I woke up this morning and I got myself a beer.

Roadhouse blues is one of my favorite Doors songs, if not my number 1.
It's a blues-rock song, which I enjoy cause I like blues a lot.
It was first released as a single from Morrison Hotel in March 1970.
The band often played it live and one live version appeared on the album An American Prayer(a posthumous album) and has been called "probably one of the best live performances of any song" That version also appeared on the Greatest Hit album and the In Concert album. In this version, Jim talks about his Zodiac sign to a female in the audience. I will try to find this version on youtube and post it.

So what's the story behind this song?
Jim liked to sing blues numbers at their jam sessions when he got drunk, and he also likes listening to blues. One night when jamming on a lot of blues numbers, they came up with this song. The album Morrison Hotel was a return to their earlier sound/style that made them popular. This song has been called "The ultimate bar song". Jim Morrison came up with the line "keep your eyes on the road, your hands up on the wheel" after riding with his girlfriend Pamela to a cottage they owned outside L.A. and she was driving erratically. And I found an interesting video on youtube where Jim tells the story himself about how they came up with the idea.

Dig it?




Update: I couldn't find the live version I talked about earlier but here's another live version + the studio version. They are both pretty cool.



Studio version: