Roadhouse Blues

Krieger said it came out of a jam. He started playing the riff and Morrison came up with the words, and he thought they were great. It was recorded on 4 and 5 November 1969, with Rothchild pushing for take after take. Botnick later wrote in the 2006 liner notes that it took two days to realize Rothchild's vision of recorded perfection, and that some of the rawer early takes blow the roof off the place. On the second day Lonnie Mack, then working for Elektra, played bass because the regular bassist, Ray Neapolitan, was stuck in traffic. Mack told Krieger he had never played bass but would try. John Sebastian of the Lovin' Spoonful played harmonica, credited as G. Puglese, and Manzarek moved from a Wurlitzer electric piano to a tack piano. Morrison shouts do it, Robby, do it at the start of Krieger's solo. Alice Cooper has said he gave Morrison the line about getting a beer.

The song was the B-side of You Make Me Real, which reached number 50 on the Hot 100 in May 1970, and it charted by itself on the Cash Box Top 100 at 76. It got strong FM radio play, and Botnick called it the all-time American bar band song. Lester Bangs, reviewing the album for Rolling Stone, called it a powerful blast of raw funk. A live version on An American Prayer in 1978 was played on album-oriented radio and helped the band's revival.

Live and covers

It is logged in 28 Doors setlists, and it opened the set at The Warehouse in New Orleans on 12 December 1970. Status Quo heard the record in a club in Germany in 1970 and recorded their own version on Piledriver in 1972. John Lee Hooker shared vocals with Morrison on a studio version for the 2000 tribute album Stoned Immaculate.