Hello, I Love You

The harmony is deliberately simple — a repetitive three-chord rock riff in A major anchored by a prominent flat-seventh chord (G natural). This mixolydian coloring is precisely what caused the song's famous controversy: the A-G-D pattern closely mirrors the riff of The Kinks' 'All Day and All of the Night.' The simplicity reflects the song's origins as one of the Doors' earliest compositions, written before the band developed the more adventurous modal and blues-based harmony that defines their signature catalog.

'Hello, I Love You' is one of the earliest songs in The Doors' catalog. Jim Morrison wrote it in 1965, and it was first recorded that year by Rick & the Ravens — a forerunner group that included Ray Manzarek's brothers and Morrison — at World Pacific Jazz Studios, as part of a six-song demo used to pitch for a record deal. Although officially credited as a Doors group composition on both the Waiting for the Sun liner notes and with ASCAP (where all four individual members are listed as writers), the Doors themselves resisted Elektra Records' pressure to include it on their third album, feeling it represented a shallow pop approach they had long outgrown.

Written as far back as 1965 and recorded reluctantly at Elektra's insistence, 'Hello, I Love You' became The Doors' second U.S. number-one single despite the band's own reservations about its commercial shallowness. The track is notable for its driving guitar riff (acknowledged by the band to echo The Kinks), Morrison's Venice Beach-inspired lyric, and its place among the first rock singles deliberately issued in stereo on a 45 rpm record.