New York City Broadcast, Pbs Critique 1969

New York City Broadcast, Pbs Critique 1969 was issued by the European bootleg imprint Bad Joker in 2016 under catalog number BOSS5-2034, pressed as a standard black LP and limited to 500 copies. This is a European pressing only, with no US counterpart under this specific catalog number. The source material draws from the PBS Critique television broadcast recorded in 1969, a session that has circulated in various forms over the years, including the related PBS Critique, New York City 1969 FM Broadcast on orange vinyl, also from the Bad Joker stable.

The front cover uses a semi-glossy finish and is visually split into three color zones that give the sleeve its distinctive green, white, and blue character. A bold lime green horizontal band runs across the top, carrying the classic Doors logo in white, the lettering rendered in the band's familiar stylized font. Below that band sits the main photograph, a blue-tinted image of all four Doors members standing in a line against what appears to be a set of heavy wooden doors set into a brick wall. From left to right, the figures are dressed casually in the late-1960s style: the leftmost member, John Densmore, wears a light denim or canvas jacket over dark trousers, the second, Robby Krieger, sports a darker jacket and sunglasses, Jim Morrison stands third in a white open-collar shirt and jeans with a noticeably fuller beard reflecting his 1969 appearance, and the fourth member, Ray Manzarek, leans slightly against the door frame in a striped shirt and dark jacket. Graffiti is faintly visible on the wooden doors behind them, including what reads as a partial phrase. A second lime green band runs along the very bottom of the front cover, carrying the title New York City Broadcast, Pbs Critique 1969 in clean white text. The overall color palette, green bands framing a blue-washed photograph, gives the sleeve a period-appropriate but clearly modern production aesthetic consistent with other Bad Joker releases.

The back cover is a solid navy blue, uncluttered and minimal. The track listing is centered on the sleeve with the Side A and Side B headers printed in the same lime green as the front cover bands, while the individual track titles appear in white. No liner notes, no session credits, no photographs on the reverse. The Bad Joker logo sits in the lower left corner alongside small print text and a barcode occupies the lower right. No insert is included.

The PBS Critique session from 1969 is one of the more frequently bootlegged Doors television appearances, and collectors who have followed this source material will already be familiar with the Critique release cataloged separately here on DoorsInfo.com. What makes the BOSS5-2034 pressing worth distinguishing is the specific track sequencing. Side A opens with Tell All the People, moves through the Alabama Song / Back Door Man medley, Wishful Sinful, and closes with Build Me A Woman. Side B leads with In Conversation With Richard Goldstein before closing on The Soft Parade. The inclusion of the Goldstein interview segment is a genuine draw for anyone building a comprehensive Doors spoken-word and interview collection, as it provides context around the band's mindset during the Soft Parade era. For collectors focused on live and broadcast sources from this period, this pairs naturally with material like The Doors Live at the Konserthuset, Stockholm, September 20th, 1968 - Radio Broadcast, which documents a similar broadcast format from just a year earlier.

On Discogs, 207 collectors have logged this pressing against 23 wants, which signals reasonably wide distribution for a 500-copy limited edition but not deep secondary market demand. The want-to-have ratio is low, suggesting the market is not particularly hungry for additional copies at the moment. Anyone looking to round out their Bad Joker holdings or build a complete PBS Critique broadcast reference shelf should also cross-check the Wishful Sinful - North American TV Appearances 1967-1969 release on this site for broader context on the band's archival output across formats.

For a 500-copy limited European pressing from an unlicensed imprint, BOSS5-2034 is a competent addition to a Doors broadcast collection rather than a priority acquisition. The packaging is clean and consistent, the source material is historically relevant, and the Goldstein interview on Side B adds some genuine value. Collectors who already own the orange vinyl variant of this same broadcast will find little here they do not already have, but those missing a standard black vinyl representation of this session will find this a solid, modestly collectible option at a fair secondary market price.