Doors legend Robby Krieger to release first solo album in 10 years

Doors guitarist Robby Krieger has announced his first solo album in a decade. The Ritual Begins At Sundown will be released on The Players Club, a division of the Mascot Label Group, on April 24.

The Ritual Begins At Sundown was written with Frank Zappa’s old bandleader and bassist Arthur Barrow, and reflects Krieger's longtime love of jazz.

"When I wrote songs for The Doors, it was always the music first," says Krieger. "I think you have to have some musical ability to really understand Jazz, when I was young I didn’t really understand it, it took me a while.

"I was going to the clubs with John Densmore - before The Doors - to really get an appreciation of Jazz. We used to go see Wes Montgomery, Roland Kirk, Miles Davis, stuff like that. At first I didn’t really get it, but after a while it sank in and I always loved it after that."

Krieger has also released the first song from the album, The Drift.

Appearing alongside Krieger and Barrow on the album are former Zappa band members Jock Ellis (Trombone), Sal Marquez (Trumpet) and Tommy Mars (Keys), AeB Bryne (Flute), Vince Denim (Sax), Chuck Manning (Sax), Joel Wackerman (Drums) and Joel Taylor (Drums).

Recorded at Krieger's Horse Latitudes Studio in Los Angeles, the album features nine originals and one cover, Zappa's own Chunga’s Revenge.

"After The Doors I started becoming interested in Jazz and started hanging out with a guy called Sal Marquez,” says Krieger. “So we put this band together and that was the first Robby Krieger band and we played at the Whiskey A-Go-Go with Don Preston, Zappa’s keyboard player.

"Arthur Barrow, who was a huge Zappa fan - this was before he worked with Frank - he decided that, after graduating from North Texas State music school that he was gonna come out to LA and try to get into Frank’s band, which was pretty brash of him.

“He started hanging out with Don and with Zappa, Don was in my band so we decided to put Arthur in charge of the mixing at the Whiskey for our shows, that’s when I first met him in the 70s."

The Ritual Begins At Sundown is released on April 24.

The Ritual Begins At Sundown tracklist

1. What Was That?
2. Slide Home
3. The Drift
4. Chunga's Revenge
5. Hot Head
6. Yes, The River Knows
7. The Hitch
8. Dr Noir
9. Bianca's Dream
10. Screen Junkie

Robbie Krieger - The Ritual Begins At Sundown — (Image credit: The Players Club)

Online Editor at Louder/Classic Rock magazine since 2014. 40 years in music industry, online for 27. Also bylines for: Metal Hammer, Prog Magazine, The Word Magazine, The Guardian, The New Statesman, Saga, Music365. Former Head of Music at Xfm Radio, A&R at Fiction Records, early blogger, ex-roadie, published author. Once appeared in a Cure video dressed as a cowboy, and thinks any situation can be improved by the introduction of cats. Favourite Serbian trumpeter: Dejan Petrović.