Riders
On The Storm @ Apollo 
Riders on the Storm played the Apollo in Manchester, England last Wednesday night, January 7, 2007. Following are two media reviews of that show.
Riders
On The Storm @ Apollo 03/01/07
ORIGINAL Doors members Ray Manzarek (keyboards) and Robby Krieger (lead guitar) walk onto the stage with all the confidence of their tighter-than-life trousers and louder-than-hell shirts.
Filling in for the late (and great) Jim Morrison is singer Ian Astbury (The Cult), who looks every bit the rockstar - with his thick mop of curly hair, black leather jacket and unshaven face.
And almost 41 years on from when they first formed The Doors, they prove they still have the skill to knock out a crowd.
As soon as Road House Blues brooding bass lines give way to Krieger’s first guitar onslaught of the evening, people are hooked.
Cigarette smoke fills the air, as do hundreds of mobile camera phones (the cigarette lighter is now a distant memory).
Other tracks performed on the night included the classics Break On Through, People Are Strange and the awesome When The Music’s Over, during which, a hyped up Astbury tries to summon up the ghost of a Manchester music legend - “Lets see if we can get Ian Curtis in here too”, he asks the crowd.
Super-charged
After pouring their heart and soul into these superb rock songs, the legendary psychedelic-rockers perform a super-charged version of LA Women and the tune turns out to be a requiem for their much-missed friend “Lets hear it for Jim Morrison” hollers Ian Ashbury to the enthusiastic crowd.
Tonight Krieger and Manzarek may be less riotous than their former salad day selves, but they certainly do not suffer for being that little more mature than most of the bands that grace the Apollo stage.
Krieger, 60, dazzles with a youthful-looking grace and his stunningly fervent guitar solos, whose execution has surely bettered with time, never bore.
He plays his guitar with effortless ease and ability. You can tell by the joyful expression on his face that he is enjoying every note that comes out of his guitar.
He is so skilful, that it is often too painful to watch, too amazing to comprehend.
Riders on the storm played an absolutely blinding gig, which became a platform for Ian Astbury to show off his amazingly powerful voice that sounded uncannily similar to Jim Morrisons.
I’m sure the lizard king was proudly watching over them, grinning broadly, with his shirt unbuttoned and a glass of whiskey in his hand.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/manchester/content/articles/2007/01/04/030107_riders_storm_feature.shtml
John Atkin (gig: 03/01/07)
The Doors. The Doors, The Doors, The Doors!
There, I’ve said it. They might not be able to, for ludicrous legal reasons, but
the fact is that what you have here are two of the three survivors of the most
important American rock band ever.
 Ray Manzarek (pic: Alli Price/Digitalli) |
The tantrums of former drummer John Densmore may stop Ray Manzarek (keys) and Robby Krieger (guitar) using the name, but this is the closest you could get these days to an authentic Doors live performance.
Ok, we all know the story of Jim Morrison… the Lizard King, Mr Mojo Risin’, the face that covers the damp spots on the walls of a million student bedsits. July marked the 35th anniversary of his death, while 2007 marks the 40th anniversary of the band.
But in four short years, The Doors produced a canon of material most would struggle to emulate over a career five times that long. And most of it is on show tonight, in a faultless setlist.
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| Robby Krieger (pic: Alli Price/Digitalli) |
Manzarek and Krieger are, of course, the focus for most of the packed (despite three-figure prices for the best seats) Apollo. But they’ve found the perfect vocal foil in ex-Cult singer Ian Astbury. Described by Manzarek as Jim’s “European cousin”, his appearance and vocal cadences suggest Morrison, but he’s a consummate-enough performer to establish his own identity in this setting.
What follows is like a script… Roadhouse Blues, Break On Through, When The Music’s Over and Five To One fly by, before Krieger’s fleet-fingered flamenco solo mutates into the inevitable Spanish Caravan. His playing throughout is a revelation; one minute applying understated latin-flavoured licks to classic Doors tunes, the next fret-tapping like Eddie Van Halen’s psychedelic dad.
Still they come, the main set culminating in Touch Me (dedicated to the late James Brown) and a glorious, incendiary interpretation of LA Woman.
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| Ian Astbury (pic: Alli Price/Digitalli) |
The sound effects heralding the encore suggest we’re about to get the song from which the band – also including much-travelled bass genius Phil Chen and drummer Ty Dennis – took their new name.
Instead Krieger’s vintage Gibson SG guitar launches into Peace Frog, which feels somehow appropriate as it’s the bassline on which the entire Madchester movement was founded.
All that remains is for Light My Fire to provoke the audience into one final, blissful rapture. Astbury’s pleas for a public campaign to “get these guys on at Glastonbury” should not go unheeded.
(thanks, Paul)
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