The Doors – Live At The Isle Of Wight Festival 1970

Bloody flippers, fingers crossed all these rsd crap moves are reissued

My listening rating system (1-5):
music (subjective) / sonics / pressing
4.5/3.5/4.5

Great recording of The Doors last European performance at the last great festival of the 60s. Excellent mastering and vinyl, I think the music and Jims voice come through pretty amazing given it was recorded outside. One of the best live performances of them I think. Jim’s performance is very focused but soulful, great display of his singing. Packaging could have more, but is still cool and each is numbered in gold foil.

This edition is for the true Doors fan IMO. It's a great copy of a good performance. The pressing is flat, heavy and without defect. The mastering is very good. No issues with the pressing or sound quality. Rhino did a great job there.

However, I do not consider this one of the best performances for the Doors. I think Alive She Cried, Absolutely Live and the Hollywood Bowl are all better choices. I disagree with Ray Manzarek that this performance was a controlled fury. Robby, Ray and John are excellent in their performance but they always were excellent. Morrison was always the X factor. In this performance, I agree that Jim was controlled and his vocals were strong BUT he was also very tame in this performance. There's no wandering off in poems, rants or attempts to provoke the crowd. Even worse, there are no shrieks or shrills especially when it's time to scream "try to set the night on fire!" Morrison sings in a lower range throughout this set. The performance is just missing that Doors edge and I suspect it had everything to do with the Miami incident that occurred previous to this concert.

Finally, the packaging is just OK. Too many other sets (London Fog for example) go above and beyond with photos or additional propaganda. I have a higher expectation for a limited release like this. It's not even a gatefold. Rhino did provide nice inner sleeves and numbering but that's the extent of the packaging extras. It was $32 new but it appears the double LP is the driver for that. Concerning the sides, there aren't many songs on each side so you do have to flip a little more frequently than normal.

I'm not beating this version up. It's good and I like owning it as a serious Doors fan. I'm encouraging a more casual fan to consider other live performances. This is not the edgy or animated performance that made the Doors bust into their well-deserved legendary status (IMHO).