Song of the Week – Waiting for the Sun, The Doors

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I’ve always found it interesting when a band names an album after a song that’s not on that album, but on an earlier or later disc. The most famous example of this is Led Zeppelin’s Houses of the Holy. That was the name of their fifth album, but the song by that name was on their next – Physical Graffiti.

The first example of this disconnect that I noticed was with The Bee Gees. Their first album, Bee Gees’ 1st (1967), contained a song called “Cucumber Castle.” They later used that name for their 1970 album.

There are further examples of this throughout rock history.

Artist / Title / Album Song Appears On
Elvis Costello / Almost Blue (1981) / Imperial Bedroom (1982)
Tom Waits / Frank’s Wild Years (1987) / Swordfishtrombones (1983)
Smithereens / Especially For You (1986) / Green Thoughts (1988)

Today’s SotW is The Doors “Waiting for the Sun” from their fifth album, Morrison Hotel (1970).

The name of that song was also used as the title for their 1968 album release. The story goes that the band worked on the song for their third album but didn’t like the way it came out. Funny then that they still wanted to name the album after a song that didn’t make the cut.

Thankfully they continued to work on it and came up with a gem for Morrison Hotel a couple of years later.

Can you come up with any other examples? (Greatest hits compilations and live albums don’t count.)

Enjoy… until next week.

3 thoughts on “Song of the Week – Waiting for the Sun, The Doors

  1. The title of Johnny Thunders’ solo album was “So Alone,” but the song was not on the original release. It was thought that Johnny was too out of it on the recording. When it was released as a CD the song was included.

  2. Costello’s song Imperial Bedroom was not on the original release of Imperial Bedroom, but was released as a b-side and later as a bonus track on the various reissues of the album.

  3. i have a couple of examples rolling in my head, but my old brain cells will not retrieve, Tom.

    but, this did make me wonder about songs like, “Yellow Balloon” by the “Yellow Balloon.” Ugh in so many ways it is silly.

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