The Doors were different. They didn't proclaim that there was a new sheriff in town. On the contrary, they announced that law and order had broken down completely and the rebels and scruffy riff-raff had boldly taken over Main Street. The Doors were non-conformist, definitely anti- establishment and exactly what we'd been waiting for. No more Mr. Nice Guy. The handsome, charismatic Jim Morrison wasn't shy in his singing brazenly about freedom from all rules, seeking uninhibited sex and living a bohemian, devil-may-care existence. To that notion we summarily cried out in our quaint vernacular, "Right on! Where do we sign up?" and the California gold rush was on again. The Doors unwittingly opened the flood gates that made it easier for bands like Jefferson Airplane, Buffalo Springfield, Grateful Dead, Sly & the Family Stone and even the strange Mothers of Invention to find more acceptance within the budding flower child movement. The curse had finally been lifted. Don't get me wrong, though. I'm not putting The Doors on the same plateau as the Fab Four or even The Who. No way. I'm just saying that in this egregious L.A.-based quartet we homies found four literate misfits that spoke our language and that aspect alone was a refreshing break-on-through for us.

Problem was, the indulgent, hedonistic mindset that attracted us to them like moths to a hot flame was so damning in nature that it figuratively beheaded the group barely four years after they came onto the scene. Densmore, Manzarek and Krieger were gifted musicians who instinctively knew where to draw the chalk lines but Morrison was the prototype bad boy who couldn't care less about his public image or the moral majority's outrage over his open indulgences in lewd behavior, drink and drugs. The upside of that stance was that we young Brandos thought it "cool." The flip side of that coin was that it systematically eroded the quality of The Doors' music to the point where, of their six studio albums, only their debut and grand finale are exceptional with the four in between containing only glimpses of brilliance. And, tragically, Jim's self-inflicted abuse slowly transformed him from a sly, grinning lizard king Adonis into what critic Lester Bangs called "Bozo Dionysus" and there lies the shame of it all. No matter the spin one applies, their story is very sad.

This LP, "13," is a representation of their first five long-play offerings. I wonder if, as the 70s dawned on western civilization, the suits at Electra could see that the group was sliding down the slippery slope of decline and the label had best try to seize the moment before their waning popularity sank their profitability into red ink oblivion. Top secret corporate news flashes about how things were progressing on album #6 (especially with word coming that their long-time producer, Paul Rothchild, had taken a hike) were not encouraging so it's hard to blame them for issuing a compilation at that juncture. To them the future was uncertain and the end was always near.

From the impressive 1st album they wisely included the full 6:50 rendition of the ground- breaking "Light My Fire," the incredibly intimidating "Back Door Man" and the hauntingly beautiful "Crystal Ship." The above average but slightly uneven "Strange Days" LP is represented well by the poignant and unique "People Are Strange," the dangerous romance of "Moonlight Drive," "You're Lost, Little Girl" with its predatory aura and the carnal plea of "Love Me Two Times." The unfocused "Waiting for the Sun" album earned spots with the banal-but-catchy "Hello, I Love You" and their excellent anti-war anthem, "The Unknown Soldier" with its abstract juxtaposition of obscene brutality and gleeful march music. The disappointing platter that is "Soft Parade" shows up in the form of the big band brashness of "Touch Me" and the hard rock of the superb "Wild Child." Many fans find something to like about "Morrison Hotel" but I'm not one of them so the silly antics of "Land Ho" and the we-can-always-do-a-blues-tune sentiment of the overplayed "Roadhouse Blues" is as suitable as anything else they could've chosen to cull from those dismal Jim's- on-another-bender sessions.

My advice to the progger who desires to own a decent collection of Doors music is to purchase the opening and the closing albums of their career with the irreplaceable icon Mr. Morrison and toss in their sophomore effort to boot because you don't want to miss having the fantastic "When the Music's Over" in your Door jam under any circumstances. Still, if you happen to come across "13" in the used vinyl bins you should probably pick it up because, despite its faults, it accurately reflects the up and down nature of the group's artistic endeavors from '67 to '70. 3.3 stars.