Jim Morrison

[general gruesome]

Thought I'd create this topic to see what people's responses and thoughts were. What are you opinions on The Doors frontman Jim Morrison.

[Hepcat]

The Doors became one of my favourite bands when they burst upon the scene with "Light My Fire" and have stayed as such ever since.

The inception of the Doors came in July of 1965 when two former students from the UCLA film school, Jim Morrison and Ray Manzarek, ran into each other on the beach in Venice, California. Jim had been writing songs which very much impressed keyboardist Ray who had been playing for a band called Rick & the Ravens. The two decided to form a band and recruited drummer John Densmore in August and guitarist Robby Krieger in September. A bass player proved unnecessary since Ray could play the bass lines with his left hand on his Fender Rhodes Piano Bass while playing other keyboards with his right hand.

Jim's rich, lustrous vocals together with Ray's organ work proved ideally suited for the dark flights of fancy that the band undertook to lay down in song form. The lyrics were steeped in mysticism while the arrangements were an imaginative blend of classical and blues influences into contemporary rock. The Doors were playing psychedelic rock before the term had been coined - but a very accessible, commercially viable form of psychedelia. Robby proved to be a capable songsmith as well and the Doors were well on their way to stardom.

"The Doors of Perception", a book by Aldous Huxley, provided them with the inspiration for their name.

Their unique sound proved popular enough to land them a gig as the house band at the prestigious Whisky-a-Go-Go in Los Angeles. There they opened for such bands as Them who were riding high with hits such as "Gloria" and "Here Comes the Night". It was also at the Whisky that they developed their closing number, "The End", in which Jim would improvise vocals while the other three fellows laid down a steady, compelling and almost hypnotic, backing track.

At the recommendation of Arthur Lee the lead singer of Love, Elektra Records president Jac Holzman and his producer Paul A. Rothchild took in their show one evening in August 1966. Holzman offered them a contract and the Doors signed with Electra just over a week later on August 18th.

It's a good thing too that the Doors had landed a recording contract on that date. Just three days later they managed to get themselves fired from the Whisky. You see Jim had been drinking and partaking in hallucinogens and managed to pass out in his apartment. When he failed to join his bandmates at the Whisky prior to the show that evening, his bandmates came and dragged him from his apartment and propped him up on stage at the Whisky. It was during "The End" which the Doors had been using as their closing number that Jim embarked on the "Oedipus Rex" inspired flight of fancy that culminated in the words "Mother, I want to...!" The crowd went wild as the band exploded into a climactic frenzy behind Jim. The Doors knew they had killed that day!

Jim's father, an admiral in the U.S. Navy, just would not have approved. Neither did the manager of the Whiskey. He fired them in disgust as soon as they got off the stage.

The Doors recorded their self-titled debut album with the aid of engineer Bruce Botnick and producer Paul Rothchild in the closing months of 1966 and it hit the shelves of record stores in January 1967. "Break on Through (To the Other Side)" was chosen as the lead single. It flopped immediately.

It was the release of their second single, "Light My Fire", in June of 1967 that vaulted the Doors to superstardom. It sold a million copies and reached number one on the Billboard Charts on July 29th staying there for three weeks in a row. When I heard the dark melodic strains on the kitchen radio for the first time I was fascinated. I loved it! It was like nothing I'd heard on the radio up to that time. I knew that the boundaries encompassing rock had just been dramatically expanded and that rock had left its period of youthful innocence behind.

It was the Doors' performance of "Light My Fire" on the Ed Sullivan Show that established them as the cultural icons they remain today. Jim appeared wearing tight black leather pants which must have caused appalled parents' jaws to drop across every single living room in North America. I certainly expected expressions of horrified disgust in as many as two languages from my very old school father. He must have been too shocked though, or maybe he too was hypnotized by the seductive organ riff behind Jim's throaty vocals. Much to my surprise he just sat there in silence. All I know is that I watched the performance intently in almost rapt disbelief. These fellows made the Beatles look like innocent choirboys! They were a step above and beyond whatever else was happening in rock at the time.

Interesting too is that Ed Sullivan had demanded that the Doors change the words of the song from "Girl we coudn't get much higher" to "Girl we coudn't get much better" as a condition of performing. You see it was actually illegal to use the word "higher" as a drug reference on American TV at the time. The Doors had agreed but when it came time to sing the line, Jim clearly enunciated the word "higher". Ed Sullivan was understandably furious and banned the Doors from any further appearances on his show. When told that the rest of the band's five scheduled appearances on the show had been cancelled, Jim reportedly said "Hey man, so what? We just did the Ed Sullivan Show!"

Here's the video:

THE DOORS "Light My Fire" on The Ed Sullivan Show

I just love that type of insolence. Stick it to the straights I still say! I may be a stockbroker and a "respectable" member of society these days, but I still take delight in offending those more straightlaced than myself. And woe to any bureaucrat or corporate suit who annoys me and finds himself in my company!

I bought their debut album a couple of months later - and let me tell you I was well and truly hooked on the Doors within one or two plays on my little mono fliptop record player. The music just drew me in. When I played it for one of my buddies, he stayed uncharacteristically silent - but bought his own copy a few weeks later. He later confessed to me that the Doors sounded so moody and Satanic to him the first time I played the record that he never thought he'd be able to like them! He's remained every bit as much of a Doors fan as I am to this very day.

The tumultuous career of the Doors as a quartet was unfortunately cut short after six groundbreaking studio albums by Jim Morrison's untimely death in 1971 at the age of 27.

[Pauspy]

...and Riders of the Storm was their best song! 

[BaronLatos35]

Big fan of Morrison and The Doors. I read "No One Here Gets Out Alive" multiple times in high school. I love their music, especially the bluesy later sound. The way he broke on through was captivating to a high school kid.

When we went to Paris, we stopped at Pere LaChaise Cemetery to see his gravesite. It was a serene experience. There must have been 6-8 other people there. One person was playing "When the Music's Over" from a portable. Here was Morrison buried with other artists and writers.

I've posted these before, but for a Jim Morrison thread, they can go back up.







Not sure why I'm so serious, this was when someone was playing "When the Music's Over"...

[typhooforme]

In.my.top.3.or.4!--The.songs.of.my.youthful.days.

[Inkfink]

Indians scattered on dawn's highway, bleeding.
Ghosts crowd the young child's fragile eggshell mind.

[charp13]

Well I've never seen those photos before, Baron! And I am jealous. What a wonderful trip that must have been for you and Mrs. Baron.    And how romantic! (I would say it in French, but I only studied Spanish).  I have read about Jim Morrison's grave and seen photos, but it means so much more when someone has a story like yours to go along with the photo. Thanks for sharing this special memory.  And I have to add- You are such a beautiful couple. If I saw you two walking around in Paris, I would think you were movie stars! 

[BaronLatos35]

Thanks for the kind words charp...my wife would love hearing that. She has that charisma, I usually play the background.

We were fortunate to be able to go. We visited her sister and brother in law when they were living in London. It was a 2.5 hour train ride to Paris. We figured it was now or never, so we escaped for 3 days, 2 nights. It was a delayed honeymoon of sorts (we never did go on one after the wedding).

It was romantic indeed.

One final thing about Pere LaChaise...it was a beautiful Gothic visual display. We went in October, so the Halloween mood was just right. There's a thread around here showing various cemetery pictures.

[Hepcat]

Here is the Doors' famous appearance on the Smothers Brothers Show:

The Doors - Wild Child (1968 Smothers Brothers)

Check out Robby Krieger's shiner. He got it in an altercation with some renecks in a bar a few days earlier. He refused to let the makeup people disguise it!

[Illoman]

Jim Morrison's Grave by Steve Taylor:

Am I a pilgrim?
Or another souvenir hound?
In the city of lights I set my sights
On a king's domain.
It was a manhole
Dug over at the edge of town
And a spray can scrawl
on a cemetary wall
says "You'd better behave"
Jim Morrison's Grave
It's getting cold here
And there ain't a lizard in sight
Did the end begin
When you shed your skin
In the home of the brave?
Somebody shake him
From the land of larger than life
Where the remnant warn
of a legend born
In a dead man's cave.
Jim Morrison's Grave
I stay driven 'cause there's nowhere to park
I can't shut my eyes, I'm afraid of the Dark
I lie awake
That stone left me chilled to the bone
Sound the alarm before it's done
Find Jim Morrision
Come away to Paris
Let him see another day
Let him fade out slowly
Only fools burn away
Let a true love show him what a heart can become
Somebody find Jim Morrison
Find Jim Morrison's Grave
Ohhhh......
I get weary, Lord I don't understand
How a seed get strangled in the heart of a man
While the music covers like an evening mist
Like a watch still ticking on a dead man's wrist
Tick away

[Gillfan]

Baron- Great pix! For some reason I always thought Jim's grave had a but of him on it. Is it obscured in the pic or is it not there?

[Illoman]

Here's the video to that song I posted the lyrics to. You can see that bust Gillfan mentions. Not sure where it is in relation to JM's grave...

Steve Taylor - Jim Morrison's Grave

[BaronLatos35]

Baron- Great pix! For some reason I always thought Jim's grave had a but of him on it. Is it obscured in the pic or is it not there?

It's not there and they had a fence up. The results of the constant vandalism and attempted thefts in the past.

I was hoping to see a bust as well.

[Hepcat]

Here's a good clip of the Doors on Canadian TV in 1967:

The Doors - The End (Live '67 Canadian TV) PART 1

[Gillfan]

I understand leaving flowers and whatnot at a grave, but I don't understand vandalism. Bizarre.