“People Are Strange” by The Doors

"People Are Strange" turned up on the Doors' second album, Strange Days, in September 1967, and it was born out of a black mood. Early that year Jim Morrison came by the place Robby Krieger shared with John Densmore, looking deeply low; Krieger talked him into a walk through Laurel Canyon, up in the Hollywood Hills, and Morrison came back elated with the first words of the song in his head. Krieger heard the melody and knew they had a hit.

Morrison and Krieger wrote it, though the sleeve credits the whole band, and Paul A. Rothchild produced it for Elektra. It's a short, woozy stagger of a thing, carnival-crooked and strangely catchy, over before it has finished unsettling you. With "Unhappy Girl" on the flip, it climbed to number 12 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.