the movie will begin in five moments,the mindless voice announced. all those unseatedwill await the next show. l.a. woman was like coming home andit was simple and bluesy and just... lt was the bare bones,the essence of what we were about. and rock and roll is supposed to beout of a garage. the record has that kind ofa feel to it. lt's almost like a jam. that was probablythe most fun album to make. 1 970, we had one last album to go,and this could be our last album. we are gonna make the albumin this zen moment in time.
we didn't discuss the future. "the future is uncertain.the end is always near." this was the albumthat wrapped it all up in a neat bow, and presentedthe doors' essence to you personally. they found a unity that was exactlywhat they needed to show their audiencethat they still had what everyone originallyloved them for. musically, l just think it holds up. lt's 40 years later,and it's still a fantastic record.
l am telling you that right now,there is a 1 6, 1 7, 1 8-year-old kid who is listening tothe doors for the first time as a new band,and is getting his or her mind blown. we were a four-man band.l always thought of us as something like the modern jazz quartetof rock and roll. the doors set themselves very deeplyinto the cultural history of not only rock and roll,but of the united states. they had established themselvesin the american consciousness. they had establishedthemselves as special.
by the time we get to '69, the doors had achieved,probably, continental notoriety. we were justthe filthy, dirty, doors. l don't think they sought notoriety,but it sure did come to them. after all, where doesthe name the doors come from? lt comes from aldous huxley's book,the doors of perception. and that comes from a lineby william blake. "lf the doors of perceptionwere cleansed, "man would see things as they are."
dot, dot, dot. "lnfinite." there was an entirenew culture being aborn. lt was called the counter culture,but we always thought it was the new culture to come,the culture of the 21 st century. they were working on an intellectualand lyrical level that was higher thanmost other people. and to me, they were right up therewith the beatles and dylan. jim led with his poetry. he wasn't waving a flagand saying "follow me."
he reached into your heartand your spine and shook you hard and made you figure out who you wereand what mattered to you. we considered ourselvesmore a mirror of society. we were just commentingon what was going on. there were more things to explore.lt was just beginning. l thought, "okay, we have donethree albums "in exactly the same setting,the same configuration. "let's bring in the horn playersand the string players." the idea of strings and horns wassomething ray and l talked about
before we even made our first album,because we loved jazz. and that's something we wantedto experiment with and go through. they have success.they have hit records. they have recordsthat people think are crap. they have actually done the lifetimeof experience, compressed into less than four years. what they did,first on morrison hotel and then on l.a. woman,was they went back to blues. they were a bandappropriate to their times
that were on the edgeof whatever was happening. and the edge is the placeyou always want to be. this is changeling.this is the first song we recorded and it turned out to bethe first song on the album. they come out with this great,kickass rocker called the changeling. and the first thing you hearjim morrison say is, "get loose." okay, l'm ready to get loose.let's see what you got. l think, in a way,it anticipates his leaving. he has been through all this stuff.
what else can you doas the singer in a rock band? he is always talking about himself,that he is a changeling in that song. he is just expressingwhat was gonna happen. he was telling everybody,"this is it. "you are gonna see me change." we had been shot downin the streets in kent state. bobby kennedy was dead.martin luther king was dead. our great leaders of peacehad been assassinated. lt was a terrible time.
the racial problems in theunited states were reaching a head and in 1 970 there wasthe invasion of cambodia. that was the same yearthat l.a. woman was made. vietnam was really heating up. we were trying to get out.there were riots in the streets. a madness had swept across america. jim felt that you change insideand then that will change the world. he was not too muchon overt politics. but we wereat the centre of the cyclone.
the changeling, to me, represented and spoke to all these thingsthat we have been going through for the last few years. and the changes in america, andthe fact that we were the changeling. janis joplin died later in the year and jimi hendrix died laterin the year, both of overdoses. and jim was overdosing himselfon his drug, which was alcohol. morrison, he had been arrested. he had been in court.he had been crazy drunk.
he had all the womenthat he probably could want. he had actually been throughall of the things that a young man lookingto take over the world aspires to. they were providinga kind of soundtrack for not only the counter culture,but for a liberal consciousness that was in the process of growingand that they were part of. lt leads the album off and whathappens after the album is over with? he leaves town. he wasn't so brokethat he had to stick around. he could leave everything behind him
and attempt to find a new lifein paris, or perhaps, his death. "been down so longit looks like up to me." that's what he sings in l.a. woman,on the album. he was feeling the full effectof the american justice system at a time when the american justicesystem had an axe to grind. my whole life with the doors, theywere attacked by the establishment. there was a constant campaignto derail us. the doors created terrorin the hearts ofamerica, because here is this wholegeneration of kids
that was standing up and saying,"no, that's not okay with me. "l have a position. l have a life."and there was no precedent for it. miami was definitely a turning pointin the career of the doors. what an insane night it was.hot and sweaty, 14,000 people waitingfor the lizard king to come to miami. jim is a florida boy.he was coming home from california. you know l was bornhere in this state. you know that? l was born right herein melbourne, florida, 1 943.
then l got smart, went outto a little city named los angeles. and he could see itnot as a performer or a fan, but almost like a social scientist. the phenomenon of this engagementof a rock band and an audience. and, "what can l do with that?how can l mess with that?" you are all a bunchof fucking idiots! you are all a bunch of slaves. let people tell youwhat you are gonna do. so how long are yougonna let them push you around?
there are no rules.there are no laws. do whatever you want to do. do it. and jim finally said to them,he said, "what do you want? "what do you want from us? "we are a rock and roll band,we play some pretty good songs, "but you wantsomething more, don't you?" "yeah!" and you believe jim morrison wasgonna do whatever he talked about. and that was frightening to people.
then jim morrison goes on to say,"how about if l show you my cock? "ls that what you want?" and l am going,"oh, my god, the guy is drunk. "he is gonna expose himself.we are in some deep shit here. "this is gonna be disastrous." lt was kind of torturing me,because l had found my path in life, and l loved music and our singerhad a pact with the devil. they came looking for a riot,and when they got one, really, the biggest impactand the biggest fallout was on him.
he got busted for indecent exposure, public profanity, public drunkenness, and my favourite,simulation of oral copulation. first the concert, and thenthe aftereffect of the concert and then the trial,weighed heavy on jim's shoulders. he determined that he wouldturn it into a test case. what we are testing down there is the issue of artistic freedomof expression. so he was found guilty on two counts,facing three years,
perhaps less, a year and a halfin raiford. raiford penitentiary. jim was a free spirit.lt was almost an insurmountable assault on his consciousnessto threaten him with that. the tour we had was cancelled.we had a tour of 20 cities. miami was city number one. we couldn't play anywhere. the hall owners associationhad a big meeting and they banned us from most ofthe major halls in the united states. lt almost killed the band,and it probably killed jim.
lt completely destroyed that thingthat an artist has when they know they are makinga difference and they are doing something, and then all of a sudden,he is on the defensive. well, okay, we can't play.let's just record. l think going back into the studiowas a way to get them re-focused. because when they were in the studio,the reason why they came together in the first place is clearlyobvious to them. we get togetherat the doors' workshop
on the corner of la cienegaand santa monica. the first question is,"anybody got any songs?" and sure enough, jim and robbycome through with a whole bunch of songs again,just like they always did. the doors had been in rehearsal,trying to get the new album together, what was to becomethe l.a. woman album. l went to several rehearsals and jim,especially, was really bored. couldn't reallyget himself up for it. paul was not happy, and when he left,the band was not happy.
because he told them that he wasnot happy with the music, with what he had heard,and he walked out of that session. l understand later that he convenedthe band at sunset sound and listened again. we played badly,played extremely badly. riders on the storm wasn't good. which paul rothchildthought sounded like cocktail music. there was nothing there. you just couldn't get a good takeof any kind of feel whatsoever.
l said, "this albumis going to be a disaster." one moment l just got up,went into the studio and said, "hey, listen, l'm bored. "the first time in my life whenl have been in a studio "and l have hadmy head down on the console." and l told them, "hey, look,l love you guys and l love the music, "but it seems to methat you are not turning me on "and l'm not turning you on." paul went home. we all just stoodaround kind of in shock.
so we all decided,"hey, we'll do it ourselves. "we know how to make recordsby now. we've done five of them." we got bruce botnick, who's probablythe best engineer in town. jim then says,"man, do we have to record here? "l don't want to record here." then l say,"what about your rehearsal studio? "would that work?" "rehearsal studio?"l said, "are you comfortable there?" he says, "we love it there."
lt was the roomwe had rehearsed in forever. our music was seeped into the walls. and so it was very comfortable.lt was home. just seemed that they were cooking,working together. they were in the pocket all the time. they liked each other, they were getting alongwith each other. they just seemed happy. and when they were playing downstairsand this stuff was just crackling,
it was amazing to me. l was reallyexcited about the new music. we just did itlike a garage band record. now that was brilliantand it worked exquisitely. we always used to love to docrawling king snake. lt was one of our favouritejohn lee hooker songs. and l think we had really meantto do it years before and never got around to it, and this being moreof a bluesy album, it was the perfect time for it.
that blues element of the doorskept them somewhat grounded, yet they were able to turn itinto an otherworldly event. so crawling king snake was kind of a call backto that roots that they loved. jim liked to think of himselfas an old bluesman. he was a big fan of muddy watersand howlin' wolf, and all those old blues guys. and he loved the truth in the songsand the rawness of it. and he related to it.
and if he had had his choice,he would have done that all the time. crawling king snake is a wonderfulcostume for jim to wear. he is playing a part, he thinks,but he is also the part. lnvariably, robby kriegerwould have something ingenious. the doors' secret weapon.the man would always have something. and he would say, "yeah, l got one.lt's called love her madly." "love her madly,"like duke ellington. duke ellington would always sayat the end of a concert, "we love you madly."
robby picks that upand twists it a little bit to make love her madly.plays it on the guitar. l knew that love her madly,when it happened, was a hit. l just knew it, and we all knew it. l was fooling aroundon a 1 2-string guitar, and the melodyjust kind of came to me. at the time, my girlfriend,who later became my wife, lynn, every time we had an argument,she used to get pissed off and go out the door,and she would slam the door
so loud the whole house would shake. so that's where l got the line."she's walking out the door." a minor. tempo's like this. and l've got it. and then jim starts to sing. robby, again, underestimated. not only as a guitar playerbut as a songwriter. look at all the hits he wrote.light my fire, love her madly,
love me two times,tell all the people. "don't you love her madlyas she's walking out the door." what a great line. of course you do. "yeah, l don't ever wantto see you again. we're done. "wait a minute." l hear, "oh, god! l'll putthe vox continental right in here." the doors' greatest strength assongwriters is that they didn't think of themselves as individual writerscoming in with their bit. they thought of themselvesas a songwriting band.
l thought it was a little toocommercial for their first single. there was a very special advantageto my not being at the sessions. l got my ownfirst blush reactions to things. and when the hair stands upat the back of my neck on a song, that's one l pay attention to,and it happened for love her madly. that was the first time we triedplaying with another guitar player, with a rhythm guitar player. we wanted to feel live, you know,so we figured, "okay, we'll get this guy marcbenno," and he just kind of played
the perfect rhythm stuff,which allowed me to go ahead and play my leads at the same time. and bruce botnickbrings in jerry scheff, elvis presley's bass player. jim just lit up like a...he was happy as a camper. he says, "elvis presley's bass player?me? he will play with us?" l said, "yeah." so l called jerry and he said,"absolutely, l would love to do it." and just did somebrilliant stuff, man.
that bass line on l.a. woman.holy cow! l.a. woman, in some respects, isfilm noir, rock and roll film noir, and l remember going to downtown l.a.when you just drove down there and walked the streets and it smelled like one of those oldblack and white film noir movies. for me, a los angeles native,it's our anthem. you know, what describesl.a. better than l.a. woman? answer, nothing. lt was the quintessential expression
of what living in californiawas like. you know,women took him in and fed him. but women fed him in manydifferent ways, not only with food. but with support, with sex,with emotion, with booze, and he was thanking them in the song,but he was leaving them, all of them. and he was leavingthe city that he loved. "city of night" is a referenceto john rechy's great los angeles, homosexual novel.great novel called city of night. so he has gothis literary reference in there.
"another lost angelin the city of night." wow, you know, the lyricswere so good and they were so... so raymond chandler,so nathanael west, so 1 930s, 40s,dark seamy side of los angeles, a place where jim would easily go. l think here, we go withray's piano solo. yes, and this was an overdub. but how it works perfectlywith his wurlitzer piano. al kooper's band,blood sweat and tears,
they play a song calledday ln the country. this is... l playedday ln the country. l think he liked that part of l.a.,that you could be a stranger in l.a. you could hide behind a beard and get away with it even thoughyou were a rock star. "l see your hair is burning.hills are filled with fire." that's what poetry is. ln very few words,you create this entire world. this guy who had words...
they were so percussive.l immediately heard rhythms. and here is john on drums.hear what he's doing. this is all on one track. we had to make decisionsin those days. lt was all recorded on 8-track. so we locked it in. listen to how they're lockedtogether, john and jerry scheff. great player, great feel. drummers and bass playersare brothers in the basement,
cooking up the groove.they are bonded. and then morrison says that classicline, an anagram of his name. "jim morrison." play withthe letters, turn them around, and move them aroundand you come up with "mr mojo risin'." lt was that quality of being strongerthan everything around you. and of climbing up out of that. mr mojo risin'.lt's a brilliant image. and it comes from blues.
"l got my mojo working."muddy waters, willie dixon. "mojo" was a blues termfor sexuality. and so, l thought, "well, what ifl slowly increase the tempo? "like an orgasm." and listen to this scream from jim. he was obviously having fun,enjoying himself. yeah! lt was like the energy level inthe room went from here to overhead! we were operating up here.energy is up here. doors operated up there betweenthe four of us quite a lot.
the song l.a. woman, that wastotally put together in the studio, just from sitting around jamming. so, l always say that'sthe quintessential doors song because of the way we wrote it. here comes robby's solo. you need to be in a car withthat on ten. and screaming downthe freeway in los angeles listening to l.a. woman.you will get that song. l.a. woman, the metaphor of the cityas a woman is brilliant.
"cops in cars never sawa woman so alone." l mean, this is just great stuff. lt's metaphoric. he's lookingat the physicality of the town, and thinking of her and we needto take care of her. lt's my hometown so let'snurture the l.a. woman. texas radio and the big beat.jim used to recite that as poetry in concert but he didn't havethe little bridges that he sang. and l remember ray saying,"hey, what about texas radio? "you know, we have neverreally done it."
you know, that was that thingabout morrison all the time. lt wasn't so much about the music,but about what this guy represented. what was he talking about? what was he trying to say?what was he trying to tell us? lt's jim eating his microphone. l'm going to solo john and jim so you can hearhow they are working together. this is a great exampleof a song starting as a seed and flowering and becominga complete song.
and not doingit over a period of days. lt was a poem and this lick. l just, l don't know why,l kept the beat, but then l decided to follow themelody with my snare drum. those stations in mexico, theyused to broadcast across the border. wolfman jack was broadcastingfrom south of the border across the south and playingwild r and b and howling at the moon. these would have been thingsthat a lot of kids jim's age would have heard.
"let me tell you abouttexas radio and the big beat. "the negroes of the forest." that scene that he paintsis so primal. man, that is one of thegreatest lines ever written. because when you are stoned, and you are out thereon the perimeter, you are immaculate. this is psychedelicswe're talking about. this is expanding one'sconsciousness. this was a journeyto become immaculate.
jim's life was poetry. with all of the tumult,the lack of rhyme, the free style that life has. l don't think there was a better poetof jim's age, of jim's time. near the end of the mixing, jim said that he wantedto go to paris. ln one of my photosof the recording studio, there is a chalkboard, and written on that chalkboardare the words "a clean slate."
jim needed a clean slate. l think that was his giftto the band. he could go do what he wanted to do if he worked with themon this next album, which l think he thoughtwould be his last. he said, "l am going to paris,"and we said, "what? "you're not finished yet, man." we're not finished with the record.we haven't mixed all the songs. he said, "everything is fine, man,l've done all my vocals.
"you guys are doing fine.lt's sounding great. "l'm going to go to paris with pam." l did not really think, especiallyafter l said goodbye to jim, that he would ever come backas a member of any band. there is no question jim announcedhe was resigning. he was going to be a writer. lt wasn't,"l'll never talk to you again." lt wasn't hostile. lt was, "this is what l'm going to go do withmy life and we'll see what happens."
obviously, he was kind of messed up and we said, "hey, man, great.do what you have to do. "when you come back,we will worry about this." l mean, it sounded likea good idea to us. unfortunately, it didn't turn outthat way. and off he went to parisand l never saw him again. that was it. l never saw him again.l never even talked to him again. he was only over there likethree, four months. we are all riders on the storm.l think that's everybody
who has had vicissitudes in life,love in life, disappointments. never knowing exactly what is goingto happen next. facing everything, a kind of braverythat we all have just to be alive. lt's not easy out there. riders on the storm. a little more jazzy, darker. has that melancholy, but it has that rolling feelof a band playing together. riders has this mood. lt originallycame from us jamming on this,
ghost riders ln the sky. and we are jammingand it's got this sort of western, clint eastwood mood, you know. and from there it kind of morphedinto more of like a... and it kind of turned intoriders on the storm. and jim changed the words from"ghost riders in the sky" to "riders on the storm." l said, "okay, that's great, man.riders on the storm. "but we can't do vaughn monroe."
"an old cowpoke went riding outone dark and windy day." so, l said,"let me see what l can do with this," and here is what l came up with. we got to put some jazz to it.make it dark. and sure enough,this is what happened. jerry scheff says,"what's the bass line?" and l say, "like simple. "e minor, a major." he said,"oh, man, that's impossible." l said, "what, for you?"
and here is jerry scheff by himself. and he is basically playing what raywould have played on his left hand, if he was playing a piano bass,but with some latitude, because what ray could playwith his left hand couldn't always translateinto a bass. so, like those little slides. at this point, singing this vocal,he knew that he was going to paris. and he was singing his love to pam. and here is ray's solo, you can hear.he was taken direct,
which means he wasn't playingthrough an amplifier and it was just direct injectioninto the console. more thunder. bring in the thunder. the loneliness that that songconjures up about how we are here in this torment that we call the world, trying to keep our headsabove the fray, above the surf, above the storm. that whisper voice that's justsinging "riders on the storm."
you can hear that in the last two"riders on the storm." that's jim's spirit whispering to usfrom the ether, whispering to us from the beyond. my last message to jimafter he had gone to paris, l told him l had just quit drinkingand it was time for him to quit, too. he sounded lonely and distant,as if it wasn't panning out for him. and maybe it was the cycleof alcoholism again, had re-entered his life there. jim went in to take a hot bath
and she describes finding himthe next morning. she had gone to sleepand he had died in the bathtub. on his back. she said he was smiling.l'm glad to hear that. when l heard, l didn't believe it,because he just seemed like this lrish drunk who wasgoing to party till 80. jim was so larger than life,you know? the way he was, l couldn'timagine him dead. we knew from the gravityof the reports from paris, and hearing from bill siddons,
the manager, who had gone thereto help to arrange the burial, that this was all too real. phone rang monday morning at 4:30. and my wife, cheri, sat bolt upright and when the phone started ringing,and said, "jim's dead." and l looked at her,and went, "what?" and l answered the phone. and it was clive selwood,our label manger in the uk, telling me that three differentjournalists
had called him and toldhim that jim had died. and l got a 3:30 plane and was in paris at 6:30the next morning. l just held her for a minute and you know, the coffinwas in the living room. l literally spent hours with pamela,just talking. and she said, "he told mewhen he was there, "when he died, he wantedto be buried in pã¨re-lachaise." l just thought it was beautiful,
that he even knew enough that that'swhere he might want to be buried. and l thought there was somethingcompletely right about doing this. and l was absolutely clear, having been through a numberof press debacles in my life, that the best thing we could dois not tell anybody. we are going to do it our way.we are going to bury a poet. l lost the best writing partneranybody has ever had. l mean, it was our whole lifethat was gone. l loved playing music to his words,
and that's what l miss terribly.l don't miss the self-destruction. ln his case, they went hand in hand. whenever we lose a creative person, we lose something that could beadded to the culture to make the culturericher and brighter. l think with jim's death, one ofthe lights of the '60s went out. hyacinth house wasthe loneliest song jim ever wrote. "what are they doing in the hyacinthhouse to feed the lions these days? "l need a brand-new friendwho doesn't bother me,
"who doesn't need me." l don't want to have friendsthat need me. l don't want to have people around mewho are leaning on me. lt's too heavy.l'm only 27 years old. let me go. l need a new friendwho doesn't need me. ls he referring to his main squeeze? or is he referring to hisfriends like me? ls he referring to the band?l think he is referring to everybody. l think he is saying, "let me go.let me be somebody else."
to be frank,the last few years of his life, there were several "friends"he was hanging with that were kind of idolizing him and didn't discouragehis substance abuse. so, were those friends? losing some of the people, the hangers-onwho were dragging him down. lf you hang out with drinkers anddrug-takers, you're not necessarily gettingfrench symbolist poets.
you get kind of likecreeps and weirdos. here is a chance for me to quoteone of my fellow people, a man from poland, mr chopin, so l'm doing a littlechopin polonaise. my solo. and jim sings. l spent a fair amount of time hangingout in the studio with them and they were having a good time. they were wonderful songs.
the changeling was kind ofa tribute to james brown. love her madly wasclearly the single. so l knew l hada single for am radio, and then l knew l had l.a. womanand riders on the storm for fm radio. those were guaranteed. lt was a terrific record. lf you are going to have an epitaph, if you are going to haveone last record, then that was the record to make.
the doors are a living entity. when l play them tonight, they willmean something to my audience. that music speaks to you and me. and it speaks to kids and it speaksto people older than us. lt was an incredible statementof how strong they were as a band. and what a unique and extraordinarypartnership they were. you can feel the warmthand the liveness of it. lt was really our mostspontaneous album. jim got empowered by us producingl.a. woman ourselves.
we all did, 'cause we madeall the decisions. and it was inspiring. l don't think the imagination,inspiration, beauty at a high spiritual levelever go out of style. whether it is bach, or scriabin, or the doors, people are stilllistening to all of them. "his world on you depends.our life will never end." the ultimate statement.our life will never end. and the ancient egyptians used to say
that if you say a man's name,he is alive. so l take this opportunity to say"jim morrison."
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