Think of his Bach-influenced Vox Continental organ hook on Light My Fire. Try to imagine Riders On The Storm without his ghostly electric piano. Witness his funked-up organ motifs on Peace Frog and The Changeling, or his delicate, modulating piano on Waiting For The Sun’s Yes, The River Knows. Ray Manzarek was one of rock’s most distinctive and innovative keyboardists, a true renaissance man drawing from a vast pool of diverse influences.
Jim Morrison’s lyrics aside, the palpable dread and foreboding of The Doors’ music (is there a creepier summer song than Summer’s Almost Gone?) was in the main evoked by Manzarek’s keys. Robby Krieger and John Densmore were no slouches in the chops department either, but it was Ray who had the sounds and imaginative gravitas to carry that weight.
