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From the bars to the arenas, learn the fascinating stories of how our biggest rock music legends made the leap. Each episode reveals the stories, songs and little known facts of the journey from obscurity to fame of one of rock music’s biggest stars. Join us on Garage To Stadiums as host Dave Anthony teams up with an author of a rock biography or director of a rock documentary to explore that journey, their early years, the stories behind the scenes, their top songs, and their place in music history.
Learn about the passion, talent, luck and even scandal that often came together to propel these stars from obscurity to household names.
G2S_S1E9_THEDoors_
Thu, Aug 29, 2024 12:34PM � 1:02:05
SPEAKERS
Dave Anthony, Jim Cherry
Dave Anthony 00:01
Hi there. I'm Dave Anthony, and this is the Garage to Stadiums podcast. On each episode, we tell you the story of how one of our music legends rose from obscurity to fame and play some of the songs that mark that journey. Welcome to Garage to Stadiums. Today's episode is the story of The Doors. The Doors were a band from Los Angeles, California, and formed in 1965. They were only together for six short years, putting out only six albums with its original lineup, while other bands sung about peace and love in the mid to late 60s, The Doors relentlessly challenged, confronted and inspired their fans with uncompromising and provocative songs that combined jazz rock, electronic blues and even Latin musical influences. They also possessed one of the most electrifying elite singers in rock history, Jim Morrison, an incredibly well read individual who was also a poet. Morrison possessed an intoxicating blend of charisma good looks and a curiosity for the dark side of life that combined with the band's mesmerizing music, often forcing audiences to straddle that fine balance between jubilation and mayhem. Accordingly, Morrison became the very embodiment of 60�s rebellion. The Doors have sold over 100 million albums worldwide and have been the inspiration for many bands that followed in various genres like alternative rock and punk. To tell the story of The Doors from the Garage to the Stadiums, is Jim Cherry, author of �The Doors Examined�. Jim was formally a columnist for and appeared on the �Rants, Raves and Rock and Roll� magazine radio show. He's also a novelist, having written several novels, short stories and poems, he joins us today from Chicago. Jim, welcome to Garage to Stadiums. Jim, what attracted you to The Doors as a fan and writer?
Jim Cherry 02:00
When �Apocalypse Now� came out, and I started listening to the radio they started getting more airplay on the radio at about the same time. So of course, the DJs would say, now here's The Doors. I head right to the record store. And got the first album. I brought it home, and I sat listening to it, and by the time I got to the instrumental of �Light My Fire� . I was a fan.
Dave Anthony 02:22
Instantaneously.
Jim Cherry 02:29
Pretty much everything Jim Morrison said, The Doors were about sex, death and travel. And when I was listening to the to the instrumental, I was really getting into it. It was like one of the first times something an artist had said about their work, I understood what they were talking about.
Dave Anthony 02:49
Let's go back in time and understand Jim Morrison and maybe Ray Manzarek. Tell us about their family life, their early days, and then we'll move on to the other two.
Jim Cherry 03:00
Yeah. Jim Morrison, his father was in the Navy, and his mother actually, they met at Pearl Harbor, I think, in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor. Jim was born in Florida on December 8, 1943 his father was a career man in the Navy. He was a rising star. He became an Admiral. So, his father was always gone. His father was involved in nuclear projects in New Mexico. That's where probably the one of the most important events in Jim's life happened. They were driving to Mr. Morrison's posting in New Mexico, and they came upon a truckload of Indians that had been in an accident. And there was some dead and dying Indians on the road, some blood on the road. And Jim said at that moment he felt the soul of one or two of those dead Indians leap into his soul. His mother tried to, you know, not make it seem as traumatic by telling him it was a dream, only it was just a dream Jimmy just dreamed. But I think she reinforced, by doing that, she actually reinforced the event in his mind. Later he recorded the incident and it was used on �Peace Frog�.
Jim Cherry 04:34
I really think it was a subjective moment, and his parents didn't understand that, but I think it was a very instrumental and key moment in his life, if not a false key moment in his life.
Dave Anthony 04:46
I want the audience to remember that moment, because it does inspire Jim to almost explore that spiritual side. Of course, we will touch back on the fact that Morrison's dad was involved as an admiral in the in the Vietnam conflict, which is interesting, which we will touch back. Ray Manzarek. Where was he from? Was he from Chicago?
Jim Cherry 05:14
He was from Chicago. He got interested in music. He learned how to play the piano. He you know, his father used to take him to Maxwell Street, and there was, of course, lots of musicians playing open air, playing electric guitars and playing the blues. So Ray got hooked on that. Not hooked, but maybe he was exposed to it at an early age. He was playing piano and everything. And then Elvis came along and turned everything around. Most of The Doors, Elvis was always one of the pivotal parts of that generation. I think his father was working kind of like a civil servant, or something like that. He had done that in Chicago, and they had the family moved to Los Angeles. He joined them there, started going to USC, or UCLA. Excuse me.
Dave Anthony 06:05
And so Morrison and Manzarek, Manzarek being the keyboardist, and of course, Jim Morrison, lead singer and ultimate lyricist, major lyricist of the of The Doors. They end up at UCLA Film school together.
Jim Cherry 06:20
Right. Jim always was interested in the theater. You know, everybody knows, he read a lot, Rimbaud. He was like reading Artaud. He decided he wanted to go to UCLA to make films. So he kind of defied his father and showed up at UCLA. And so his father just consented and filled out the forms and Jim was at UCLA taking for film courses. At about same time, Ray was entering for his master's in film. So Manzarek starts a band. Ray Manzarek had a band, Rick and the Ravens with his brothers, and they actually they played a lot of gigs. They played the Turkey Joint East in Santa Monica, which was a hangout for a lot of UCLA Film students. After they graduated, they went their separate ways. Ray. Ray was actually on a fast track to become a director. He even got written up in Newsweek magazine for one of his student films at the time. So he was just hanging out at the beach, and one day he bumps into Jim Morrison, or Jim Morrison bumped into him. Now, I put that in quotes because maybe even to Ray it was just accidental, but Jim had already proposed to one of his roommates, Dennis Jacob, that they start a band called The Doors Open and Closed. And so Dennis Jacob asked Jim what he wanted to do in the band. Jim said, I want to sing. And of course, he had, he'd never sung anything, but in any band or anything, at the time.
Dave Anthony 08:11
So you�re saying this, this meeting was not by accident.
Jim Cherry 08:15
No. I think Jim, Jim was famously on that rooftop in Venice, California, taking a bunch of acid. You know, I was having all this, seeing this fantastic rock concert in his head as he phrased it. He had written all these songs to hold on, he said, to hold on to the melodies. So when he bumped into Ray, I think he was looking for Ray, because he knew Ray was in a band, and actually the band had a record contract. I don't know how many times Jim may have walked up and down that beach hoping to bump into Ray. And Ray may, you know, Ray, may even believe that it was accidental, but I think it was pretty Jim, did pretty consciously wanting to hook up with Ray and get a band started.
Dave Anthony 09:06
So basically, Jim joins this band with Ray and his brothers, but his brothers ultimately decide to quit, and that leads to other individuals to join the band, and they are very talented. One is John Densmore, the drummer, and maybe talk a little bit about John, and then Robby Krieger, the guitarist. From where did they come from and how did they get involved with these other two film student slash wannabe musicians?
Jim Cherry 09:38
Well, Ray's brothers quit because Jim's lyrics were too weird. John and Robby were born and raised in Southern California. They were only about a year apart in school, John being the older Robby the younger. They went to high school together. John started out in junior high and high school, he started getting into band, and they put him on the drums. After high school, he starts getting into jazz and starts hitting the clubs on Sunset Strip. He was very much a jazz oriented player. He said that when rock and roll first came around, he was a jazz snob and turned up his nose at it. He started getting turning on to rock and roll, and he played in a band that happened to have Robby Krieger, and it was called the Psychedelic Rangers. Probably the only reason the Psychedelic Rangers are even known is because John Densmore and Robby Krieger were in it. Robby, he grew up in LA sat around Santa Monica getting into trouble and stuff, and his father was looking for an outlet for him, and Robby was interested in music and guitar playing. So his father, besides sending him to a private school to get him out of trouble, Robby started getting an interest in flamenco. Robby, he kept playing flamenco and classical guitar up until he saw Chuck Berry at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium in 1965 and so that was like, you know, Ray and Ray and Jim were already forming The Doors in 1965 so I think Chuck Berry is what changed Robby over to electric Guitar. And I think when he joined The Doors, he had only been playing the electric guitar for like, 18 months or something.
Dave Anthony 11:46
That's an incredible like, that's an incredible fact. Here's Robby Krieger joining this band The Doors, which goes on to become one of the more influential bands of the 60s. And he's barely picked up the electric guitar, but then, of course, leaves his mark on the band, as we'll find out with his incredible guitar playing and ultimately, some songwriting. There's an interesting story on how Jim Morrison came up with the name The Doors.
Jim Cherry 12:13
Jim was always into poetry and reading and writing poetry and everything. So William Blake had in one of his poems, if The Doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear as it is infinite. So that Aldous Huxley, he wrote �The Doors of Perception�, which was about his trips he took on hallucinogen.
Dave Anthony 12:39
Under the influence of mescaline. It was, yeah, which is right, right, in the early 50�s which is pretty early in the psychedelic world, yeah.
Jim Cherry 12:48
And he, he wrote, wrote �The Doors of Perception�, based on, you know, took the title from Blake. Jim, read it, I'm sure you know, when LSD was starting. Quite a few people read that book. So that's where The Doors came from.
Dave Anthony 13:06
So The Doors get together. Now, the four of them, they are literally playing in a garage behind a Greyhound bus depot in Santa Monica, and they start practicing. They don't play gigs yet. They're just practicing in the garage trying to form a sound, as we discussed earlier in Jim Morrison naming of The Doors from reading the book that �Doors of Perception� by Aldous Huxley. Jim is a prodigious reader and has written poetry for years, so his poetry and reading insights are used to create the mystical lyrics for which The Doors will become known. What's interesting is he has no musical training, and so to help craft the songs, he literally has to often hum a tune to the rest of the band.
Jim Cherry 13:53
Yeah, that's exactly what happened before that, even before the rehearsals at the behind the Greyhound station, Jim and Ray would go to UCLA and one of the music rooms, and Ray would put together the arrangements for the songs based, like you said, Jim, telling him, describing to him the feeling and you know the melody as best as he could. So yeah, they're rehearsing back there, just working out the songs. You know, for a couple of months they ended, they said the first time they played �Moonlight Drive� with Robby playing bottleneck guitar, they knew they were a band, and that was their final lineup. And then, you know, they started looking for jobs. You know, the only place that they could find was London Fog.
Dave Anthony 14:53
Kind of like a rundown, sleazy L.A. club, London fog, and they appear on the bill with Rhonda Lane, an exotic dancer.
Jim Cherry 15:01
It wasn't known for its music or for much of anything except, you know, as a hangout for sailors on leave or something and it wasn't even very crowded very often when they auditioned for that, Jim and Ray filled up the club with their UCLA friends, so the owners were said, Oh, man, this is they're great. You know, they filled the club up.
Dave Anthony 15:26
We're in February to May period, 1966 they've got this residency, at the sleazy club. Then that leads to, I guess, them trying to get into the famous Whisky a Go Go.
Jim Cherry 15:39
The Whisky A Go Go had this booker named Ronnie Herron. She is a young woman. She developed a crush on him, and that got her to go down to the London Fog and walk, you know, see them. And she eventually did get them, booked them into the Whisky A Go Go.
Dave Anthony 15:59
And that's where they started to really develop the reputation Jim deliberately starts to become this provocateur on stage at the Whisky A Go Go that starts to attract some attention, right?
Jim Cherry 16:11
The Whisky A Go Go was a very well known club. You can find the old videos of like people hanging out there, like Paul Newman and just the creme de la creme of Hollywood elite there. You know, nothing stood out about them, until one night, Jim didn't show up for the show. So in between sets, Ray and John ran out looking for Jim. They found him at a cheap hotel. Jim was, he was in the hotel, his hotel room, naked, except for cowboy boots, and he was really just totally wasted on acid. So they managed to sober him up enough to get him dressed and get him to the club. So the first thing he said, when he when they got him the club is, you want to play �The End�? There's, like, trying to talk him out of it. No, Jim, we play �The End� at the end, you know, Jim was said, no, no, no, I want to do �The End�. So they start �The End�. They get to the long section where there's, you know, just musical improvisation. And then Jim starts going into the what is now known as the oedipal section. You know, the killer awoke before dawn.
17:31
He put his boots on, he took a face from the ancient gallery, and he walked on down the hall.
Jim Cherry 17:43
And, you know, Ray said he kind of, he recognized the classical origins of it right away. And then when he said, he went to the room where his parents stayed, and mother, I want to and Ray said, Uh oh. And Ray knew it was coming, but he kept on playing.
Jim Cherry 18:16
And you know, Jim, no. Jim said, Mother, I want to fuck you dead. Father, I want to kill you. And, boom, they just launched into this musical cacophony
Dave Anthony 18:35
The profanity, the explicit retelling of that Greek myth of Oedipus during �The End�. I mean, this is 1966. I still think it would be like outrageous, but here he is in 1966 Morrison doing this.
Jim Cherry 18:54
Yeah, and I to this day, I don't think any rock group or any musician, even gangster rap or anything like that. I don't think anything as sensational or controversial has ever been uttered totally.
Dave Anthony 19:10
I agree totally with that. And so from there, they're signed up by Electra records. They put out the first album, and of course, it has a lot of these songs that they've been working in the garage these last year or so. First release was �Break on Through (To the Other Side)�.
Dave Anthony 19:41
The obvious hit that was on that was �Light My Fire� , which we'll talk a little bit about. �The End�, which. You referenced in the story and another song called �The Crystal Ship�, among others.
Dave Anthony 20:18
I guess Morrison, who was the primary songwriter had sent everybody home with homework to say, guys like you all got to come back with a song. We need more songs. And the only person who came back and did his homework was Robby Krieger, the guitarist, and he comes back into the studio with �Light My Fire� as his song. I mean, that's quite a song to come back with as your first song.
Jim Cherry 20:42
Right? Yeah, he said he wrote it in 20 minutes.
Dave Anthony 20:46
The other interesting thing about that song, of course, is they get on the Ed Sullivan Show. Ultimately,in September of 67 they're going to play that song, and the censors do not want Morrison to sing, girl, we get much higher, right? Because higher has drug connotations. And, of course, what does Morrison do? He says higher. He says higher during the song, which will show on YouTube. We'll play that, put that on the..
Jim Cherry 21:13
Yeah, that's a pretty interesting video, you know, because Jim just says higher. It was part of the song. He didn't he didn't emphasize it in any way. He just sang it as part of the song. But there's a really kind of cool part during the song where, after Jim says higher, it cuts to Robby and he has a smirk on his face.
Dave Anthony 21:38
Got away with one here. Yeah, yeah. Album two comes out �Strange Days�, September 67 it went to number three on the US charts and contains songs like �Love Me Two Times�, �People Are Strange�, �When the Music's Over�.
Dave Anthony 22:24
And so the band starts touring, and then, you know, showcasing their two albums, and something happens that goes down in history and little old New Haven Connecticut, which leads to, which leads to Morrison, if you can believe this, folks arrested during the concert performance. Can you give the audience a bit of a background of what happened at that now infamous concert?
Jim Cherry 22:50
Sure. So before the concert, the band is all backstage. Jim is with a girl. They go to an empty shower to be alone. Some cop comes by, you know, thinks they're just kids, you know, and tells them to get, get out of there. And Jim says, No. And the cop, the cop started getting, you know, authoritarian copish on them, I guess. And the cop said, last chance to get out. And he pulled out a can of mace. And then Jim said, last chance to eat it. He grabbed his crotch, and then the cop maced him. And so Jim runs out into the hallway screaming that he's blinded. So of course, everybody rushes around, and, you know, they get his eyes flushed out and everything so Jim comes out. Everything's fine until they get to �Back Door Man�, they go into the instrumental of �Back Door Man�, Jim starts telling the story of what happened backstage when police chief Kelly, or something comes out on stage and says, young man, you have this is an indecent show, or something like that. He says, the show is over. And then Jim puts thrust the microphone into the cop's face and says, say your thing, man, and they are, that's when they grabbed him and arrested him, hustled him off stage.
Dave Anthony 24:27
And he was charged with inciting a riot and decency public obscenity by now, Jim, we've got Morrison as one of the most charismatic figures in rock, and this is 1967 now he clearly, as you've pointed out, is a deep thinker. He's written some electrifying poetry, like lyrics. This guy, if you look him up, he's physically attractive. He's one of the first rock stars with long hair. Women were attracted to him. Men were attracted to his rebellious nature and take no prisoners approach. By all definitions, he's a mysterious figure. You've touched on a couple things that I want to touch on because you've got the mercurial that the handsome side, the ability to sort of inspire and connect to an audience. And then there's this shy side of this guy and the use of narcotics and alcohol to try to get the courage up to be on stage from the earliest Whisky a Go Go days. Tell us a little bit, give the audience a sense of the charisma, but also the dark character underneath.
Jim Cherry 25:34
Well yeah, I think they go hand in hand, like you said, Jim was, uh, good looking. Robby said that when they were at the London Fog that they always knew that they would make it because Jim was so good looking. Jim always had a dark side. He was always reading poets like Rimbaud, Baudelaire, I'm sure Poe. He was he was called Rock and Roll Poe and Jim's lyrics were dark like you mentioned �Crystal Ship� earlier. You know, that starts off, I'd like another kiss, another flashing chance at bliss before you slip into unconsciousness. You know, things like that. That was just, that was one of the thing about the things about The Doors. Some of their lyrics were very 60 or 60s, but Jim always had a dark twist to them that set them apart, you know, like moonlight, �Moonlight Drive�, that's pretty standard, uh, love song, until you get to the end with, uh, or to the part where it's like, come on, baby, we're gonna drown tonight.
Dave Anthony 26:36
It�s interesting, because, you know, the summer of love and the piece of love stuff that sort of kicked off in 67 and kind of went through the rest of the 60s, man like these guys were not about that sort of piece of love message. They were exposing the dark side of the mind. They were pushing audiences, Jim being the ringleader of that.
Jim Cherry 26:57
Yeah, they, they were exposing the dark side, you know, they had, you know, the summer of 67 they're, they're putting songs out like �People are Strange�. You know, it's all about alienation. You know it's not peace, love or flowers. You know, it's even you get to �Five to One�, you know, which is like their revolutionary song.
Dave Anthony 27:45
Yeah, you've got the guns. We've got the numbers.
Jim Cherry 27:47
The numbers, yeah.
Dave Anthony 27:48
The dark character, you know, the drugs, the alcohol. It starts to make itself more of a presence in the band's daily lives, including recording sessions, which Jim, I guess, leads us to album three, ��Waiting For the Sun��, July, 1968 it went to number one on the charts. Contains the songs, �Hello, I Love You�, ��The Unknown Soldier��. How much controversial song that effectively reflected the Vietnam sort of civil action and rebellion against that war. And �Five to One�, which you just referenced,
Jim Cherry 28:49
�The Unknown Soldier�, I think that was the first song that was banned. They had banned because of its content. A straight reading of the lyrics, it's, it's about ending the war in Vietnam. You know.
Dave Anthony 29:01
Morrison was sick of having this war brought into the TV living rooms of the nation every night, right? Death and destruction literally presented to us as we sat there.
Jim Cherry 29:12
Yeah, I don't know how old you are, but yeah, you I remember seeing, you know, TV, you see jungles being napalmed. It wasn't much different from the beginning of �Apocalypse Now�, you know some of the news things.
Dave Anthony 29:25
100% you'd see this every night on the news, like in the early 70s, late 60s, unbelievable, right? Something that's rears its head in this album, and the recording of it is the increasing drunkenness of Jim Morrison during the recording of �Five to One�, for example, he had to be supported by studio assistants in order to stand and sing his parts, and that leads us to the drinking leading to more chaos at concerts. Do you want to talk a little bit about this unbelievable concert that they did in Flushing Meadows, New York, the Singer Bowl, August, 1968 the Singer Bowl Stadium was created by the Singer sewing machine company. It had a rotating stage, electric rotating stage, and the band is going to play there with The Who of all people opening up and tell us a little bit about the chaos that ensues that Jim is again the ringleader of.
Jim Cherry 30:25
That's at a point where Jim decided he wanted to try and provoke riots to see what if he could do it. And so Jim just threw out all the stops in this he was he threw himself around the stage. He was writhing on the stage. But that was Jim, wanted to try to provoke a riot, and to see if he could, just to see if he could do it. Because, you know, you heard the Beatles have riots, you know, Elvis, yeah, right. It's, you know, it's The Who we're having riots, you know, it's kind of they were, who was smashing their equipment. So it was kind of Jim wanted to see if he could do it.
Dave Anthony 31:04
So fans are repeatedly rushing the stage. The cops are meeting them with nightsticks. Morrison's yelling obscenities. He's taunting the police. The crowd is getting agitated. They start throwing chairs at one another. One girl is hit by a chair, inspiring Pete Townsend to write the song �Sally Simpson�, which ultimately appears on the �Tommy� album because Pete was in the audience. They had opened for The Doors, but the riot spills out into the streets and gives you a sense for how Morrison can kind of help get a crowd on the agitated side.
Jim Cherry 31:43
Jim knew how to work people up, you know, Jim knew how to bring an audience to a peak, and then he could let them down if he wanted to, you know, bring them down. But sometimes he didn't want to. He just pushed and pushed until, until they went. That was, that was one of the times that he did that.
Dave Anthony 32:04
Yeah. And then the next month, in The Doors go to, what a 17 date European tour concerts in London, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Stockholm. These are, this is the first time that they've gone to Europe to tour. And again, Morrison indulges in the streets of Amsterdam. Fans are coming up to him and giving him narcotics of every kind.
Jim Cherry 32:30
Grace Slick said that famously, she saw somebody give Jim a big chunk of hash, and he just swallowed it. Um, yeah. So by the time he got to the concert, he was pretty out of it. They got him backstage and turned out they had to rush him to the hospital.
Dave Anthony 32:52
Wow. It's incredible. You know, you've got this band that has this incredible lead singer. He gets these crowds agitated. It's almost the example of civic action in inaction. And his dad is an admiral fighting the Vietnam War across the globe. And it's almost like two sides of a coin that are playing out. John Densmore, in his book, �Riders on the Storm�, says this is the point now where we're realizing Morrison is becoming an increasing risk. Literally, they had no idea what would happen when he went on stage, because he was increasingly abusing alcohol to the point that, you know, he was just too drunk to perform or use inciting audiences, as we've just discussed. And Jim, this sets the stage for the Miami incident, which has become infamous in rock history. Maybe set that up for us the various factors, because there's a few the shocking event, this is March 69 that we're in.
Jim Cherry 33:59
March 1 of 69 we have to go back to February of 69 where the living theater is playing at USC. They're a theater company known for their experimental plays. They have traditional plays done in experimental ways, like Antigone, even Frankenstein. But they also have a play that they call paradise now that is total audience confrontation. The members of the of the play, you know, they start out on stage and everything. They take off their clothes, and then they go into the audience and start confronting them, trying to push them. You know, why you're Why are you here? You're part of an audience. Why are you part of an audience? And you know, it's like, no, I'm not free. You know, I can't smoke pot. I can't take my clothes off, you know, and Jim is there every single night for their for their performances. And so Jim was impressed by them, and, you know, he's cut. He was starting to get dissatisfied with his sex symbol image and everything, and he wanted to do more with it. So he thought the living theater was an answer to what he was looking for.
Dave Anthony 35:27
Kind of a performance already wants to try.
Jim Cherry 35:31
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's exactly what he does. He goes there planning to do a Doors version of paradise. Now, one problem is he starts missing flights and starts drinking in between the missed flights. Of course, they're drinking on the plane too, and so by the time Jim gets to Miami, he's pretty drunk. Another factor was that the promoters, they sold, they had chairs, they sold out a certain amount of tickets, but then they decided they could make more money by pulling out the chairs. So they took out all the chairs and sold more tickets.
Dave Anthony 36:08
They put 12,000 people in a space designed to hold 7,000 on an incredibly hot night.
Jim Cherry 36:15
He's heard about the promoters trying to rip them off, and he wants to do �Paradise Now�. So he says, Start saying all these things like, you know, you're all a bunch of fucking slaves. You know, you don't take, you know, they're roaming your face in the shit. You're gonna take it, aren't you, you know, things like that, just pushing and pushing and pushing.
36:39
You're all a bunch of fucking idiots.
Jim Cherry 36:59
They only get through a few songs. Jim is forgetting lyrics. He's stopping songs because he wants to get into the rap about freedom and just the whole paradise now thing.
Dave Anthony 37:13
He kind of takes the naked thing from them and says to the audience, let's see a little skin. Let's get naked.
Jim Cherry 37:19
Yeah. He starts in inciting them to do that, he said, gets naked. And then, as an example, he's like, You came here for? What did you come here? You came here for something else, right? And then he says, you want to see my cock. And so then that's when, allegedly, he exposes himself. But no one saw it. No one. You know, there's that literally 1000s of pictures taken. Not one picture of him. It's very doubtful that Jim did expose himself.
Dave Anthony 37:51
So he's charged with public drunkenness and decent exposure. I mean, this is serious stuff now, and the band, as a result, becomes blacklisted in many cities, particularly in the southern US, because of this incident, they were even banned on radio stations, Jim.
Jim Cherry 38:08
Yeah, they were banned, and the tour starts falling apart in the next few days, they lost a million dollars in gigs. And imagine that a million dollars in 1969 like you said, they started getting banned from radios radio play.
Dave Anthony 38:22
But they go into record another album in July of 69 and it contains songs Robby Krieger comes up with, ��Touch Me��, �Wild Child�, which is Morrison's song.
Dave Anthony 38:55
But what's interesting about this album is when Krieger originally wrote �Touch Me�. I guess it was entitled �Hit Me�, based on an argument that he had with his girlfriend, and Morrison said to him, we cannot have a song. Morrison, of all people, saying we cannot have a song called ��Hit Me��. We need to change it to �Touch Me�.
Jim Cherry 39:13
Yeah, Jim was fine that the audiences were reacting really literal to the lyrics and everything. So he says, I'm not getting up there singing, �Hit Me� lyrics like we've got the guns, but we've got the numbers and, yeah, you know, it's, it's flirting with violence, but it's nothing overt, right? But �Hit Me�. That's pretty overt.
Dave Anthony 39:37
And this is the first time it kind of shows a little bit of chaos internally and dissension. Densmore talks a lot about this in his book that you know, he literally started to hate Morrison at this point. One interesting thing I read and did research was apparently Alice Cooper was around during the recording session, and he was reportedly worried about Morrison's health. And if you've listened to our Alice Cooper episode, you know the debaucherous lifestyle, uh, alcohol parting that Alice led. So Jim, if, if Alice Cooper is worried about your health, you're likely in serious trouble, right?
Jim Cherry 40:13
Yes, yeah, Jim was drinking a lot. John quit during the third album because Jim passed out drunk in the local booth, and John was getting hives.
Dave Anthony 40:25
So Jim is now, you know, facing these charges from Miami, the dark side of Jim. They called it Jimbo, apparently, the band the next album �Morrison Hotel�. It's kind of a return to the rootsy door sound. Was it not?
Jim Cherry 40:41
Yes, yeah, it was. So with all those canceled gigs and everything for �Morrison Hotel�, they had that time again to work out the songs and everything, I think it shows you know they're the songs are little more textured and mature.
Dave Anthony 40:59
So the �Morrison Hotel� album has songs like �Roadhouse Blues�, �Peace Frog�..
Dave Anthony 41:19
Just a bunch of great songs. On August 10, 1970 the trial officially begins at the Dade County Courthouse as the state of Florida versus James Douglas Morrison. Interestingly, someone returns to testify on behalf of Jim Morrison, and it's his dad, Rear Admiral George Morrison, and he wrote a letter, did he not to support him? Yes, he did. They were not speaking. I mean, he had broken up contact with his family.
Jim Cherry 41:50
Right when he was starting The Doors, Jim wrote his father that he's starting a band, and he was going to sing and everything. And you know, what did he think of that? And his father pretty much wrote back saying, that's a crock of shit. You know, you never showed any musical interest or talent.
Dave Anthony 42:07
And yeah, Admiral Morrison Jim's father, stationed in the South Pacific and involved in the Vietnam War, sends back a type written letter telling his son, Jim, quote, to give up any idea of singing or any connection with a music group because of what I consider to be a complete lack of talent in this direction, unquote. And after that, Jim had broken off contact with his father and his entire family and claimed he was an orphan in any press the band received, he did not speak to them for years, which makes the fact that Admiral Morrison testifies on behalf of his son rather poignant.
Jim Cherry 42:47
Right. So then for Miami, Admiral Morrison sent a letter to the judge, basically saying that his son was always a good citizen and he had wasn't much of his of his son's music, but he knew Jim wouldn't do anything that was anti American, or that wasn't, you know, adverse to the interests of the United States, basically. I'm sure that letter was more instigated by Jim's lawyers, and not by Jim.
Dave Anthony 43:19
So incredibly, I guess, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, Jim Morrison was convicted for exposing himself while the more minor charges of public drunkenness were dropped. What's interesting is he turned down a plea bargain, which would have required the band to play a free concert in Miami. So he was determined to show he was not guilty and he wasn't gonna give in with a plea bargain, but he was sentenced to six months in Florida's notorious Rayford State Penitentiary and given an additional 500 fine, $500 fine, but he was, I guess, bailed on a $50,000 bond.
Jim Cherry 43:58
The reason he didn't do any plea bargains or anything like that. It was a First Amendment issue, you know, freedom of speech and to present, you know, a theatrical performance. So, yeah. So that leads up to �L.A. Woman�. Again, they have a lot of free time. They're not doing as many gigs, or as many gigs, so they're in the studio. They start writing songs.
Dave Anthony 44:23
What's interesting is it's got some of their biggest hits. Obviously, �Love Her Madly�, �L.A Woman�, �Riders on the Storm�, these kind of tunes were great.
Jim Cherry 45:16
Jim and Ray go if �The Soft Parade� was you know, they're experimental with jazz, jazz and string, things like that. Yeah, and orchestration. �L.A. Woman� was their, Jim and Ray's return to the blues, which they grew up. Jim had always like when he was a teenager he'd gone to the blues bars and things like that. Listen to blues bands. So that was a return to their roots. And like �L.A. Woman�, you know, it's Jim's maybe farewell to L.A., or at least his Ode to L.A.
Dave Anthony 45:54
After the recording of �L.A Woman�, Jim's longtime girlfriend Pamela Courson, convinces Jim to move to Paris to focus on his poetry writing. Jim's first book of poetry, called �The Lords and the New Creatures�, had been published by Simon and Schuster in 1970 and is actually still in print today. The couple leave for Paris in March 71 and Jim begins to focus on poetry writing again.
Jim Cherry 46:20
I think Jim is a very underrated poet. I think he is the best poet of his generation. You know, the rock star thing got in the way some of his poems, like an ��American Prayer��, the poem, I think that is that rates up there with Allen Ginsberg's �Howl�, or even TS Eliot's �The Wasteland�. You know, I think that's just a great statement of reflection of America in the 60�s.
46:49
You know, we were being led to slaughters by placid admirals, and that fat, slow generals are getting obscene on young blood. You know, we are ruled by TV.
Jim Cherry 47:01
Jim wanted to be a poet, and what he knew poets don't make a whole lot of money, and so I think he took a shortcut becoming a rock star to get his poetry out there.
Dave Anthony 47:13
The last phone call Jim makes to any member of The Doors was to inquire of drummer John Densmore how the �L.A. Woman� album was doing. And on July 3, 1971 Jim Morrison is found dead in the bathtub of his Paris apartment by Pam Courson, his girlfriend, his last words, according to her, were, quote, Pam, are you still there? Unquote. Jim was 27 years old, and the cause of death was listed as heart failure. Some who were around Jim that day claim it was a heroin overdose, although no autopsy was performed, as it is not required by French law. I mean, we'll never quite know what happened, because Pamela Courson died of a heroin overdose in 1974.
Jim Cherry 47:57
And before he left, Jim signed an agreement with them, or a codicil to their contract that he wouldn't start another group in Europe called The Doors. And I think Jim signed that with a big smirk on his face, because he was done with rock and roll. Pam wanted him to concentrate on poetry. Jim wanted to concentrate on poetry. Yeah, but The Doors, you know, Ray, Robby and John, after �L.A. Woman� came out, they were, are starting to make the ��Other Voices��, what would become �Other Voices�. �Other Voices� were released in September of 71 you know. So you know, with �L.A. Woman� having been released in, I believe, April of 71 so yeah, they were already rehearsing.
Dave Anthony 48:44
Yeah, those albums didn't do very well, and ultimately the group disbanded. I guess there was 71 and 72 the albums put out the last two without Jim. They didn't do that well, and they kind of disbanded in 73 they came back in 78 to do the �American Prayer�, which was Jim's poetry, and that was put to some of the songs of The Doors. Give me like one word to describe each of the members of the band.
Jim Cherry 49:10
Oh, man, let's go with Jim. Poet. Ray the heart. John and Robby were the hippies of the band.
Dave Anthony 49:18
John strikes me as the conscience of the band.
Jim Cherry 49:21
Yeah I can, I can see that. Yeah, very much. So especially in nowadays, you know, he's, he's written books called �Unhinged� about his lawsuit with Ray and Robby, about the use of the name and advertising, right? So yes, he's very much the conscience of the band now. And Robby underrated, guitarist.
Dave Anthony 49:48
Yes, Densmore filed a lawsuit against his bandmates, keyboardist Ray Manzarek and guitarist Robby Krieger in 2003 just three days before Manzarek and Krieger started their tour as a band called �The Doors of the 21st Century�. The core of Densmore�s action was his belief that Manzarek and Krieger should not use The Doors name in their reconstituted touring band, which used at different times, Cult singer Ian Asbury, Police drummer Stuart Copeland and even a guy named Dave Brock, who was in a Doors tribute band playing the role of Jim Morrison. Who did The Doors influence with their dark, moody music?
Jim Cherry 50:27
Man, yeah. Iggy Pop directly. Iggy Pop was at a concert in Michigan where Jim was very drunk and there's like, a bunch of jocks and stuff in the audience, so Jim was making fun of them and singing falsetto, and he was very drunk. Iggy Pop said, you know, that guy can do it. I can. Same thing with Patti Smith. She pretty much saw The Doors, yeah, the
Dave Anthony 50:54
poetry side.
Jim Cherry 50:55
Yeah, the poetry side. And, you know, she saw The Doors, and said, Jim Morrison can do that, so can I. And if all people here is an off the wall influence Bruce Springsteen. Bruce Springsteen saw them, saw The Doors in New Jersey. Bruce was more influenced by the style and the showmanship and everything, and that's why I started thinking that Jim Morrison is a rock star's idea of a rock star. Yeah. You can get into punk rock. You know, punk took everything, just about everything, directly from Jim Morrison, you know, leather pants, the attitude.
Dave Anthony 51:35
That's a great point, because Iggy Pop is considered the Godfather of Punk, but Jim Morrison inspired Iggy. What is their place in music history? What will they be remembered for, The Doors?
Jim Cherry 51:45
Everything. Stage presence. Like I said, Jim Morrison is a rock star's idea of a rock star. Jim Morrison is even a rapper's idea of a rock star. You know, a lot of them have been influenced by The Doors. I think The Doors music that's going to be known, as you know, we're 50 years in right now. I think The Doors are like the classical music of the future. We still know Beethoven and Mozart. I think in 400 years, they're going to know The Doors.
Dave Anthony 52:20
It's interesting the point you made about the spoken word, like Morrison speaking words during songs. I mean, he influenced Patti Smith, of course. But like, rap is all about words and speaking words, etc.
Jim Cherry 52:33
Yeah, it is. I've listened to a lot of poetry and poetry recordings in my life, but Jim has something there that it draws you in. It draws you into his poetry.
Dave Anthony 52:44
We're at that point in the show where we ask our guests to come up with three key songs that they'd recommend to the audience, and sort of why thematically they represented or recommended those songs.
Jim Cherry 52:55
Yeah, you got to have �The End�. �The End� is everything Jim Morrison and maybe even The Doors were about. It encompasses all their themes in one and their theatrics all in one thing.
53:09
This is the end beautiful friend.
Jim Cherry 53:22
Yeah, everybody might think it's controversial and everything, but..
Dave Anthony 53:29
It's, it's an astonishing musical accomplishment.
Jim Cherry 53:32
Yes, it is. Another song, you know, I'm gonna go with. I'm gonna pick a kind of an underrated song, under known. �L�America�. It's off the first song, oh, this is how old I am. It's the first song off of second side of �L.A. Woman�. But it's pretty much the autobiography of a rock band. If you listen to the lyrics, you know the friendly strangers came to town, all the people put them down, but the women loved their ways. You know, that's just an autobiography of any rock band and The Doors too. And the third, you know I'm gonna go with �Five to One�, just because I think that that represents not the revolutionary side of The Doors, but I guess �The End� is the counterculture side too, baby.
Jim Cherry 54:48
Being attuned to the times and reflecting back what was going on in the times.
Dave Anthony 54:57
Those are great picks. Jim. Would you say? The epic 1979 Vietnam War movie, �Apocalypse Now� directed and co-written by Francis Ford Coppola, led to a rebirth or rediscovery of The Doors?
Jim Cherry 55:09
Yeah, yeah it did. Francis Ford Coppola knew Ray and Jim at UCLA, Dennis Jacob, who Jim, he was a guy Jim's uh Jim was living on his rooftop. What was the editor of �Apocalypse Now�, it's always been said that he whispered in Coppola's ear about playing �The End�.
Dave Anthony 55:31
They only put out a few albums, were together basically six years. What direction do you think the music would have gone had they stayed together? Any thoughts?
Jim Cherry 55:42
Yeah, a lot of thoughts. Like I said, Jim was done with music. I think John Ray and Robby would have gone ahead and, you know, done more music. I think Jim would have gotten more into film. If Jim got back into music, it probably, you know, I think maybe, maybe he would have gotten back together with The Doors for something like Live Aid, if there's something. But I think if Jim had lived, I think we might have grown up with Jim Morrison. Knowing Jim Morrison more as a film director or an actor.
Dave Anthony 56:15
That's interesting. It's been a real pleasure to have you Jim on the show today, and we really enjoyed your commentary today.
Jim Cherry 56:25
Great. Thank you. Thank you for having me.
Dave Anthony 56:31
Some closing notes on The Doors. Remember that controversial 1969 Miami concert that resulted in indecent exposure conviction against Jim Morrison despite evidence to the contrary. Well, in 2010 Florida Governor Charlie Crist pardoned Morrison posthumously on those charges. A 1991 movie about the band called The Doors, was written and directed by Oliver Stone. Actor Val Kilmer played Jim Morrison. The film originally was supposed to star John Travolta as Morrison. Can you imagine Vinnie Barbarino as the poetic Jim Morrison? The movie remains controversial. Upon first viewing, band member Ray Manzarek was absolutely appalled by what he saw telling the Los Angeles Times. Quote, The film portrays Jim as a violent, drunken fool. That wasn't Jim. When I walked out of the movie, I thought, Geez, who was that jerk? Unquote. Speaking of movies, The Doors have more songs in the 1994 movie Forrest Gump than any other band with a total of six. Several of which appeared during the famous ping pong matches of Forrest Gump. On the 50th anniversary of Jim Morrison's death, July 2021, book publisher Harper Collins released a 600 page coffee table book entitled �The Collected Works of Jim Morrison�, which contained poetry journals, transcripts and lyrics and other notes from 28 recently discovered notebooks. Another excellent resource for The Doors history is �Riders on the Storm�, a book written about the band by its drummer John Densmore. In the book, Densmore explains the concept behind that controversial Doors song �The End� containing that Oedipal reference. Here's what Densmore says about the creation of that song. At one point, he says Jim was tearful and he shouted in the studio, Does anybody understand me? And I said, Yes, I do. Right then and there, we got out a long discussion, and Jim just kept saying over and over and over, kill the father, �f� the mother. And essentially, Densmore writes, what this boils down to is this, kill all those things in yourself which are instilled in you and are not of yourself. They are alien concepts which are not yours. They must die. We talked about the military history in Jim Morrison's family. Jim's middle name was Douglas, as in Douglas MacArthur, the famous American general who Jim's military dad, George Morrison admired. And speaking of Admiral Morrison, he had a role in the wording of the epitaph on Jim's gravestone. As we said in the episode, Jim Morrison died in Paris and is buried in the Cemetery du Pere Lachaise in Paris, France, which also contains the remains of composer Frederic Chopin, writer and playwright Oscar Wilde, singer Edith Piaf and many more. Where Jim is buried receives 3 million visitors a year, many of whom are making somewhat of a pilgrimage to Morrison's grave. Visitor levels can swell to almost 300 during peak hours, including a near riot on the 20th anniversary of Jim's death in 1991. The Oliver Stone movie we mention led to even more visitors wanting to see the site. Visitors leave bottles of liquor full, photos, memorabilia, poems and narcotics of every kind. In 1990 the grave was replaced due to extensive graffiti and other damage. Interestingly, the inscription on Morrison's grave was chosen by his father, Admiral Morrison in 1990 and is a Greek saying which can be translated as quote, true to his own spirit, unquote, or quote true to his own demon. UNQUOTE, thus leaving it open to multiple interpretations on what his father meant by it. Leave it to the mysterious Jim Morrison to be as controversial in death as he was in life. For more on The Door's career, visit garagestadiums.com where you can see our bonus coverage of The Doors, which includes video clips and historical memorabilia, including their performance some of their most well known songs at their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in 1993 with Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam on vocals. We even have an interesting thesis that Jim Morrison may well have been the first punk rocker with his leather pants, rebellious nature, confrontation of audiences and physical nature of his performances. You can also see our show notes and transcripts for all of our episodes. We've even made it easy for you to build a killer playlist for every performer featured on a Garage to Stadium episode, including a playlist on today's band The Doors, find the link to the apple and Spotify playlist in our bonus coverage section of our website. Follow our show on your favorite podstarter platform to be alerted when our next episode drops, and follow our Instagram page for more interesting rock and roll history tidbits. We hope you enjoyed our show today. Special thanks to our guest, Jim Cherry, author of the book �The Doors Examined�. And thanks also to our producers, Aminah Faubert, Connor Sampson, and our program director, Scott Campbell. You've been listening to Garage to Stadiums. Another Blast Furnace Labs production. I'm Dave Anthony. See you next time for another Garage to Stadiums story.