Bandsplain - The Doors with Jeff Weiss

Episode Date: August 26, 2021

We strip down the mythical, mysterious layers of foundational band The Doors and the original rock n’ roll martyr, Jim Morrison. Fellow child of LA Jeff Weiss of the LAnd Magazine is our guest. Follow Jeff Weiss at @passionweiss and check out The LAnd magazine at @theLAndmagazine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's with this band anyway? I don't get it. Can you please explain? Wait, like, Bandsplain? Hello and welcome to Bandsplaine. I am your host, Yossi Sallek. This is a show where we invite experts on to explain cult bands to me and to you. Today's episode is about a little band called The Doors. If you've never heard The Doors, let me know when you come outside of your

house for the first time. Here's what the doors sound like. My guest today is journalist, author, and Angelino Jeff Weiss. Welcome to the show, Jeff. Thanks for having me. I was going to say like, are you fully aware that you're like going on record as the proponent of the doors? But I know that you've written about them like multiple times. So this ship has already sailed for you. I have a delusional certitude of my opinion. So it's like, you know, it's like I don't have the chip where I'm like, no, you're probably wrong. I mean, and I probably am wrong about most things. But I've thought long and hard about it. And I'm from L.A.

I like to think of things in terms of regionalism. Sure. Like certain things you just can't understand the same way from outside of the city. And also, I grew up in L.A. too. So I have these ancestral beliefs about the Tupac Biggie Beef that never was quite resolved. So this is sort of my feeble extension of that. And you must love red hot chili peppers. I actually have complicated opinions on them, but I do like the red hot jelly peppers.

I like the red hot chili peppers. I do. I think fleas, I think they're actually like the sum of their individual parts is incredible. As a band, I'm more into the early chili peppers than the later chili peppers. More like of the early funky chili peppers. Sure, classic music journalist opinion of the red hot chili peppers. We'll let you say. For those playing at home in the drinking game, yes, you did have to smash back a shot about

the red hot chili peppers within two minutes um you know jeff i'm gonna tell you i've come around to the doors i'm sorry no it's great i think it's like one of those bands that's like we've talked about a couple of bands on here that i think are like this where it's like against your will you know their music it was not a choice if you're of a certain age but like there's no people probably who don't haven't heard a door song it's just like not possible to exist on earth and not know a Dors song, right? Well, there's a few bands, I think, that have just gotten grandfathered into like this, like, classic rock bludgeoning where you will hear them eternally no matter what, when you

turn on whatever the equivalent of like 95.5 FM is in whatever city you live in. Or go to the CVS. Like, Steely Dan is one of those bands. Like, that was the first episode we did. And I was like, oh, no, I don't know Steely Dan. And then I was like, oh, I know every single fucking song that you've played. I just didn't ever think for one second. And I didn't use two brain cells to rub together to be like, what is this?

Because it just like didn't matter, you know? Totally. But I think this was cool. I got like a chance to like look closer at something that I had like largely ignored my whole life. And you know what? No spoilers, but I'm down. Tell me about the doors. Like what how did they meet?

What was the vibe? Who are these people? Well, they met, you know, obviously all of them met a different things. It's like the most quintessentially hilarious like L.A. circumstances, right? I think Robbie Krieger and John Densmore met at like a Maharishi class. This is

like pre-Beedles Maharishi. It is the mine which is brought to the field of being. Totally. Like Aquarian air is about to start in L.A. probably there's a bunch of love beads. Everyone's in Paisley and they're like at a Maharashi meeting and somehow like they were both like L.A. guys. West L.A. guys.

And Robbie Krieger's family was wealthy. If I remember. Yeah, they were from the palisades, which was not quite like, as rich as it is now, but it was obviously still kind of an upper middle class enclave in the 50s and 60s, 40s when he was growing up. Yeah, and Densmore is a West L.A. guy, like kind of just the kind of more blue-collar middle-class area of West L.A., which no longer exists, but at the time it was. South of Olympic for my L.A. heads.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. The Palm, the greater Palms area, I believe. And Manzarek is like the Chicago blues guy that comes out to L.A., and he, you know, he's very steeped in Chicago blues, like jazz, like Bill Evans, like that whole thing, comes out to L.A., wants to go to law school, decides I'm going to go to film school, which I think is really funny because I don't know if you've ever read the Eve Babbitt's essay on the doors. I sure have an Esquire? Yeah. Gorgeous.

And she's just clown. It's one of the best things ever written. And just the meanest thing ever written. She clowns every single one of them. Like, no one's safe. Everyone has dragged through the coals. Just the mean. It's just like, yeah, it's just pure scorched dirt either.

But she. It's talking about how uncool the film was in like the 60s because this is before Easy Writer comes out, which kind of makes like American shows like that there's a possibility for like underground cinema. I think this is even pre-Cazovettis. It's really there's just like the European stuff. Like obviously Falini is out. You know, Antinini's starting. And Antonini wanted to work with the doors at one point later on. Yeah.

He did the blow up, right? That was his big movie. Yeah. And he did a movie I think called Zabriski Point. That's the one he wanted the doors to be part of. He wanted the doors to beat his at a risky point. And I think he came to the studio and was like, you know what? I don't think.

Thanks, but no thanks. I'm going to call Ping Floyd now. And Ray Manzarek was like, oh, as the Europeans normally do. So basically Manzarek meets Jim in film school. Right. Jim transfers from like Florida State, which is very funny because you can't imagine like Jim at like some like football party school and like the 1960s transfers. to UCLA. One of the things

that I think people don't understand about the doors and really until I wrote about them again was you know you hear the mythology of you know

Jim very famously when he was doing early press runs for the bands goes oh my parents are both dead. Right. That's not true. That wasn't true.

Well it was not true not only was his dad like a naval commander his dad was the naval commander in charge of the fleet that started the Gulf of Tonkin incident that escalated the Vietnam War so there's like a weird

daddy issue thing that like we'll get into that later I'm sure too, but like he's in LA. It's very much like 1963, 64, like perfect idyllic L.A. kind of before. Densmore once told me, he goes, the 60s were two years, basically.

It was 65 to 67. Basically, they all meet. At first, Krieger's not in the band. He joins later. Ray is in a band with his brother, and they're called Rick and the Ravens. His brother was Rick, the Raven. Ray was the lead singer.

Because Ray actually had a rather really sonorous, melodic voice, but he didn't have what Jim had, which is... The charisma. Cavorca. You know, the cavorka, if you will, in the words of Seinfeld. But, yeah, he definitely did not have that kind of charisma either, and probably blunessy. Because, I mean, I think a great lead singer has to be a little, like, kind of off the deep end. Totally.

Like, there's something kind of pathological about you if you're, like, have that lead singer personality. Yeah. So, yeah, they basically bring in Jim one day. He's singing with them. And now come on, everybody, let's take a little trip. They're doing all this stuff. It's not going anywhere. They don't have a basis. They're like, what, you know, like you guys don't have it.

They bring in Krieger who kind of provides like he was a flamenco guitar raised musician, very into jazz, not a rock guy. And I think it's one of the interesting things about the door is really. And when you think about L.A. as Manzarek was very explicit, he's like L.A. was not a rock town before 1965. I mean, really the first. great L.A. rock band will probably, I don't even consider the Beach Boys really rock. They're kind of a pop band. Right. But really, to me, the first great L.A. rock band is love. I just got out my little red book the minute that you said goodbye.

Cool. Okay. Yeah. I mean, that's probably my favorite band. I mean, that Forever Changes is arguably my favorite album of all time. And I think Arthur Lee was actually the one that kind of put the doors on. He introduced them. He told Jack Holisman of Electra, you know, we're getting a little ahead of ourselves, but he told Jack Olsman of the record label Elektra to come and check out this Doors band. Okay. Yeah, and then basically the very famous mythologized. You've seen it a million.

If you've watched The Doors movie, have you seen The Doors movie? Babe, have I ever? Are you speaking? You're speaking, of course, of the classic 1991 Oliver Stone vehicle, The Doors, starring Val Kilmer. The Doors hate that movie. Who likes that movie? I mean, I like it because it's hilarious, but no,

It's hilarious. In their right mind could be like, this is a fine film. It's horrible. It's a bad movie, but there are good moments in it. You know what I mean? Like most, most famously when Pam, played by Meg Ryan, throws the Thanksgiving turkey at Jim Morrison and how- It was a duck, first of all.

It was a duck? It was a duck. Because Jim Morrison, you ruin Thanksgiving again. Which is really funny. I just have one more thing to say to you, Jim Morrison. You have ruined another Thanksgiving. The movie, I think, kind of like leads to this character of the door as these like Bozo, you know, and look, they don't help themselves sometimes.

I mean, some of the Jim Morrison stuff is overheated and ridiculous. It hasn't really... It's not that it doesn't hold up in the light of day. It's just like it's like watching like a movie where you have to have a suspension of disbelief. No, totally. Yeah. I think that's right.

Because the suspension of disbelief has to be that like the 60s were very different. Like not just to be like captain obvious, but like this is a wildly different time. And I think they were so famous that there's so much recorded stuff of him and them. Maybe there isn't as much of other people that other artists that are held better in the amber because they didn't embarrass themselves in this way. But it wasn't embarrassing really then, you know, like this kind of like overwrought what we consider now overwrought like philosophical stuff. Like that was the 60s. Like that was the counterculture. Also, I'll take it now.

You know what I'm saying? Like, fine, like, I'll take it. Like, like, you want to talk about, like, Brecht and Huxley and, like, all these. You want to talk about Nietzsche and Rimbo? Or do I want to have some, like, we were watching the Woodstock 99 documented it. And I was like, would I rather have Fred Ders? Like, ooh, you know? And it's gotten worse.

Yeah. What was it replaced with, you know? Like, I'm fine with, like, a book reading man. Yeah. Basically, Jim's like, well, I have some poems that I've been writing. And, you know, Ray, you know, Ray come. Were they both kind of similar voices? So if I do the voices, just you'll have to, again,

willful suspension of disbelief. And Ray is like, you sing me your poems. And, you know, he very famously sings Moonlight Drive, which, you know. And then like the Eureka moment and Ray is like, oh, poetry, rock and roll, acid, the blues, you know, he sees it all in his head according to the myth. And, yeah. And then, but then they have this like Rick and the Raven. It doesn't immediately start out.

And everyone's just like, now we're good on this whole doors thing for a while at least, for about a year or two, where they're just gigging constantly at a place called The London Fog. I want you to rob me, ride me all night long. So this is like the pre-signing new electric doors. This is like they, you know, they're in, they're famous for obviously playing at the whiskey. Right. But they got their start at a bar called the London Fog. Right.

And then the whiskey happened because the lady that booked the whiskey thought Jim Morrison was hot. And here's the world famous whiskey a go-go-go on the strip. A favorite dancing spot for both the mods and movie stars who want to get it on. Let's drop in and see what's happening tonight. Yeah, they might have been having an affair. We love that for everybody involved. Yeah. And also like the London fog, like he was doing a lot of poppers.

So he's like wandering around in the streets. And like the London fog was like a total dump. And the whiskey was, you know, the birds like Buffalo Springfield, love. And then the doors come in and they actually got thrown out of the London fog. right around the same time they got to the whiskey. Right. Eve Babitz was also really mean about the whiskey. Did you read that part where she was like, oh, that place was like, that was like the corny place where like white guys covered Chuck Berry songs.

Yeah. She's like, what did you like? And she was like, only Dananas, which she was right. Danana's enduring. And Mousson Franks, enduringly cool. I mean, I liked her piece because I think it puts a little mythology in perspective, you know, where it's like, everyone's like, no, it was the whiskey was the coolest place ever. And it's like, maybe it wasn't. You know, like, maybe it was also on its way out.

Like, the carpenters played the whiskey is what she says, which is clearly meant as a dig, you know? Yeah. She was definitely a troubadour kind of gal. Yeah. One of my 54 pieces about the doors that I've written was about kind of the scene at, like, Los Siena and Santa Monica, where the Doors Workshop eventually was. And that was, like, their practice studio. And, I mean, I don't know.

Have you been to Los Angeles and Santa Monica lately? It's like a shake shack. It's like a shake shack now. It's like fancy West Hollywood area. Yeah, it's nice. Yeah. It's just very, yeah. And like before it was like strip clubs, Barney's Beanery.

They had this like boutique that Pam, Jim Morrison's girlfriend owned, which is hilarious. I highly recommend anyone Googling photos of Jim and Pam in this like boutique. I think it was called like Themis or something. Like it was some like ridiculous. Grecian mythology name. It's very hilarious. They're in like silk kimonos and like it's the brightest thing you've ever seen. Like you actually can't make out anything because it's.

just like an explosion of weird color. And yeah. And but at the time it was a really, just everything in LA, you know, there was the Sandy Kofax Motel, which I just love the idea of like, oh, yes, Sandy Kofax owns a motel. Yeah. No one motel year. Yeah, totally. Yeah.

You can trust him with a curfaw like that. You'll trust his ability to run a fine in. Yeah. Okay. So this is, this is very like the myth. but it's also pretty on point. Like he, the whiskey is where they,

you alluded to already, like, um, they get noticed by, not noticed, they get put on, um, by the guy from love,

but to Jack Holzman, who was the founder, I think, and president of lecture records. Yeah. And he signed them to like a one year one album deal. I think it was three albums for $5,000. With two options,

I think it was. I'm literally only quoting John Dunsmore's book. But yeah, for $5,000. Yeah. And it's kind of interesting because, like, they're already playing some of their most known songs at this point. Like, they've written them and they're playing them. Like, Light My Fire is part of that live show.

The End was part of that live show, right? Yeah, the first two albums actually had been written by the time they went into the studio. Yeah, they were. Exactly. They had a lot of stuff from, like, Jim Morrison's notebooks and stuff. Why don't we hear a song off of the first? album? Why don't we hear Light My Fire, even though everyone's heard it? I've heard it once or twice, yeah.

Okay, this is Light My Fire. You are listening to a music and talk episode where full songs and talk segments live together in gorgeous harmony only on Spotify. Guess what? You can also create your own music and talk show for free with Anchor, Spotify's podcasting platform. Get started at Anchor.fm. slash music and talk. That's anchor.fm. slash music and talk. That was Light My Fire. You know it. You love it. Maybe you hate it. I don't know, but you do know it.

The irony of the doors is that Robbie Krieger wrote most of the hits. Okay. Okay. Don't, don't start with this. Okay. Maybe Robbie Krieger wrote many of the hits. But I, besides maybe Light My Fire, he wrote a lot of them around Morrison, like around Morrison's poetry, maybe even around just Morrison as a human. For sure. I mean, it's like with any band, they're always going to be. I mean, that is the thing about bands. It's like, unfortunately going solo just doesn't usually work because like music is, I always think of the Raymond Chandler quote where he's like, all art is magic, but especially music because you're like with writing, yeah, you could have good and bad periods, but like it's still

you. With music, you're kind of relying on a singular alchemy with three or four. It's alchemy, not magic. Yeah. And. you know, that's the thing. It's like, or how were the doors without any one of those people? I mean, you have to give credit to all of them. I mean, Densmore is one of the greatest drummers of all time. And, like, the irony is a lot of people will, who hate the doors, will have to be like, okay, I'll get props to Densmore.

He's a really incredible drummer. And obviously, there was those drums, you know, you think of the drums that were very famously sampled for the takeover. Come on, you're running this reps. Mm-hmm. And John Densmore's drums on 5 to 1 are like, they're some of the most booming, easily transferable to hip-hop drums you could ever imagine.

Totally. And he had like such a gift, you know, for also like improvising his beats, again, around, like, Jim Morrison bringing in a poem and like a spare melody that maybe he hummed in his head. And the rest of the band specifically, I think Dunsmore could really, like, bring it to life. For sure. And I think another thing that's worth pointing out about the doors is that you, think of them as like, you know, people when they stereotype them often are like this, you know, this maximalist, overblown, kind of comically stumbling band.

But if you really listen closely to the music, there's a ton of negative space. There's a lot of minimalism in there. They're not just turn it up to 12. There's a lot of like cool, like echoing kind of things that really kind of contradict that notion of them as like the most like, you know, yes, some of that is true, but they also kind of had a certain level of restraint for being kind of completely, like, having none at all. Yeah. And I like that this, like you mentioned the song as written by Krieger, I think, and I don't know if this is true. It came up a couple of times in different things. I read that it was the first song he ever wrote.

Yeah. Yeah. He was a 20 years old. It's kind of insane. Yeah, he wrote it at his parents' house and the Palisades. And because Jim was like, right, like, he's like, you have to, he's like, all you guys have to go home, write a song tonight because they need more songs. no one did except Krieger and then he just like oh my first song i guess is light my fire which is incredible uh it's like i feel like hitting a hole in one like the first time you ever go golfing or something yeah if that whole in one one indoored for like six more decades yeah totally right like it was captured and then became like the biggest replay clip in the history of time yeah but he he was really into the rolling stone song playing with fire and he thought that fire being

universal you know air water earth fire like all the elements and he um decided to use light my fire as the central motivating conceit because he's like, I'd never heard a song like that before. And it's funny when you meet Robbie now, he's just kind of a shy, kind of introverted. He's very sweet. He like reminds me of like my grandfather actually. And he is a perfect guy to have in a group because you can tell that of anyone, like he just seems the most like go with the flow. And in the doors, you have three incredibly strong personalities. Like if a fourth had existed, I don't know if that band could have co-existed for very long. Totally. especially if one of them was like mental ill

which well i think it's just drunk you know we need to talk about it because i i i am interested in if that's true i mean it's true that he was always drunk but i i kind of feel like there's like something obviously that like pre you know kind of set the stage for someone wanting to get drunk that much and it's not someone who's just like feels good and is well adjusted you know well yeah i mean we can get into it. But I mean, fame is like that level of fame, that young, all of a sudden. I mean, you know, I think always about that very famous Dave Chappelle inside the actor studio clip where he's

talking about like, you know, Kanye and all these people that cracked, including kind of himself. And you're like, these are really strong people. These are not just like weak willed people like to get to that level of fame and success. And I just think even, I mean, when you really think about it, like circa 1967 to 70, I mean, how many more people are more famous than Jim Morris and maybe, okay, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, maybe Jimmy Hendricks, probably about it. yeah that's true the monkeys but even then like you know there were there were four of them where like even

Mickey Nesmith was taken off some of the heat like no one's like oh Robbie you know it's just one haircut that everyone was like oh yeah totally haircut no one's no one's chasing John Denzmore through like the DePangam all or whatever he seemed bummed about it too he wrote about a couple times he was like well why not me

and it's like babe come on the drummer if you ever wanted to be the main star you should not have peaking up the drums everyone knows that. Yeah, like, that's literally the one thing where no one can see you. Unless you're Travis Barker. Where are you? Well, okay, okay, we'll get into it, but I don't think there's any getting ahead of yourself

or spoilers in the doors since everyone really knows. But it turns out he dies. I think, I think Jim Morrison, like, because he was so devoted to, like, symbolism and surrealism, like, every piece of art he left behind is like really opaque. And so it is kind of hard to determine what was actually going on with him past like kind of extrapolating from, you know, the mythology that literal Greek mythology that he referenced or things like this. But like there is the thing that he was a military kid. So he moved around a ton never probably had got to lay down any roots. And there was there's like a really like chilling just little part of the Wikipedia where it says that Jim Morrison's brother said that his parents had this like philosophy where they never wanted to use physical

punishment so they instead used this military tradition called dressing down which was basically just screaming at the and like berating their children until they were like reduced to tears and had to acknowledge their failings that's not going to create a happy and well-adjusted person so yeah anyways i don't know i'm sure there's been plenty of speculation on all fronts of like what was going on with Jim Morrison, but like it seems like there was more than just got famous too quickly, which is its own, you know, burden to bear for sure. And we talk about it a lot on this show. Speaking of getting famous too quickly, Light My Fire is like a goddamn smash hit. That shit is the first number one single Elektra ever had, which is that's kind of crazy because Electra was around

for 17 years prior to that. It was on the charts for a while. I mean, they got super famous right away right yeah they they were everywhere i mean my mom actually saw them at birmingham high school in the late 60s in like 1967 and they was like them in the jefferson airplane yeah they were playing high schools can you like yeah they played like the birmingham high school football stadium well that's why okay that's interesting that you bring that up because i do so i would just want to point out a thing that interested me i think we've we've a bit talked about it in circles but you know in the beginning of this show but like the doors obviously like have a thing that people associate with them and whatever. But I think like that thing tends to be

completely without context just because that's not how people think of things, you know? Like the doors are just this thing that people, you know, it has its force. But it's like in 1966, which is the year not, I mean, the door self-tile album came out January, 1967. So just leading up to this, like the biggest albums on the charts, number one albums were Herb Alpert and Tijuana Brass a bunch of times. The Beatles, obviously, were dominating with, like, rubber soul and revolver. We all live in the yellow submarine. Yeah.

And the monkeys. Take the meat to have the station. Like, it was a really wholesome, for largely wholesome musical landscape. Yeah. Because you think, right, you think of the summer of love. But still, this is six, seven months before, really, the summer of love fits its prawn. Yeah. I mean, and Manzarek said an interesting thing to me.

He was like, you know, it was really just L.A. and San Francisco that were psychedelic. He's like, New York was like on like a, you know, booze and heroin type trip. Like everyone in that, like, you know, yeah, like, I mean, we're talking like, you know, the electric coolide acid test has just gone around the country. And maybe you have Timothy Leary up in Millbrook doing his experiments in New York. You will travel far beyond familiar reality into the level of transcendent awareness. Really, like, this is a, like, by name. 1967 when it comes out, I mean, maybe that's when the 60s start. I mean, the doors are probably one of those bands. When you think of, like, I mean, you think like the forest gum soundtrack, right? And obviously the doors are like really heavy into that. You know, they're, they're forest gum core. But they're actually not, which is kind of crazy, right? Like if you look-

The deep cuts aren't. Yeah. Yeah. If you look at the catalog more holistically, which again, I had never done until just this week. I was like, oh, again, I had a lot of like synapses firing when I was in this. But like the song of the end, I think it's a really important song to talk about, right? Because this is like, this is Jim Morrison core. Like this is like really gives you a glimpse into like what he was like as a musician, as a singer, as a person, as a thinker, as a poet. That song is insane. Yeah, like you can think it's dumb or whatever. But like also imagine thinking of that song.

You're like, I don't know. I'm going to write like a nine minute thing about like Oedipus, but it's really going to be filtered through my dad who I kind of hate who, like, is this guy who, like, is responsible for, like, all these war crimes and, like, you know, and, like, you filter it. And it's just, like, right. It's, like, even, like, the lines, like, ride the snake to the lake, like, weird scenes inside the gold mine. I don't care.

That's a great sentence. Like, weird scenes inside the gold mine. It's an evocative phrase. It doesn't matter if it's, like, not to be, like, Kanye quoting, you know, the hockey movie where he's, like, it's provocative. I don't know what it means. No one knows what it means, but it's provocative. Also, I'm so sorry, Tari is insisting that I correct you that it was an ice skating movie that Kanye West quoted the, you know, he said, hockey.

It's called Blades of Glory. It's called Real Life Corrections being issued. So the other thing I think about this that is like really impressive and powerful, I think, in context is like, again, the monkeys are the biggest band in the world or whatever for better, you know. and you're writing a 12-minute song that ends with you basically screaming, I'm going to fuck my mom on stage in a time where that was like unheard of. Like it was illegal. Yeah, it was not only unheard of was illegal and it was like insane. And like just that energy and that like thing was like not a thing.

Yeah, I mean that's the definition of transgression like on some level like you are breaking taboos that like have previously not existed. And like whether you think that's like corny or lame, fine. That was a really actually transgressive act. And that's clear he was a well-red guy. He wasn't stupid. And like that's the thing about the doors. It's like, yeah, could he be corny sometimes? Sure.

In the context of 60 years of time. Yeah, like I'm sure everyone will come off corny in 60 years. We talked if Kirkobay was still alive, that man would be wearing leather wrist bracelets, DJing at the fucking Ace Hotel in Palm Springs for a Coachella party and like railing lines of cocaine at cabin in New York. Like there's just no way. No one can survive. As Gore of Idaile once said about Truman Capote dying, what a great career move. It's kind of, I mean, sad, dark, dark but true.

Totally. And as we'll get into it in this show, I'll just put it forward now. My thesis statement here is that the doors maybe didn't invent punk, but they certainly allowed it to happen. Like, without this band, I don't know if American punk would have come around the way it did. Yeah. But like, you say like, oh, if you think it's corny or whatever, it's not corny. It's, that's punk.

getting up in front of people and screaming edipus shit when it was like none of that was happening and you could literally be arrested for it that's the definition of being pumped totally i mean like they did not give like they it's so they might have jim jim didn't no it's so it's so ingrained in our consciousness to be like oh they didn't care they were rock and roll rebels you know what i mean but like okay

remove yourself from that like that is like now i don't know what rebellion is like you know what i mean because it's like it's been so thoroughly desicated. You know, the rebellion has been commodified a thousand times over. And obviously, you know, a lot of it comes from the beats. I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness. Again, another thing that I love that people kind of mock. And I'm like, actually, if you dig a little deeper, like there's a lot of amazing stuff.

Yeah, dig, get it, you know? So, yes, the beats, totally. And the beats, and Jim Morrison was influenced by Ginsburg. Oh, yeah, for sure. Michael McClure, who I, you know, I got to interview several times, actually, when I did a big story in the beats and he's still live. He said that Jim Morrison was the best poet of his generation. Was he? No. But at the same time, he, I'm not actually really wild about Jim Morrison's poetry.

I think that's kind of one of the fatal flaws. It's actually kind of good. It's interesting. It's better than I thought it was going to be, for example. For sure. And like, I think honestly, like his air quote poems work very well as lyrics. Like, I don't know. I think most, like, I don't know why everyone mocks the doors's lyrics where I'm like, what band has good lyrics?

Like, seriously, almost every band has terrible lyrics. If you really, like, write them as, I mean, yeah, maybe. I don't agree with you. Leonard Cone. Okay, yeah, he had good lyrics. That's because Leonard Cone was an actual poet also. I know, but, like, what, I mean, I don't think most bands, like, lyrics hold up as poetry. You know what I mean?

Like, I think if you really want to mock most bands, like, I don't know, like the strokes. Okay, no one's coming for the doors in front of you right now. No, but it's like the excess can be applied to almost any band. Totally. I mean, even, again, even Nirvana. Like, if you take those lyrics and read them out loud, like, I think they're cool. I 100% agree with you, yeah. But I don't know if they would hold up, you know, if this is like the standard we're doing.

But yeah, they're not Gates. It's, Babette says it also in her piece, it was really good. I was like, rock and roll stars didn't go to college. That wasn't a thing. But they did. Like, this band went to college. college. They were educated. They were like into, like we've said it already, like William

Blake and Nietzsche. Like, it was just like a different vibe. Well, Eve is a little bit, a little bit misleading because, you know, Dylan had a little college. Mick Jagger had a little college. Like, there's a little college as a treat. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, they like,

they weren't like, she, you know, you have to be kind of careful. Eve is so great because like she's almost like a polemicist in some way. But like, she's just so, like, you believe everything. I'm like, I don't want to have Eve says it. But, you know, I think it was more... She's like you. Her stertitude of her opinion does convince you.

It's a very L.A. thing. But, okay, well, anyways, this album is a breath of fresh air. The other big song on it is Break on through to the other side. We'll also end up being a really important song in the canon.

Yeah, I think it's worth kind of mentioning. Something I've thought about a lot is I think the doors, You know, what did he call him? I mean, it's a dumb phrase, but he called himself for erotic politicians. Erotic politicians. It's dumb now, but it wasn't dumb then. Again, it's like context is everything if you think about this band. Like, back then, that was like, people didn't talk that way. I mean, it's dumb, but it's also kind of an interesting combination of words, you know? Well, the, the focus on sex and death, I think, is really important. I mean, break on through the other side can also be looked at as like the other side being death, you know, the other side. side of life. And I think even like we're talking summer of love is starting and all these bands,

like these other psychedelic flower power bands weren't concerning themselves with sex and death as much as they were like love and peace, you know? The doors were dark. Yeah, this is incense and peppermins. Wear some flowers in your hair. Like, you know, even like the dead are like, you know, the dead aren't the dead at this point. I mean, they're just kind of like a really loose. I mean, I think the 67 dead stuff is cool, but they're not like a fully formed band that they would be coming in a few years. The doors are basically like, right as some very dark songs. You know, like, show me the way to the whiskey bar. That's like a song that was written like in Weimar, Germany, you know, when like everything, all these institutions were collapsing. The end can't be darker. I mean, really only the 20th century

Fox is like the only, you know, but then like they have all these like blue songs too. And I think that's the thing also that gets lost. And obviously we'll get into it later with LA Woman, which I think is they're, in my opinion, their best album and kind of the one where you can say anything you want about the doors, you kind of have to respect them just off the strength of LA woman. I think that's like the one album that you can't mock. Yeah, it's unimpeachable. Yeah. But Jim Morrison, like, what a voice, right? We like, take this for granted. You're like, he was 22 singing these songs. Like, what 22 year old can sing like that now? Like, imagine like a 22 year old now singing Backdoor Man. He'd be like, you'd get him laughed out

right out of the room. So you are of the camp that he has a really good voice. I think one of the greatest voices ever. Yeah. I think it's like, I think Sinatra with a blow. contact with Satan. I like his voice a lot. I really like it. But I, maybe I just don't know enough about music or singing or whatever to like make any distinctions between good and bad voices. But to me, I like it the same way I like Anthony Kedis's voice where I'm just like,

oh, this is so singular. I think Anthony Kittis has a great voice. You're really alone in that, I think. I do too. But, you know, people will. Okay. So Backdoor Man is a cover, right? I'll reach your pork and days.

I eat more chicken and any man ever say. It's a Howling Wolf cover, I believe. It's Willie Dixon wrote it. Do you want to play another song off the debut album? Yeah, let's see. I mean, we could play, I think Crystal Ship is, like, people, that's like one of the songs that people mock the most about the doors, but I actually think it's a pretty cool song.

And, like, it's really a beautiful ballad. Yeah. This is Crystal Ship. was Crystal Ship. I don't want to like harp on the fact that it was truly a like a wildly wholesome landscape. But I'm, did you ever watch this TV appearance that they did for this album that is before. Because they, the next album comes out quite quite quickly, I think, after this. But they're on this show called Malibu You, which was a variety show.

Okay, it's amazing. I'll hop to send it to you. It was hosted by Ricky Nelson And it's like Full Gidgett You know what I mean? It's like They're I don't think they're actually

Performing live on the show It's like something they pre-recorded With them on the beach Set up like a music video Here's the hottest group going With light my fire The Doors And it's like

They It's like girls With like little blonde bobs And little bikinis With these like insane Like mentally ill plastered White smiles on their faces While like

The doors are being the doors. Like Jim Morrison is just like brooding and like singing Light My Fire. And there's like one unhinged frame of this video where like someone's just holding a match in front of a close up shot of one of these blonde girls who's just smiling like a fucking idiot. And like it's so weird because it makes no sense that this band and this sound and this aura of them fits with what's happening in this like show. But it was such a popular song, you know? And I think that's a really good. That's just a really good indication of like how the era is changing and the doors are changing it. Yeah. And I mean like we go, we talk about the beach boys again. Like this is like they're like some surfs up like surfing USA

shit. And the doors are like I will drown you in the ocean. I mean the beach boys got darker and darker and after the doors. Yeah. After the doors. Yeah. Totally. No, but the doors were just like and Pruderdale and I talked about it a bit. It's like they were even they were just unprecedented. And I think it's a very LA thing and I think you'll agree. It's like if this was a San Francisco band, it might be different. But like like. Like, they really did embody, like, what L.A. was, which had so much seat. Like, L.A. was, like, the psychedelic stuff. And then it was also just the, like, fucking hookers and, like, drugs and, like.

There's just, like, L.A. has always been governed by the light and dark dialectic. You know, it's very famous in noir. You can see it in. I'm not the biggest John Fonte fan, but you can see it in his word. I mean, either, honestly. Yeah, kind of found it overrated. John Rishi, one of my favorite authors actually ever who's still alive in 90. I just interviewed him for like my second time recently.

He's an amazing, amazing author. And he wrote the book called City of Night, which is where they got the title of it. City of Night. Yeah, that's where they got it from. That's actually Ray Manzirk put me on. He was like, he mentioned John Reschie. And then I found a copy of a John Reschie book and bought it. But it was amazing.

Yeah. And it's like, again, like a very dark book about gay hustling in the 1950s. Like they were quoting really cool shit. Like they weren't just like, you know, these dumb, stereotypical bro idiots that just took acid one time and thought they were deep. Like these were people that like mind was opened or whatever. Yeah, Raymond Zerick, like when I would interview him like, like he's fucking smart. Like he might be like absurd and pretentious, but was smart. John Densmore's a very smart well-read guy.

And Robbie Krieger was like a prodigy. Yeah. I mean, he's a bright man. I mean, he's not like necessarily. He's not the best talker in the world, but he's very smart, obviously. And you can tell like he's in it was like a rich interiority. And yeah, I mean, to play the guitar like that, I mean, he was 20 years old like playing most of those guitar lines in the first album. So I don't want to harp too much on this.

But I think it's to, you know, keep building my case for the doors to punk pipeline. The office album, they also appear on the Ed Sullivan show. This is a very famous story. Obviously, you know it. I know it. Maybe not everyone knows it, though. um dad solven show was like the hugest thing in the world

they're like oh you get to go on it and they're like listen babe plays just don't say girl we couldn't get much higher can you imagine also a time that you couldn't say the word higher on TV because that was like verboten and now what's happening is so different um so jim morrison's like yes of course absolutely and then just gets on there and like sings it with all of the relish of the world and they're like

well you can't play on here anymore and he was like well we already played. But that's punk. I totally agree with you. Well, and like, yeah, let's get into it. I mean, fine. Like, what was one of Iggy Pop's favorite band? The Doors. Ian Curtis, one of his favorite bands. The Doors. Like, yeah. Iggy Pop is the thing, I think, where it's like, you could argue the Stooges were the first American punk band because that was still the 60s when the Stooges started. And he was, that was his favorite singer and he was influenced. Okay. Second thing, they are handpicked by Paul Simon. This is all before the second

album comes up. Handpicked by Paul Simon to open for Simon and Garfunkel at Forest Hills. 10,000 people. Jim just doesn't feel like it. Just like kind of phones it in the thing, kind of is a little bit of a dick on stage, is a dick to Paul Simon, and then just slams down his microphone on stage and screams for a full minute.

Show me something more punk. Yeah, I agree. Love it. Okay. You'll hear no complaints. No complaints. So Strange Days. Tell me about Strange Days. That's their second album, which comes out, like the same year as the first one.

It's like nine months later. They were just like DMX. But yeah, the Strange Days is also an amazing album. A lot of the songs had been written, you know, from Jim's kind of poetry notebooks. I mean,

it starts strange days. You know, I remember that. I was thinking about movie, strange days. It was like they were, I mean, that's another thing too is like,

I always said like, you know, people want to talk about like the door as being bad. But you're like, they're one of the greatest sync bands ever, right? Like you put a door song in a movie and you immediately get like a time of place. Like strange days is a weird, mystical, eerie. Like not enough can be said about man.

Zerick's like organ riffs. Like those are bizarre. Like I guess the only real analog is the animals. Like they were kind of the one like Eric Burden. Obviously Jim Morrison did take a little bit of me. Take a load from the great blues singers. He takes a little from Sinatra. He definitely takes them from Eric Burden of the animals.

But those organ riffs are like so haunting that they're playing, you know, which is like a weird thing. It's like almost like a demented demonic church music, right? Totally. Why don't we hear Strange Days so we can hear what you're talking about. Let's do it. Yeah. Why not? This is Strange Days. That was Strange Days. Gorgeous, gorgeous organ situation. Yeah. And like the way that they layer it too is, I mean, I think they probably were recording a lot of it live or, you know, on 4-track or whatever. It was an 8-track on this album. Just so, you know, it was a big deal because there was no 8-track before this.

Yeah. I mean, and you can kind of hear the layering, too, where it's like, you know, Krieger's guitar is kind of just like buried beneath it. It's like very like, it's like an elegant, meticulous thing. Like, and the producer Paul Rothschild was like a very notoriously kind of a strict producer, you know, and Manzarek was like, oh, no one can be the dictator of the doors. This myth is not true. All Paul Rothschild did. I mean, he, everyone gave Paul Rothschild credit. But again, like, he was a great producer.

And this is, you know, this is the guy who just produced Janice Joplin's Pearl. And, and he was like, that was one of, Jim Morrison doing the end was like one of the greatest. performance as ever. Or I think he produced pro later, but he said it later on, like, watching Jim Morrison do the end was one of the greatest things I've ever seen a singer do. Yeah. Because on the end, he would

improvise, right? Like, that was, like, a big thing about the end. It's like he would improvise poetry. I mean, that's why the song is 12 minutes long. There's also, which we haven't talked about, but I think we can talk about it here. Light My Fire is like this, too, and I assume a bunch of other songs in the catalog. There's

spaces in these songs, like, kind of It's not jamming in the sense of like a Grateful Dead, right? It's more like scheduled jamming. It's like, it's pretty jazzy. Like that's what they're really going for. Like, light my fire. It's jazz jamming, not jamming? That's just called improvising when it's jazz.

I think it's jamming. Yeah, it's still jamming. I mean, but I think it would jam. I think the jam bands have kind of usurped it and kind of like made it like when you think of jam. This is not fish, babe, is what we're saying. Yeah, you think of like string cheese incident. You're like, no. But I yeah, I could a could have banned fish as well, but it's up.

We already did that. Oh, did you? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, the whole thing is the, you know, whatever. But yeah, they, I mean, yeah, they were going for Coltrane, you know, for that, that rift, man,zeric was going for Coltrane on the riff on my fire.

And there is that, that jazziness too. And this is, you know, that's like, I don't know. They weren't, like, again, like, they were, they were taking from this, like, cultural ferment was happening. That was the underground that they. they were kind of riffing on. It wasn't like the stuff in the mainstream. They weren't trying to do Jan and Dean songs. They weren't trying to do like, you know, incense and peppermints or whatever.

The monkeys, yeah. Yeah. I mean, this album is, I mean, I think has some of the most also, also again, famous Dors song. I mean, not a spoiler, but the doors were literally around for four years. So it's not like they, like every one of their things was part of the importance of their catalog. But like, you know, this album has people are strange.

everyone knows. It has Love Me Two Times. Love me two time, girl. One for tomorrow. One just for today. Good song. Yeah.

Yeah. Really good song. Yeah, just a good love. I mean, the doors, again, had this, like, they had the ability to write, like, a pop hit. You could literally, like,

imagine it produced differently as, like, just a straight-up pop. Totally. Or, like, Love Her Madly. You know what I mean? I love Love Her Madly. Don't you love a manly? Amazing song.

That's on the next album, I think. And then there's, then we have like a song like horse latitude. When the still sea conspires an armor. Yeah, that one is like definitely emblematic of the worst of the doors. I don't hate it. I feel like it's cool. Yeah, because again, it didn't, in the context of the musical landscape of the time, it was so cool to put something in this fucking weird. where like Jim Morrison is just like screaming poetry over like yeah mute nostril agony good line

you know what I mean yes but honestly yeah maybe I don't want to listen to it I don't like slap it on all the time but I also don't listen to G.G Allen in my free time you know like it doesn't mean they weren't important you know kind of a punk you know kind of a fun move you're like yeah we're the best selling band in the world oh here's my weird screed poem about horses about horses like pretty cool This Strange Days was also the album, which that famously Joan Didion crept in on. And she wrote that like amazing, which I'm just going to read it because I think it's wonderful. And I do think it really gets to the heart of the doors. So she was there. Jim Morrison did not show up that day. There are three of the four doors. There is everything and everyone except one thing. The fourth door, the lead singer, Jim Morrison, a 24-year-old graduate of UCLA who wears black vinyl pants and no underwear and tends to

suggest some range of the possible just beyond a suicide pact. It is Ray Manzarek and Robbie Krieger and John Densmore who make the doors sound the way they do, but it is Morrison who gets up there in his black vinyl pants with no underwear and projects the idea, and it is Morrison they are waiting for now. I think

she oversimplified a little bit Jim Morrison's contribution, but I do think she said it in a cool way. Yeah, I mean, what does she call them like missionaries of sex and death. Was that or like apocalyptic salvation or something? Yeah. I mean, she, I mean, she, I mean, she, it's interesting to me also that if, if you were like,

who were two of the four best writer of the 60s, I would definitely be like Joan Didian and E. Babids. Totally. Different ends of the spectrum. Totally. They're yin and yang. Well, I mean, very famously in, I think it was an L.A. woman. Eve wrote this like, thank you to, uh, to Joan Didian and John Dunn for being who I didn't have,

you know, being them so I didn't have to be that. And I like, which is kind of a great historical slander. But yeah, both of them were so intrigued. I mean, E. Babitz obviously dated Jim Morrison for a while and was like kind of in love with him, even in spite of all the things. So that's like kind of the other thing I think worth considering is like it probably was more than just him being really good looking. Because I assume E. Babitz probably had her fair share of handsome suitors at some point. Yeah, she kind of implies that he was a hymbo and it's clearly not true. And that's her prerogative.

Totally. And however she went like she gets to remember it. But he clearly wasn't. But I thought that Joan did the thing was nice. The other thing I thought was cool about this album was the other 10 minute long epic freestyle poetry screaming. Yeah, when the music's over. So it's not just one screaming poetry song. There's two.

When the music's over here. Totally. I mean, and like when the music over is, okay, like, again, one of those things that maybe feels a little hackneyed, but it kind of works, right? Like, it's sort of, all right, like, we're going to end the. album with when the music's over. And like the doors are one of those bands too where, you know, I mentioned sublime earlier. And they're just bands where like every idea is bad, but it still works. And I think people get hung up on like, well, that's a bad idea. But you're like, yeah, actually, though, that they they pulled off all these terrible ideas somehow, some way. Because

they were really talented. Okay. So what else is going on during this? Jim Morrison is, I don't I don't want to say devolving because I don't even know that it went about, like, he was kind of always a little bit off from the beginning and his like erraticness of his behavior and hard to pin down. Show me a normal poet. Yeah. Fair. Show me a normal podcast host. None. None.

So, but he, it's getting worse maybe, I'm assuming. Yeah. Only because it's allowed, right? Because he's now he's super famous. He's got money. Less songs are being written. You know, like they're ransacking that, you know, what we didn't use in the first album, which is never like a good thing.

But of course, they are recording it like six months later. Yeah. So it's like this is like you could kind of think of this as like a double album if you wanted to. For sure. Like the first Doors double album. Yeah. We haven't talked about the reviews, but these two albums get really good reviews. Like music journalists are really into it.

Yeah. I think, Dylan, did we say that Robert Criscoe did not like the first album? We always look to our Paul Bob because he just says the funniest things. He gave it a B-minus, the first album. But he says, I admit that some of the tunes retain considerable nostalgic appeal. He must have reviewed it after the fact. But there's no way I can get around it. Jim Morrison sounds like an asshole.

Well. Okay, Bob. Yeah. As opposed to Bob, Robert Griscoe, who always seemed like the nicest man imaginable. Totally. Just like a paragon of light and virtue. And like the other thing, too, is like probably, I mean, I'm not like. like the biggest Lester Bangs guy in the world.

I think some of his stuff is great. Some of his stuff, again, like, can be really overheated and pretentious and probably every other adjective you could throw at it. But called Jim Morrison the Ophus Laureate. Love the Doors, especially L.A. woman, like big fan. Gryl Marcus, you know, one of the best rock writers of all time, just wrote a book like seven eight years ago, maybe it was probably about 10 years ago now, about the doors, about, you know, seeing them a bunch of times in the 60s and how he would still think about them, you know,

50 years later. And there's something to be said about that. But because we don't, I mean, look, I love the birds. I love Buffalo Springfield. We don't think about them that way. You know, we don't think about the zombies that way, even though Odyssey and Oracle is an incredible album. I mean, even love, I mean, love who I would, you know, gun to my head, I'd probably take them over the doors. But we don't think about Arthur Lee and love that way.

And, of course, you can get into the racial implications. So there is an argument you made also the mental health thing about love really only has three classic albums, whatever. But, yeah, I mean. Also, like, the doors. and don't take this the wrong way. The doors aren't the doors because they had great songs. That's part of it. The doors are the doors because they had great songs

and they were captivating and Jim Morrison died. Yeah, I mean, I compare them a lot to Tupac because they're great to put on a T-shirt. You know what I mean? The Sella Venice Beach, they're a dorm room poster. There's a mythos. There's a, you know, live fast, you know, and die young. Like, sex drugs and rock and roll thing about them that they,

I mean, they are the sex drugs and rock and roll cliche. It's interesting that you bring this up. The poster and the like cliche thing. Okay, something struck me recently. I had a rental car. So I had to listen to the radio. I never listened to the radio. Obviously, do listen to the radio.

I never listen to the radio. I listen to K-Jazz 88.1 a lot. But I'm not, you know. Okay, Jeff, boys. Okay. It's calming in the L.A. traffic. I put on Alt 98.7, you know, just hoping maybe like a gin blossom song would make its way to me.

Yeah. Within an hour, I heard two Nirvana songs. And in between, it was like, I don't know, the names of contemporary rockies are like dirty heads and like whatever like, yeah, no, no, contemporary, like, two, 20-21 guitar rock bands. What? Their bands are get played on the radio that are from 20-21 with guitars? Yeah, paramour, like just like things that are like more, more contemporary.

Like Olivia Rodriguez. No. No. I don't think they would play that. But anyways. I was really blown away when I was like, this would, this is the equivalent of like us turning on K-Rock, which was the alt-rock station of L.A. in the 90s and hearing a song from the 60s. Because those Nirvana songs are 30 years old. They're classic rock by decade standards, but they still play them on the alt station because like time stopped with guitar rock music, I think, around the 90s. But I was like, it's interesting.

is Nirvana like the doors? Like in the sense that like do people seek out Nirvana to listen to or are they so over exposed and like is Nirvana as like an idea and Kurt Cobain as like a martyr in the same way as like Jim Morrison is so like seeped into our culture that people don't even think about them as music anymore which I would argue that's how the doors are too. I think a lot of people are like the doors a thing not a music. You know? For sure.

Yeah. I mean, I think there is probably an argument to be made as Nirvana is probably the last great. I mean, you could, they weren't obviously classic rock band, but like kind of like they had some, some elements of it. I mean, they love the Beatles, you know? Right. And what probably holds up about Nirvana is it their influence of the Melvins and the pixies?

It's probably their influence of the Beatles, you know, because he's a great pop songwriter. And that's, I think, one of the reasons why. But it was wrapped in kind of a more harder, disson and edge kind of thing where, okay, fine, it's punk. You know, Nirvana were a punk band. at heart. I'm not even talking musically that. I'm just talking culturally. Like is, oh for sure. Are they like in the same category now as the doors as like you go into Hot Topic, you get your Jim Morrison shirt, you get your Kirkoban shirt? You know what I mean? You get your

two box shirt. Like yeah, 100% kind of crazy right. Like I didn't think I that must be what people who like lived for the doors in real time feel like about seeing the doors commodified or like whatever, kind of like milked dry of any life, which is like often how it makes me sad about Nirvana, because like, you know, that was in real time such a big deal and such like changing of everything. And now it's like almost just like a trope. Oh, for sure. Yeah. I remember being really young and watching like those Nirvana and MTV and just being like, this is the coolest thing I've ever seen. And I'm sure that was like that for the doors. I mean, and I think there's credit to John Densmore for kind of trying to be the one pushing back. And again,

What's more punk than Jim Morrison being like, no, fuck this. We're not going to have our songs commodified. We are not doing this stupid Ford jingle. We are not going to be some like sellout like little corny ass band that's like going to be team operas. I think it was. Cadillac. With a Chrysler?

Chrysler. It might have been Cadillac. It was one of those America. Yeah. It was like Buick. I think it was come on. Bewick. Yeah.

Come on Buick. Famously Buick offered them $75,000, which at that time was like $5,000. I don't know, to have the song. And Jim Morrison. was missing in action as he liked to be. And the rest of the door said yes. And then Jim Morrison came back and said literally no and killed it. It ended.

Yeah. And John Dunsmore kept the spirit alive in future things by trying. I mean, look, the doors have gotten but licensed a lot of still, but probably less than the Beatles, probably less than the Zeppelin, probably less than most of those classic rock bands that had the opportunity to be licensed to death. I think I read in one of your pieces that they offered them $15 million to put a Doors song some car commercial like within the last deck no 2003 and they said no

yeah it was Denzmore was like no absolutely not yeah denz more has been yeah and it was just on one of those and it's like you got to respect that it's like how much I mean it's always the question it's like how much money do you need yeah well but to some people it's infinite you know what though I literally not even

allowed to be mad at people because it's like capitalism is running everyone dry and people just need to make money where they can't it depends on the thing let's play another song from this album to just push the point home of strange days, you have chosen, my eyes have seen you. Do you want to talk about it a little bit before we play it?

Yeah, I think it is just a weird fucking song. Like, and I like, I think it's just such a cool. There's like a mystical element of it. Like my eyes have seen you. It's like, again, like you think of the doors as the strange day is when the music's over. But like a song like Mize have seen you is just like, and it's just like drifting under television skies. You know what I mean?

Like it's like kind of has this weird poetic. imagery and again you can be like it's bad poetry or whatever I think it's kind of subjective but I would watch David Lynch movies when I was like I watched like one I watched like Mahal and Drive and I was like this is the most pretentious bullshit I've ever seen and I hate this and over the pandemic like I was like I'm going to see Twin Peaks

and when I first started watching Twin Peaks I was like you know not really crazy about it but now like I'm kind of obsessed with it but the point being that there's artists like that you brought that up though because I will say this producer Dylan does want to murder me but David Lynch is a really good example

of an artist that without context like you said it was pretentious like I watched Blue Velvet that was the first thing I watched and I was like this is stupid and then I thought in my little brain with my seven brain cells I was like think about that era

and this coming out and you sing that anyways let's play this song I'm sure it's a banger everyone wants to hear it here is my eyes have seen you okay that was my eyes have seen you before I move on from this album I need to speak about

the album art. Yeah. It's insane. Or the original. I think it's great. It's great. I love it. Yeah.

It's like very like just surrealist, bizarre, like very French. It looks like a felony film. It's like there's like a mime and a, I don't know, clown. Yeah. Totally. Yeah. It's like very proto lynch like Felini. Yeah.

Completely. Like it's kind of crazy though to think that like they're that famous and largely off the back of Jim Morrison's face. which was prominently featured on the first record. And they were like, on this album, we were putting a fat man wearing a zebra skirt, a little person, a mime, and some jugglers. Yeah, we're going to have Marcel Marceau instead of Jim. You know, and like, right?

And like, and Jim obviously, again, like cool, like kind of cool. Like they were like all for one, one for all. I know that's corny. But again, like Jim Morrison could have been the stereotypical asshole. By the way, I'm like, I'm the guy. I wrote all the lyrics, I should say. I'm going to take 50. You know what I mean?

And they all split it equally. So it's like that's one thing that's respectable and admiral about the band. And two, clearly Jim Morrison's like retreating from this like not wanting to be like the kind of lame. He's like almost like an anti-Mick, right, to some degree where Mick's like, give me the attention. Give me the attention. I'm the lead singer. And Jim's like, uh, yeah. Like, I mean, even if you look at like L.A. woman, right?

Like he's like like shunt it off in like the lower left or the lower right corner. Like he's like almost like a woodcut dwarf. You know, and it, he's not trying. And if you're really going through all the doors albums, really, it's only the first one in Morrison Hotel where he's really kind of front and center. And you know that the label wanted them to be like. Yeah, like just put his face everywhere. Yeah, put the moneymaker there. You know, I don't, I don't not sure again, just upon my examination, if the thing of Jim Morrison was that he wanted to be famous or that he loved performing.

He loved being witnessed, you know, which I think our. two different things. Yeah, I definitely, I actually think he probably wanted to get famous and immediately did not want to be famous anymore. It's kind of my theory. The tale is oldest time as we. Yeah. Like, yeah. I think in, I think if he could have made money probably like making experimental films. I mean, he tried to make an experimental film, which is what the Johnny Depp

documentary they used. It was a experimental film highway. It probably wasn't as talented as a poet or as an experimental filmmaker as he was as the lead singer of like a really great rock band. Wait, that part of that documentary was actually him. That was all him. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. People walked out. We were trying to figure out. I was like, is this a lifetime reenactment? Or is this? Because it looked so, so much like him that I was like, this is uncanny if they found a person that looks as much like him. People walked out of Sundance, the director told me, because they're like, oh, he's so corny. You hired an actor to play Jim Morrison. But no, that was. Put a disclaimer. I think people would have been really into it if they understood what it was. I think they did at subsequent film, like film festivals, but they did not, like the actual documentary does not have no live actors, but I think they did at film festivals for that reason. Yeah, it's, it's unbelievable because that was, you know, at his heart, he was this like,

you know, wanted to be this avant-garde symbolist poet slash filmmaker. And because it was the 60s, right, you have the French New Wave, you have Italian, you know, cinema kind of just like taking over. In America, there is an experimental filmmaking tradition is really kind of kicking off. And they wanted to be a part of that and you see it in a cover like strange days you see it in in them putting like a horse latitudes thing again like yeah we look at it as pretentious but who else was doing stuff like that i mean the dead kind of to some degree we're doing weird things like but but they weren't doing it as theater and the velvet under under this was theater yeah and no one you could argue is a little bit but no one listen to them but like you know what i mean there's no pressure when you have a patron like andy warhol who's like make your weird experimental art and like and you play maxis kansas city every week and that's like the time here. The doors are like, we're at the Hollywood Bowl, you know, and that's, you know, we're playing Madison Square Garden or whatever. It's very different. We're playing festivals all over the world. There's a different set of expectations. I mean, it's like now it's like, yeah, like you can do whatever you want if no one cares. But the moment people start tearing, then like the machine kicks in and like people are going to be like we need, you know, and the doors, their story is one of really resisting the kind of machine as best as they can. And again, like in this kind of capitalist destroyed like landscape we inhabit, you kind of have to admire that. Whatever you want because no one cares is the band's plan motto for this show, which is what we do because no one cares. I have a question, which I think will lead into the thing I want to talk about next.

Why do you think Jim Morrison once having achieved the fame hated it so much? Like what do you think it was specifically about it that, you know, was not desirable for him? I mean, I think it's the same thing that honestly anybody would. like this the I mean I'm sure it's probably now harder in the digital age I mean can you imagine Jim Morrison's DMs like Blowing up babe. Yeah really really really funny. It'd be like a really funny parody like Jim Morrison's DMs and it's just like he's only quoting like like a Paulinear. Jim Morrison would have been one of those people that doesn't have Instagram for sure because he didn't even have a phone.

He didn't have like a home phone. Yeah. And why do I think I think because he was a real artist and I think like I think like I think he probably understood that fame is like the death of the artist, I think to some degree. I mean, I think some people have artfully navigated it. But even if you really look at it, I mean, look at somebody like Bowie, who write is the textbook example of someone who handled fame really well. Kind of, he kind of like started doing every jerk imaginable and moved to Berlin and like kind of became 94 pounds and with like a spectral ghost wandering through like, you know, the the terrain of Berlin. Like, you know what I mean?

like no one really handles fame that well at all. It's almost impossible. I mean, if you, and you look at his peers too, right, Hendricks dies, Hendricks dies.

John Lennon gets real weird. And then like also like does a lot of like kind of fucked up suss things that like have been overlooked. Maybe maybe. He seems he's just even killed throughout the years. Yeah. Like you get, yeah.

I mean the Rolling Stones like get addicted to heroin and move to the south of France to dodge their taxes. Like you know what I mean? Like everyone is doing weird things. Like, No one is like, I don't know, I'm going to buy a house in like, like, Rockford, Illinois and then like raise a family, you know. Yeah, I mean, Jim, I mean, he obviously ends up going to Paris at the end. But I think, I think just that when you want to be, I mean, at heart right, Jim was a writer.

That's his identity. Whether you think he's a good writer or not is a different argument, his identity is as a writer, right? He thinks he's a poet. And especially as a writer, that is not a rock star's personality. That is a very different personality. Like the writer... It's introverted and needs a lot of alone time. I mean, one of my favorite quotes from him was I drink to talk to assholes.

And, you know, whether you think he was an asshole or not, like, there were a lot of assholes on Jim Morrison at all times. I mean, famously, Ray Manz-Earic said, you know, this group of friends. I mean, it's the classic celebrity trip, right? The entourage comes in. Yeah, the hangar honors, totally. Yeah. Yeah. Every woman, like, you know, there's the famous, you know, that was the famous thing, the Patricia Caneeley versus Pamela. Canilla.

Yeah, yeah. in the Doors movie, which again is played, the problem with the Doors movies, it's all played for a kind of like campy laughs, even though they think, I mean, Conno McLaughlin is like, you know,

it's like, swinging Twin Peaks, you know, it's Kevin Dillon. That, yeah, I mean, maybe the most inspired casting as they cast Crispin Glover as Andy Warhol,

and that scene is so unnerving. That was actually great. It's a great scene. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, yeah, okay, I drink to talk to assholes. I think he,

you know, I think you could say he was shy. There's a lot of stuff about the early doors shows where he wouldn't even look at the crowd because he just couldn't do it. Obviously, he grew out of that. And I'm sure drinking helped. I would say also like this thing that we keep talking about, this punkness is like, you know, you grew up with an authoritarian father. The idea of like I will not do anything anyone tells me. And like the more you're in enabled to not do what people tell you because of fame.

It's like it just you'll just do it more and more. Right. It's like he could have some of it was just for no reason. It was just like in his mind. He was like I'm not doing like it was so anti-authoritarian. Yeah. It's like very like Bartleby the Scrivener. Yeah.

Totally. What is Bartlelele of Scrovna? I would prefer not to. I would prefer not to. Yeah. I would prefer not to. That's like the amazing. He's like I'm not saying no.

He's like I just would prefer to do. burn on to. So things start to get a little more wild. There's also a craze happening with Jim Morrison leading up to this, like in these first two album spans and like, you know, he shows up. Sometimes he doesn't. He plays pranks. There's a thing about him like coming into the studio and putting the fire extinguisher

all over the instruments. Who knows why. It's mostly fun in games, pissing on people's beds, whatever. Then in New Haven on December 9th, 1967. he gets maced by a cop backstage at a show before they are supposed to go on for like being with a woman because that was like illegal or something. You know, again, really a different time. And so they go on really late because he has to like unmace his eyeballs. And the crowd is like insane.

And he essentially like riles them up even further. he's making fun of the cops. This is played to hilarious effect in the Oliver Stone film. But he he gets arrested after for inciting a riot, for indecency for public obscenity. And the band is now kind of over it, right? Like this is around the point where the band's like, you're annoying. Yeah, I mean, and also I should add, like, a real like fuck the police before the fuck the police. You know, it's a whoa.

Another reason why rapper is like, like, you're annoying. like Jim Morrison was because of the attitude, you know? Big ACAP. Like a, like, yeah, totally. And, yeah, I mean, they kind of, I mean, the thing about Manzarek was like Manzarek would have held on for, like, Manzarek loved him. Like, that was like his, he like had a hero worship of him. And Robbie is just like kind of just the go with the flow, kind of chill Jewish future grandpa to be. And but Denzmore is like, he's also really serious artist.

And he's an intense guy. He's really passionate. And he really cares about the music. and I think he sees Jim just throwing it all away. And I'd like to think, you know, I have spoken to John Dunesmore several times. And I have a lot of respect and admiration for me. He's a really talented, smart guy. And he doesn't like to see, you know, his time being wasted.

He's like, he wants to be a great rock and roll band. He wants to make great art. And he's watching it slip away from them as like they're descending. They're becoming kind of these creatures of the pop mainstream that they never wanted to be. They wanted to kind of change culture. And then they're, you know, now they're becoming like, almost what they hated you know with you know but

it I mean that comes later right there's like the first three albums are really good and then we get to the soft parade which we'll get to I'm sure in the course of yeah yeah I think you're right like I think you know Ray Manzara kind of worshipped Jim because he probably did the things that Ray wouldn't do but maybe

secretly wanted to Robbie Krieger was on his own trip but John Densmore was I don't want to say a square because he wasn't but He was like more square than the rest of them. And he definitely was more like proto-goop like guy who was like meditation is the better thing over which he's totally right. This is the other thing. Robbie Krieger and John Denzmore like super early adopters of transit meditation like we were talking about which is like an enduring.

64, 65. Yeah. Like I did it like, you know, 10, eight years ago. And it's like crazy. It still goes on. But they got really into meditating. And so they didn't really party as much anymore. they were like kind of like this is like you know the thing and if they partied if you if you believe the

film and documentary it was like jim morrison kind of like forcing tabs of acid in their mouths or like making them do whoppers or whatever but they were chilled out and and ray manzarek was like seven years older than everybody and he was like basically married so totally yeah from the from the get from the get from the get go like they were fighting over the fact that they had to pay some of like the two hundred dollar a month for like their like huge venice apartment like the manseric mansion yeah so this is like, okay, so things are going a little crazy at the time. Just to like make it clear, they're massive. They're massive, massive, like you said, they're playing the Hollywood Bowl.

They're playing huge, huge, huge shows. They're probably the biggest band in America. There's like a little bit of time before waiting for the sun, which is the next album. I think in the meantime, John and Robbie go to Ravi Shankar's Canara School of Indian Music in LA and they study some Indian music, which is cool, probably shows up on the next album, which I think it was July 3rd, 1968 for this. I mean, so again, like, right? For waiting for the sun. You're waiting for the sun. So that's, I mean, they're really just like pumping them out. Like, that's three albums in 18 months. That's, I mean, I guess the bands did that

at the time. And the Rolling Stones did that the Beatles did that. If you were cashed out. I think you kind of had to, right? That was like the expectation. We did, we've been doing a U2 episode and I think that was also you two did four albums, four years. It's just how you That's how you were expected to. And then they had to tour. This Waiting for the Sun was their first number one record, right? Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, I think like I'm looking through the track list now of Waiting for the Sun and like, you know, it didn't get the kind of acclaim of the first two, but it's still a really good album. I mean, like, Hello I Love You is a kind of a cheesy pop song, but it's a great cheesy pop song, you know. Love Street, I think is an amazing. classic song. I think of, you know, very Laurel Canyon, you know, the famously, you know, I think like that place, Pache, the Italian restaurant is there. But that was like the love street where the,

that was the little liquor store that they have. Which is still there. Yeah. The Lowell Canyon, country marty thing. Yeah. And that was like, that was like, you know, where the creatures meet, you know, so they were like really in the mix and like, you know, the classic height of right above the sunset strip. Um, not to touch the earth again, a very proto-environmental anthem, one of the first ones, you know, like, silence brings out, you know, not many, and I mean, now again, a band writing environmental anthem, you're like, okay, cool play.

But, you know, this was, this is 1968, you know, it's pretty. And again, like, summer's almost gone, wintertime love, I think are really great, like, there's like, there is that, you know, you think them as the poet, there is this, like, seasonal element of them, you know, you think of fire and these seasons. I mean, they're very traditional metaphorical conceits, but, like, they do.

you know, I think one of the songs I mentioned that which worth playing was I think summer's almost gone and I you know there's a sadness to it and I think that's something that kind of they Jim Morrison and Kerouac have a lot in common both true problematic faves but there's a real sadness at the core of them that I think it's often overlooked and I think summer's almost gone is really a song about probably the death of his youth if I had to guess you know even though you know they're he was like 23 or 24 at the time 25 max yeah

I love Summer's Almost Gone and I do want to play it because I think for somebody who has only heard the like again CVS core songs of this band. Like this is a pretty unexpected song because it's really it's really subtle in a way that I think a lot of their songs aren't and it's really beautiful. So yeah, let's play Summer's Almost Gone. That was Summer's Almost Gone by the doors. I think you made a really good point about like kind of the subtlety of it. It's one of my favorite songs that's not on the best of the doors, you know, one of the classic. And again, like they did have a lot of sides, like maybe that they with the stuff that, you know, CVA score, classic rock radio like beating into death.

But there are like other songs in their catalog that really show a band that was kind of maybe more sensitive and kind of not just like, just like trying to write these driving anthems. They were really, they weren't really. striving for like poppits i mean yeah they they they knew that they had to have a single on every album so that's what a hello i love you for but most of the album tracks i mean like the un you know we'll talk about you know if we're talking waiting for the sun i mean i think the unknown soldier again is a is a classic anti-war song from the period classic anti-dad song yeah yeah yeah totally a lot of dad dad issues in the doors yeah although i don't know is that i don't know this song is specifically about the vietnam war if it's just like a general against war as a

Yeah, yeah. Then that one in five to one, that one was also, again, like kind of a kind of a metaphorical song. No one really knew people thought it was about Vietnam. But like he was, Jim Worson, who his credit wasn't about to be like, well, this is not the Vietnam War. And he kind of kept like a certain mystery to it. And also there's there obviously are a lot of interviews of the doors, but there is the benefit of not being in a media saturated culture. You know, Jim Werson, again, not on Instagram, not having to do a bunch of interviews every, you know, he's not on. doing YouTube interviews. So we're really like... And he didn't do that many interviews, right? Isn't it kind of like... At the beginning he did. Not towards the end, I don't think. Right.

But in the beginning, wasn't he doing that kind of like punk thing where he was like tongue-in-cheek answering most questions where you're like... Yeah. Yeah. It was like the Bob Dylan thing. Where it's like you're kind of lying. Yeah. kinks publisher

was about to sue them over Hello I love you because they thought it sounded too much like all day and all of the night. Yeah. But then they didn't Yeah. I was going to say that's another argument to your point.

The kings have a lot of really good songs, but no one worships them the way they do it the doors because the kings don't have Jim Morrison. You know, they don't have the mythology in any way. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

They're great band. But this album, while very good, does not show the fact that the recording was harrowing. Jim Morrison is extremely wasted all the time. Often doesn't show up. When he does, it's hard to get him to do what he needs to do. Apparently, John Densmore develops a stress rash around this.

And then this is also when the door's first play shows outside of North America. On the back of this album, I think. they started to play in the UK with Jefferson Airplane. Yeah. This is also, and I'm sorry to say it, when Jim Morrison does start to get a bit fat. You know, I think critics historically think of Strange Days and the Dors' first album as the classics, right? The acknowledged, you know, first two out the gate, Stone Cold classics. Waiting for the Sun, I think a lot of people saw as a good disappointment.

You know, even though there are really great songs on it, I think it's a really good album. But people often think of this one and the soft parade as like their, their, okay, they're a fading band now. You know, other bands are coming out to take, you know, it's not the summer of love anymore. Culture is kind of shifting. The 60s are starting to get dark. You know, we're still a year away from Altamont. Yeah.

But the 60s really only lasted to 1967. We're right now. We're in 1968. You know, there is drugs. There are police crackdowns in the strip. It is not the same kind of euphoric, you know, like they're starting to realize, you know, the Vietnam War is escalating. Obviously, you see a song like Unknown Soldier in 5 to 1 kind of factoring in.

that, but they're not, they're kind of a band at this point, like, searching for an identity to some degree. You know, there are you the anti-war band? Are you, like, writing, Hello, I Love You type hits. You have these, like, kind of seasonal love songs in the middle that are, like, moody kind of, like, down tempo affairs. It's sort of all over the place. Whereas when you think of, like, strange days in the first album, those are really coherent pieces of music. Like, there's a consistent sound. They've also, uh, worth pointing out, they're kind of going away from their blues roots on waiting for the sun. You know, there's, There's not the bluesy song. And yeah, and I think they were really kind of, I think the writing process at this point was really belabored. And that was another reason why, you know, it was harder to get, you know, he's kind of starting to break free from this desire to be the rock star. You know, he already has the money. He's living, you know, up on in Laurel Canyon, you know, with Pamela at this time. And the fissures are already started in the show. Yeah.

Why don't, I want to hear five to one because I think it's, I don't know, because I'm not that familiar with the door's greatest, hits album but is that on there? Because this is a really good song. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Well, let's play it because it's not CVS core. I don't think you would hear it as CVS. This is 5 to 1. That was 5 to 1.

Things are getting out of hand. Jeff. Yeah. I mean, they're, he's drinking a lot. You know, the Alta Saniga motels is getting a lot of use. Yeah. He's in Germany. Yeah. He's in Germany. He eats an entire block of hash.

Cannot perform. Racings, all the parts. A real power move. Yeah. Apparently, like, they come back to America. They're playing some shows. They're on a tour. There's, like, arrests and injuries and riots at, like, three of their shows.

That's kind of a bad thing to be happening. But, again, you know, it's not... I think it's a good indication, like you're saying. Like the 60s are over and people are fucking squirly. Like it was a rough time. They're unraveling. And I think did Kent State happen yet? It's or it's about to.

That was I think in 71, I think, actually, Kent State. The year he died or the year before he died? He doesn't get 71. Yeah, 1970 was Ken State. So we're coming up on Kent State. Right, right, yeah. But, you know, leading up to Kent State was like a bunch of college, you know, protests. Like Reagan is going to shut down all.

the colleges in California because it's unsafe. Yeah. I mean, let's, I mean, when we think about it, 68, when they're dropping waiting for the sun, if it comes out July 3rd, 1968, it's right where it's the Chicago Democratic National Convention riots are about to happen, where police are just beating people senseless. So, you know, Democrat protesters in the streets of Chicago, just savagely beating them very famously. It's, you know, the Chicago 8 trial is, I think, about starting about that time or like they're getting arrested around that time. Yeah. The empire is definitely striking back at that point. And, you know, it's, and the doors are kind of like, you know, they're kind of unraveling. I think when you think of, I think one of the things we overlook about mental health and now we're, you know, more in an enlightened mental health period is it often happens collectively, right? I think in the last four years of Trump, like, everyone was going insane. It wasn't just like, everyone was mentally ill. Like if you weren't, then you weren't like, then you weren't paying attention. And, and I think like there is, you know, I think the last four years were probably, you know, there is this kind of thing where it's like, I mean, you can, you can imagine what it must have been like to have been that age and a young person in 65, 60, 67. And then you get to 68 and you're like, I don't know. This is like not looking good. You know what I mean, Nixon wins. And that's a real thing. Right.

And Nixon wins. And that's a big bummer. I mean, Nixon was the Trump of the late 60s. For sure. I mean, and Nixon, I mean, takes Barry Goldwater's playbook and really masters it. And like, the Republicans are still to some degree running off it. You know, Southern strategy comes in. You have George Wallace running in 1916. actually as a, I believe as a Democrat he's running, which, you know, because it is dark as well as said. Yeah, it is, it is dark and they made a very dark record. That has these gestures to the lightness, but it doesn't quite have that kind of cohesiveness. I mean, and they're also just, you know, they must be tired. I mean, three albums and 18 months, touring constantly. And relentless touring.

Also, again, I messed Jim Morrison is drinking probably 40 to 50 drinks a day. Yeah. In addition to doing acid and whatever. Now we're at March 1st, 1969. Do you remember what happened on March 1st, 1969? Is that the obscenity? Is that when he has the Miami? The show in Miami.

Yeah, the beginning of the end. Where he takes it out. Yeah. Well, again. Maybe. I'm probably not, actually. Probably not. We don't know. Probably not.

There's no knowing. For someone who was such a poet and a writer, this man did not keep a diary. So we have no real insight, honestly, into Jim Morrison, which is kind of crazy. which is kind of crazy. And the people that knew him best, his band who you could argue maybe didn't know him that well in the end because he was so closed off and Pamela Corson, who's dead. So they are late because Jim Morrison is late because he missed his flight because he was drinking. On top of that, Jim Morrison had recently in L.A. gone to see like several nights of performances by that group, The Living Theater.

who were known for being very aggressive and antagonistic and their performance are. They were like thongs and were like, you know, fuck you or whatever. Inspired Jim Morrison, I think, to then get on stage, everyone's yelling at him to play light my fire, and he just starts,

he just starts popping off. My man starts popping off. Hey, nobody going to love my ass. Come on. Yeah. I mean, it was a crazy time, too. I think also you have the, living theater. And there's a

worth pointing out, Michael McClure had a poem called The Beard, which first stage is actually in, I think, 65, 66. There's also the influence of that because, you know, he was arrested for obscenity. So it was like Gene Harlow in a Velvet Eternity with Billy the kid. It was like the plotline. I've seen it.

It's a weird play. And this is like one of Jim's like new best friends because Jim again, very inspired by the Beats. Carrowack at this point, you know, is about to die. He dies in 1969, actually. He dies the summer of the obscenity arrest. And he's kind of retreated from the 60s. You have Alan Ginsberg who's like often his own job.

I'm surprised there aren't any Alan Ginsberg and Jim Morrison photos that are floating around the way that they have the Alan Ginsberg and Dylan ones. But Michael McClure, you know, he, I like, I think I wrote about him. It's like he's almost like the proto, like hippie, mystical, spiritual guy. It ends up making albums with Manzarek. Later on, I interviewed Michael McClure in his house in Oakland before he passed several years ago. and I immediately walk in and he puts on his album with like

he puts on two albums and we're just like sitting there closing our eyes listening to him like write recite poetry over Raymond and Seric and then he's like now do you want to hear my Terry Riley album and I'm like yeah sure that sounds cool and yes I was like hell yeah I was like I don't know how I got home but

and so these are kind of the influences that are on Jim Morris and you have Artow you have the living theater you have Michael McClure again who has this obscenity charge, you know, in Los Angeles, I believe, you know, and I think like, like, so these are all these kind of things. You have Jack Daniels. Don't forget that that man had a really big influence on this whole situation. Totally.

Totally. I think people who genuinely are like, I love the doors. I want to see this. I'm so into what they're doing to like, that guy's crazy and I want to see what's going to happen, which made up now a new contingent of fans. And they're like the ones who like are just like, this is going to be crazy and I want to see. Yeah. And I'm saying, and to go back to a classic one of your analogies, let's think of Nirvana, right?

It's the same principle, right? All of a sudden, Kirk Cobain has to be like, you know, if you're a misogynist, you're homophobic, I don't want you of my shows because he's been adopted by the bros. And I think Jim Morrison at that point had been adopted by that kind of fratty audience where they're like, yeah, I like break on through it's a sick song or whatever, you know, whatever they were saying. Oh, we'll get into it. It's groovy. Those corny losers play a part in what happens after he gets arrested. So anyways, he gets arrested because he doesn't, it's kind of insane. And you do start to, if you're me, start to buy into some conspiracy theories around this time where you're like, okay, there was there's footage of this show, I think. And there's like 40 cops on stage, like while he's performing.

Because there had to be at their shows because they had the people would try to storm the stage, whatever. So no one arrests him there for like yelling obscenities. And allegedly he does say he's like, I'm going to show you my genitals. Do you want to see them? There's no photos. or footage of him actually showing his genitals. There's no proof. And then there's, like, one thing where he goes and kneels,

which apparently, according to John Dunsmore, he did all the time. He kneeled in front of Robbie Krieger's guitar in the classic, like, oh, this is amazing because he liked to see Robbie Krieger's, like, finger picking or whatever. Which we didn't mention. Robbie Currier does not play with a pick, which to me is insane. Yeah. He plays with long nails. Anyways, they end up after the fact,

arresting him for like exposure and for stimulating oral copulation, which is what they said he was doing with Robbie. Why not there? 40 cops. Well, it was like the NWA thing, right? Like where they didn't, you know, they like arrested them, I think, back at their hotel or something. It's very, I don't know.

Like we think about it now and you're like, I'm sure at the time they're like, oh, I can't. I mean, really if you think about like the way that the media portrayal of cops really up until last year, the first time there's a seismic shift, you know, we're talking. about David Lynch before. I was like, I wanted to make a joke where like, actually, if you look at Twin Peaks season one and two, it's kind of copaganda, right? Like all the good guys, you know, the wire

to some degree is a lot of copaganda. I mean, that has been like, I mean, I mean, think about what was a popular show at the time. The Mod Squad. You're like, what a terrible show. It's a bunch of people dressing up as hippies to make bust. Like, you're horrible people. Yeah. Starring Peggy Lipton, who would actually be Norma in Twin Peaks.

And that's wife. Gorgeous, gorgeous connection there. I think it was probably because it's not just that like this stuff happened or allegedly happened it's that like the whole fucking thing went off the rails right they barely played the stage started to collapse there was there was a riot

like the people rioted like he riled them up and they went crazy and they like tore down the thing and like the stage was collapsing and like there was damage and I think that's probably what made everyone pissed off it wasn't necessarily like but what they could get mad at was like this thing. And were they at the Miami Dolphins football stadium at the time? I'm not sure. No, they were in an airport hangar, I thought. Is that right? A notoriously intimate place to play a show. Yeah, which they had like, they're in something where they removed

all the seats also so they could fit 5,000 extra fans, which is like kind of crazy. Yeah, converted hanger. There's no AC. Like, imagine being in there. Like it's Miami. You're fucking sweating. This man is screaming at you or that you're a slave. You're a square. and you're upset. It all goes off. Someone threw orange paint on them. Someone hands Jim Morrison a lamb. A lamb.

Did you even get it? Literally, where did you even get it? How did you bring it into the place? That's pretty punk rock. They handed him on stage. When I watched the Oliver Stone, one, because I watched that before I watched the Johnny Depp, curse of Johnny Depp documentary.

Yeah. I thought that was like a flourish that Oliver Stone had added for effect, but there's actual footage of this person handing him the lamb. Like, it's real. Which, like, kind of makes sense because you're like, oh, this is like the ultimate Greek. Like this is like your ultimate Grecian sacrifice. So mythological.

So biblical, all of it. Yeah. Um, okay. All that to say is we're in dire straits here. Like we say this now like, who is it, DeBaby who recently is in hot water for saying the most idiotic lies on stage, whatever. Nothing is really going to happen to DeBaby except he's going to be soft canceled for like two months and then whatever.

But in this time, this, all their shows were canceled. No one would book them. They wouldn't play them on the radio anymore. Like, it was a huge deal. And then, sorry, I just have to mention these corny teens. Teens for decency. That was a real thing. It's corny fucking losers.

30,000 of them. They start protesting, getting on NBC or whatever and being like, we just, I don't know if I want my children. When I have them, I mean, I don't have children yet to see it. It's like, what kind of teen are you? Like Charlie Kirk bullshit. You know what I mean? Yeah, losers.

Yeah, I mean, Miami has that right? Because in the next decade, like, Anita Bryant is, like, out of there just doing the most virulently homophobic, like, despicable thing is that kind of like, there is this like undercurrent. I mean, because Miami, like, you know, at this time. It was the South. It wasn't what we think of as Miami now. Yeah. Yeah. It's not like Twain Wade and a bunch of like bikini models on yachts. It's, you know, it's like, it's a different world. Totally. Okay. So again, things are bad news. Yeah. And like also the legal, the legal ramifications. You know, that was a very, those were very. It was a felony.

One of them was a felony. Yeah. These were very serious allegations. It could have, I mean, it definitely. And, like, you know, a lot of the people do, you know, this shrouds him to the very end of his life, this arrest. Which was not that much longer after this case. Yeah, totally.

Yeah. And then people would have definitely forgotten eventually, but, you know. Yeah. Like, well, I mean, he got, maybe he got lucky and missed his like, like, you know, emotional rescue era, like, where he's in like a fluorescent, like, piano key tie or something. Well, he also missed having to. go to jail because he actually did get sentenced to like six months in prison.

But anyways, we never get there. They do, in between waiting for the trial, because obviously that stuff takes time, they go to make the soft parade. Which, I would say this is, yeah.

Everyone hates this album. This is the only Doors album, I would say, is like objectively a bad album. Like, I'm not going to do that. It's not good. Yeah, it's not good. There's a few moments that are okay, that are kind of cool,

but it's a bad album. It's a bad. And let's explain why. it's a bad album because I think it's there's a couple of reasons. I think one is that they're just there's bloat right like they spend too much money they take too much time what's his face Rothschild is now addicted to cocaine so he's insane he's like an insane he was already kind of a perfectionist but now he's like Steely Dan level insane and like making someone like Jim Morrison who's like I floated it on a cloud of LSD and whiskey and I don't know what

you're talking about do like 30 takes of something like nothing's good also he had like the horrible suggestion to be like you guys should have brass and strings arrangements on your thing and they just sound so corny it's really bad because it sounds just like everything else i think that was probably happening at the time yeah it's just bad it's not good it sounds like an influence on like the mighty mighty boss tones or something you know it's like a really bad it's like it's like never had to knock on what is a jam and i will not yeah it's a great song it's a great song um The thing is it's okay, whereas before where I was like, okay, the doors had only bad ideas, but they somehow pulled them up beautifully. This is only bad ideas that are executed terribly.

And like, Jim is drunk. Tell the people is horrible. I mean, they're all. I mean, like, I mean, the, the signs are so funny or it's just like on the software, it's like, you cannot petition the Lord for prayer. That song is kind of cool, though. There's some great moments in it. There are some great moments in the software. Let's hear shaman's blues.

Because that's actually, I think that's objectively a good song. I like that song. It's right. It's right. Let's hear it. It is, at the very least, a very Jim Morrison song. That's why I chose it. Yeah.

That's kind of what we're getting at. Let's hear shaman's blues. That was shaman's blues. Sorry, I like that song. Yeah. The thing is the influence of, like, there are, there's never a good time when a white guy thinks he's a shaman, right? Yes, correct. I'm sure there are good white shaman that exist, but like, it's like,

probably not your move. So no one likes this. No, just a flop of all flops. Like, just a pawn. Like, it's just like, the doors are dead. Like, it's also worth pointing out that the, this is the first album that they start to have individual writing credits because they're not getting along.

And I think Morrison, whatever you want to say about him, at least he was like, yeah, this like brass and string shit is fucking lame and I don't want to be associated with and I don't like these songs. And so, like, those are credited to Robbie Krieger and, like, Shaman's Blues and Soft Parade or Morrison. Like, they really were just like, don't fucking miss me with putting my name on that. Yeah. And he, like, wants to get, like, the celebration of the lizard, his epic poem, which finally

kind of appears in the soft parade parts of it. Like, he's so, like, it's been, like, the whole time he's been like, when are we going to do the celebration of the lizard? When are we going to do celebration of the lizard? And finally, he kind of gets to do some of celebration of the lizard. Dogs in heat Rabbit foaming And I know you guys are listening at home

And when I said this cost $80,000 to make You're like, so what, who cares? In 1969, $80,000 was like $650,000. That's a real, like, I think I saw that on Wikipedia as the comparison. That's an insane amount of money to make your worst album On top of it. You know?

I really do love picturing Paul Rothschild just fully addicted to cocaine screaming at them to like take their, do their, like, 28th take with the brass fucking orchestra or whatever. Yeah. So basically all the critics are like, well, the doors are done. Like, it was a nice run, you know, everyone has to, all good things come to an end. Like, that was kind of the vibe, you know? And it's like summer of Altamont and Woodstock, you know, it's like a, it seems like the moment is probably over. Like Manson happens that same year. It's like, it's getting weird. You know, it's like, the 60s are coming to an end and like Nixon's like fully. And like people forget,

Nixon's insanely popular. Like, it's not just the Nixon as the president. It wasn't Trump, right? But we think of Trump. Okay, yeah, most of the country did not like Donald Trump. Like, he never cracked a 45% approval rating. Like, he always had a low approval rating. He just had a diehard cult, you know, a death cult.

Right. But Nixon, like, isn't popular. Like, in 72, Nixon wins, like, every state. Also, we're forgetting and worth mentioning, 68th's the year of the riots, right? There's, like, a darkness. All the riots are sweeping through the Newark riots are crazy. You know, obviously, L.A.'s riots were in 65, so the first ones, but 60, it was the summer riots, right? So, yeah, the doors are really kind of in the middle of this.

You can really say that also, like, the doors are the, like, musical embodiment of... I was trying to look this up, and I think it's kind of impossible to look up, but, like, I want to just wonder if it's because of population growth or what it's because of, but, like, the violence... associated with America hadn't started on the level that until the 60s, right? And 60s, it's the assassinations, right? We're afraid about that, too, the assassination. Yeah, there's also, like, serial killers. There was no serial killers before. There was no Charles.

That's why that's why Manson was so shocking. Now, like, if there was a Manson, then obviously it would be shocking. But people would be like, yeah, that kind of checks out. You're like, I would believe that there's going to be a millennial cult of, you know, or and I think that's, like really important to, mention that the doors kind of gave a sound because their music was was the sound in some ways of violence you know because it was chaotic and violent you know and that's also what was happening in the country increasingly we were going from like leave it to be your 50s where like you would not

wouldn't even lock your door to like shit's going like crazy and that's Paul again to your point about Nixon I think people were scared and like they're seeing riots they're seeing protests and like they are and again like Like we we take for granted that like this was a time where like if you had long hair, people wouldn't like serve you at a restaurant or like there's a crazy story of Robbie Krieger and John Densmore getting arrested on their way back from like a transatlental meditation retreat somewhere around this time like maybe a year later because they had long hair. They're thrown in jail for vagrancy.

They're driving a Porsche. Yeah. I mean also yeah, we think of 69 right. We're talking about, you know, Woodstock ultimate until the easy writer comes out, which again is like changes kind of American cinema. And what's the plotline of Easy Writer? It's they get murdered for being hippies in the South, for having long hair on motorcycles. Oh, we represent to them, man, is somebody who needs haircut.

Oh, no. What you represent to them is sprayed them. Yeah. And that was a real. That's not like an overstatement. It was like there was, again, and I think we've danced around saying this until now, but like there was a counterculture. Whereas we don't have counterculture anymore. I would argue.

think so I wanted to ask you. Like, do you think that there is a counterculture in 2021? And if there is, is it like, all right? Like, what is the counterculture now? I mean, I think there, the problem is, you know, as I feel like I've like in my time as like a writer, I've seen like a few little pockets. I felt like like the low in theory for a few years, felt like a genuine kind of countercultural thing. The low end theory for those of you listening used to be a club in Lincoln Heights in Los Angeles where there was like hip hop shows. Yeah. And it was like, it was like a fusion of electronic, you know, what was the early version of Domestep, jazz, yeah, hip-hop, instrumental beats. Yeah, it felt very like, you know, you were going to a club that, you know, Lincoln Park or Lincoln Heights, excuse me, at the time was like, you know, generally a pretty working class Latino neighborhood. And now it, like, obviously kind of started to become gentrified. But it was, there was nothing around it. It felt very much countercultural. There were no, I mean, this is pre-instagram. Most people didn't have smartphones at the time to record.

court it. And I think one of the main problems is technology once it's hard to have a counterculture when everything becomes commodified, right? Like there's what what is like underground anymore other than it's just not as popular? What is, even these I Will Resist the mainstream poses have been so thoroughly bludgeoned by decades of people doing these countercultural poses that it becomes a pose in and of itself. You know, I had a conversation with Nicholas Jarre recently. We were just talking about how everything the moment you put it on social media makes you feel like a hypocrite. And you can be really sincere and passionate about what you're doing and try to be like, you know, like fighting for a good cause, but it still does, it can't help but feel like slightly performative the moment that

something gets on social media. It's also just that like even boomers, you know, their post counterculture like in a way, right? And then Gen X for sure they're not, they're not squares. Yeah. So like there's no. nothing to what is there to revolt against you know like yeah right yeah you think there's an urban outfitters in every city like it's okay to that what's forbidden you know yeah i mean i thought yeah i think when you really think of the last decade in terms of like mainstream well who would be the equivalent of what our kirkobain was like it probably would have been like tyler and probably like someone like billy ish right like are probably the closest things i've seen in the mainstream

but that's what i'm saying like because a lot but like she is i but i but i but i'm my point what I'm getting to is like not really right because they both to some degree got immediately co-opted by the mainstream and I think they both make you know I haven't listened to new billy Ilish album so I don't really have an opinion but I would say her last album um was sort of you know very much opposed to kind of what the mainstream pop trends were you know didn't it wasn't it wasn't produced by jack it wasn't produced by jack a honted off yeah I mean I think I would like just take it a step further and just be like there's no culture to counter I don't I don't even think it's, it's not even that people are like too weak willed to do it or whatever, but like the concept of selling out is like not applicable anymore. Like none of that shit really matters anymore. Yeah. I'm not saying it should or shouldn't. It just doesn't. Like name you a counterculture icon that didn't just like sell out and like, you know, even like Bob Dylan was doing Victoria's Secret commercials by the end, which is kind of punk, but still like he was still doing the course. In lingerie?

No, he was like, the models were in Monterey and he was just like, like, you know, like doing his like Captain Beefheart, New kind of thing where it's like, Okay, Jeff, I know we could talk forever about the parade that is soft, but I think we should move on to Morrison Hotel, a gorgeous name. And I'm sure the whole band was super excited to name the entire. I know it's a real place, but still. Why don't we before we even start talking, just play a song off of Morrison Hotel? How about Roadhouse Blues?

Okay, here is Roadhouse Blues off Morrison Hotel. That was Roadhouse Blues off Morrison Hotel. We're back to the blues, baby. Well, it was like their, this was their return album, right? Because the soft parade tank so bad, Morrison was dogged by, you know, the indecent exposure charge. The 60s were basically ending that they had ended. at that point. And I think like this is almost like a retreat to kind of their roots, which was what bands do, I think, when they've gone way too far in the other direction. And I think when

you're like having 18 minute lizard epics, they're like, all right, let's just rein this back in a little bit and do roadhouse blues and stuff like that. And roadhouse blues, I mean, I don't know if this is urban legend or if it's actually true, but I was always told that it was like named after Patrick's Roadhouse in Santa Monica. Oh my God. If you know, you know, baby, you've driven past covered in shamrocks. Never been there, though. I need to go. Have you ever been there? No, I've never. They used to have, like, I think, Dead and Doris cover bands playing there. If I recall correctly. I think we need to go. This feels like it's like if we haven't done this level of research to go there, like, who are we to even call ourselves experts? Roadhouse Blues is a great song. I can see why, well, you tell me, this album, how was it received by the Dors fans?

Well, the last two waiting for the sun and the soft braid had basically been panned. You know, they come out really strongly with the first two albums, obviously the self-titled in Strange Days. And then they kind of just became almost like what people considered the character themselves. You know, this like, Bill – Jim is like starting to gain weight, and he's becoming this bloated excessive Dionysian figure. And like even in the 60s, you can't get away. There's only so much you could get away with.

Also, the times are changing, you know, it's – we're post-assination now. The mood is darker. Altamont has happened in addition to Woodstock. The doors were at neither. And they're, you know, so they're missing a lot of these, like, you know, major counterculture figure. And they're kind of receding a little bit in the shadows. There's still a huge rock band, but they're not necessarily the biggest act in the world. And times have changed.

And then so with Morrison Hotel, this is them kind of going, like, again, going back to the roots. And kind of there isn't like, it's not a massive, massive success the way that the other, that the first two were. You know, there's not really an iconic hit single, the way you can think of a break on through, the way you can think of a rise in the storm and L.A. Woman. It doesn't have that. It, you know, it doesn't even have Love Me Two Times, which was a huge, huge smash. I think, I'd say this is the album for like the doors, the more of the door is purest, right? Because if you look through the track list, you know, right here, it's, none of the songs are really, you know, you have waiting for the sun that's on the iconic greatest hits album or Best of Doors album with, you know, Jim with the, you know, Alexander the great. You have Roadhouse Blues, obviously it's a hit. Peace Frog is probably the biggest song other than Roadhouse Blues in the album. It's a cool song, but it's not necessarily what you think of when you think of the doors. It doesn't have one of like the ten most like iconic doors songs that people think of when they think of the doors. Like they don't exist here.

I think also like it's probably worth mentioning that like maybe and I'm just, speculating part of the reason this album didn't land besides the lack of hit single is like the doors were like kind of being banned a lot of places right like this was like conservative like radio markets in america were starting to ban them because they had done too much shenanigans um and also maybe people were like a little tired of their shenanigans you know that happens like you said like they weren't part of these like two kind of big things um woodstock and altamont um because there's like kind of evidence that that's like kind of evidence that that like sound wise, it would have fit in with things that were happening on the charts. Like, like by the next year, I think Credence Clearwater Revival is like topping the billboard charts a little bit. Not saying that this sounds exactly like that, but it like fits in, right? Yeah, I mean, there's definitely that whole like blues rock, you know, there's like right. There's that first wave of blues rock, you know, the British invasion, all those bands. And then the doors are sort of like the animals obviously kind of slightly precede the.

doors and the doors kind of pick up the mantle, you know, around the same time as the Rolling Stones. And then you have that, yeah, you have your second wave of a Zeppelin and, you know, Mike Bloomfield like playing guitar and all this things. But it doesn't, I don't know, the songwriting to me is, is not as sharp maybe as, because I mean, like, they're long past exhausting their, you know, Jim Morrison's like acid songbook or whatever. Sure. They're well past that. And Jim is drinking, you know, like he's distracted. I think like what's a really. I think like what's a I don't want to say funny, but like maybe a telling tidbit is like on this album, the former like bandleader of love and spoonful, John Sebastian plays on it. But he was too embarrassed, apparently, to go by his real name because he didn't want to be associated with the doors. So he goes by a fake name, G. Puglese. I feel like that kind of says a lot about the sort of like perception of the doors in 19. 1970 when this album is released.

Yeah. It's kind of more of like a raw, aggressive sound. I think that mirrors the times. And this is kind of just more, I don't want to say it's passe, but like the way he sings on this album is still, you know, he sounds even, it really kind of foreshadows where they're going to go with LA Woman because it is a really, you know, bluesy album. And also like, you know, the themes are kind of, if you look at them really, they're kind of repetitive, right? Like you have the ship of pools. Okay, you have the Crystal Ship a four. You have Landho.

You're really, really stretching with the nautical realism here. You know, like you have a queen of the highway and a roadhouse blues. You have an Indian summer. There's always like a song about. You know what I mean? And then like Maggie McGill, which is just like, which is just like Jim being like, I'm Irish. He tried to put that, I think, on another album too. And they would shut him down.

But I guess, again, lack of songs here, they were like, you can have that one. And there's always like the song about a book. So you can always tell when a band is not as close to. Because, like, you can tell that they're kind of, like, there's a lot of dissent. I'm sure, like, John Denton's war was, like, ripping out his hair at this point. Yeah, I think this is, like, in the movie where, like, they can barely get Jim to, like, show up to do his stuff. And, you know, he's literally so wasted all the time that, like, he can, he can't really sing. You know what, despite all that, press liked it.

Yeah. The editor of Cream called it the most horrifying rock. rock and roll I've ever heard. He meant that in a good way. When they're good, they're simply unbeatable. I know this is the best record I've listened to so far. That's like super high praise. And even Robert Criscow loved it. He doesn't love a lot of things. I think the last line of his review is talking about Morrison. He's not the genius he makes himself out to be. So maybe his genius is that he doesn't let his pretensions cancel out his talent. B plus. Yeah. I mean, I think this album, again, like, you know, not to use the word like strip down, but it's like there is less of like

be Aquarian excess, right? There's less of, like, Jim being like, I'm a poet, I swear. You know, it's like, it's more of a realist record. Obviously, the alcoholism is starting to take its toll. And I mean, yeah, and I think you're right. Like this is, I mean, they, they don't tour LA woman, you know, because he dies shortly thereafter and just goes to Paris. You know, he, so they, this is kind of it for them as like a touring rock band. And obviously, you know, the shadow of the arrest is, you know, hang over them in the jail time. But yeah, I mean, the shows, I mean, I think this is around the period when it was, I don't know, I think it was the famous. this New Orleans show, which was, I think, their last show where just John Densmore is just like,

basically like, fucking I'm out and can't handle, you know, the sort of just chaos, right? Like, because it has like, I mean, they didn't even, I don't even know if they knew that if they were going to make another album after this. Yeah. I love that. I know, I know it's wrong. And I know, I don't condone this behavior. But I just love the visual of Jim Morrison in the middle of the show, like you said,

in New Orleans being like, I don't want to finish this and just sitting down. He just sits down and he's like, I'm done. Who can relate? King of quitting. It's like in Bottle Rocket, you know, where like the beginning of the movie, where Luke Wilson's like, I don't think I want to play a water sport ever again, you know? Yeah. And then the rest of the band was like, you know what?

I think we should retire. Well, actually, that's not really, I think, what the conversation was based on the 400 different source materials that I have visited, films and books. It was that the band decided it was time for Jim Morrison to retire from performing live. But isn't it true that they were sort of like entertaining the idea of finding another singer? Yeah. I mean, also like it's like one of those things where it's like Dick Cheney naming himself the vice president. After heading up the search committee, you know that like Ray was ultimately going to be like,

I choose myself. I mean, because they do to after Jim dies, they do. I mean, people don't talk about this, but they did two Dora's albums. which are pretty bad. Like, it just doesn't. We know. We don't recognize those. Yeah.

They're not canon. But the music is kind of good sometimes, but just it just doesn't work because, I mean. The magic is not there. No. And the thing about Jim is like, I think, you know, one of the things I think I gravitate to in any kind of musical or artistic endeavor is sort of unpredictability. Obviously, it's a double-edged sword because, you know, you can be so unpredictable that you, you know, choose not to, to. sing in middle of a New Orleans show and just get busted for a decent exposure, which is, you know, pretty unpredictable.

But there was like a volatility and energy that I think like really pays off with the band. And I think that's like one of the interesting things about the doors is if you really look at like bands, everyone has to play their role. Right. Like it really is like a, like a, I think of like a basketball team, right, because there's only five people on the court baseball. There's a million people. But it really is this kind of this interplay where it's like gym obviously is like.

like the star player who wants to just like take 40 shots a game. But like also is kind of moody and like might walk off. And like, you know, like, he says, Ray is just, he's very talented. He's probably your number two guy. And he'll do whatever it takes to make it work. But he is totally alienating. John is like kind of like, you know, like an aggressive. Salt of the earth.

Salt of the earth. Yeah. Like he's he doesn't take, you know, he doesn't like, he wants them to be the team. And then you have kind of the, you have Robbie who's just like the glue guy who just. no matter what like rob is just like I'll just write my occasional hit like and just kind of just be like a chill guy like living with my bobcat in the mountains no ambition

just vibes he told me the originator he told me a few years ago he's like my dream is just to write a number one instrumental hit I'm like I don't think this is going to happen but I admire you yeah um why don't we move on to L.A. woman since I think L.A. woman is a in many ways their most important album

and at the very least more important than Morrison Hotel so let's kick it off by playing a song off L.A. Woman because I want to play three songs off this album. So you choose. I mean, should we just

I mean, let's just get into it. Let's just go with the title track, L.A. Woman. Okay, this is L.A. woman. that was LA woman There's some rumors that this song is about Eve Babbitts

I don't think it is but I'm gonna say that I believe that it is I mean if I were Eve Babits I would say it was about me more likely it's about some amalgam of LA women much like Danny California

is an amalgam of LA women Black bandana sweet Louisiana Robbing on a bank in the state of Indiana Yeah, I mean, yeah, totally. I think Eve Babitz, it's not about Eve Babitz, but I would argue that Eve Babits is the LA woman. So, like, symbolically, you know. Sure, sure, totally.

Right, like, Jim, at this point, is having, you know, his tangled love affairs. You know, he is with Pamela Corson. Yes. And then he marries Patricia Connolly in a Wiccan ceremony. Yeah, Mary is, like, heavy air quotes. Like, first of all, he's like, fucked out of his mind and it's also like not illegal

binding ceremony. So another fun thing about this song. Lots of fun things about this. This is a fun song. We can say that. This is a fun song. Mr. Mojo Ryzen was just Jim Morrison rearranging. First of all, getting into the concept of Mojo,

really big back in the early 70s. And then rearranging the letters of his own name to discover that Mr. Mojo Risen was a is it an anagram of his name? It's an anagram. Yeah. I love this song. It's a jam. It's a smash.

It's a fucking banger. No one can deny it. I feel like this and maybe nothing but a G thing are probably like the two great LA songs that I can think of when I think of like the iconic LA songs. This song also, John Reschie, was named after John Reschie's very famous city of night. And I think it really speaks to kind of Jim's like literary streak. I mean, I understand that. like people are like, oh, you read a book. It doesn't mean you're smart. But I don't know, not that many

great, you know, it's like everyone what, Mick Jagger, you know, referenced like a very famous Russian novel and sympathy for the devil. And everyone's like, oh, Mick Jagger read a book. But like Jim Morrison's talking about the seminal gay liberation novel and kind of just speaks to the repression of what gay people faced in the 50s and 60s and, you know, no one really gives some credit. And Ray Manz-Eark said when I talked to him, you know, he was talking about this being this just like great LA noir song, this, you know, name-checking John Rushie City of Night, one of the great LA novels. And but it's also like this, just like a freeway banger, you know, it's like 3 a.m. You're driving along PCH and it just sounds perfect. Yeah. You're right.

It does sound perfect. And also like, I think we've talked about it a little bit, but like, just so everyone knows where we stand or where I stand, I think Jim Morrison doesn't get credit for how literary and smart he was, even though I think that's probably, what his most insufferable fans, you know, hold on to. But, you know, he was, he was a, he was a poet. He was a writer. Yeah, I mean, he gets like, well, he's like one of those figures, like, I think, like a carouac or a Bukowski.

His poems are so good. Yeah, his poems are good. Yeah. Okay. L.A. Woman is a banger, like you said, like a, like hit the road fucking banger. And a lot of, a lot of this album is that vibe. But I think there's also, like, some really overlawn. looked like beautiful sort of slower songs.

And I want to hear one right now. I want to hear Hyacinth House because that's one of my favorite door songs of all time. And it does not get the credit, right, that it deserves. Definitely. Okay. Let's hear Hyacinth House. That was Hyacinth House. Do you know I love this song, Jeff, besides the fact that it's very enjoyable to listen to?

I think it's one of Jim Morrison's most. like deeply personal songs. And it's like so eerie how it like the reference to the myth of Hyacinth ended up playing out in like what ends up happening to him. I mean, and what's currently happening to him, right? Like Hyacinth was a Greek person in a myth who was like this beautiful young lover of the god Apollo and the whole thing of him was like the beauty, right? But he loses it. and he dies. And then he, like the highest in the flower is, like, created by Apollo. I think he ends up resurrecting him.

Anyways, I think a lot of this is, like, Jim Morrison, like, lamenting. I mean, we mentioned it. Like, you know, he's kind of lost his youth in beauty at this point, even though he's only, what, 26, 25 here? I don't know if he turned 27 after the recording of the album, but he's 26 or 27. Yeah. Which is insane because he looks like 65. He looks like he has a service. I was ungenerous. But yes, he's not, he's not the hot young man he was before. And then there's like, you know, there's these like lines about like a brand new friend who doesn't bother me. It's like, you know, that could mean you, that's open to interpretation. But it's like, is it doing music? Is it alcohol? Like he's really like kind of bearing his soul. Like I'm unhappy. I've lost my youth and my beauty. Like the best part of my life is over. It's a really sad song.

Yeah, it's super relatable. This is just no new friends. But he just is like, I mean, it's just profound alienation, right? Like, it's just all these hangers on around him, you know? And that's one of the things Manz Eric would always talk about is like Jim had been consumed by these hangers on that all they wanted to do was like get him drunk, you know, and just like hang out with him. And I think that's something that a lot of celebrities face. You know, they expect him to kind of be the life of the party. And, you know, everyone who speaks to him speaks about him is like, you know,

he was a, like when he was sober, you know, he was a super introspective guy always carrying a notebook. And he was, he was really a writer. And but, you know, he'd get at this point, he's getting drunk and he'd just become like a madman, you know, and he, and he, he had a room. You know, at this point, he's, so they record the album at the, the Doris Workshop, which is the practice studio on Santa Monica Boulevard in Los Angeles. And, you know, he's always wandering into the strip club next door, you know, just shambling, you know, his, his wife. or Pamela his girlfriend has her boutique there it's kind of become like this vortex for him he has an extra room at the Alta Sienega Motel which is now like basically Jim Morrison Shrine and she's super fucked up too at this point Pamela yeah yeah I mean yeah I mean I think and like he's already kind of planning his escape you know um like to Paris you the song he's like I've been uptown I've been downtown I've been all around you know and he's he's just really looking I think for some kind of ballast which is just not you're not going to find out of You're not going to find it in L.A. if you're like in 1970, 71, if you're Jim Morrison. Yeah. I think we didn't mention the reason that they're recording at, what do you call it, the Doors Chateau?

The Doors Workshop. Because they had started to record at Sunset Sound. And the producer, Koki Rothschild, he quit during the sessions because he thought, I guess they had played. him riders on the storm and he was like this sounds like cocktail music I believe his... Cocktailed direct quote was... Yeah, look, I think it sucks.

I don't think the world wants to hear it. It's the first time I've been bored in a recording studio in my life. I want to go to sleep. That one song about the killer on the road sounds like cocktail jazz to me. I'm going to tell us how he really feel a bit. So he leaves and then they replace him

with Bruce Botnick who was the engineer for Let It Bleed and Pet Sounds. and he and forever changes. I love. And forever changes. Yeah. I mean, I think it really benefited the removal of Rothschild, kind of more freedom for them to just kind of like vibe again.

Yeah. LA woman is sort of unimpeachable. You know, it is one of the great LA blues album, which is not, you know, LA's always had a blues scene, but it's not necessarily a city that's famous for the blues. And you see it really all over with Jim with his southern roots, you know. You know, Texas Radio on the Big Beat, I think is a perfect example. of, you know, Manzarek was like, well, I guarantee you he was listening to Wolfman Jack, like, broadcasting, you know, and you just hear echoes of like these, you know, great blues

singers that you'd hear that I'm sure Morrison must have heard like floating around being a kid down there. And, um, like, this is the stuff you can't fake, right? Like, you can, you can argue that, oh, well, you know, he was this like bloated, like character of asset excess or whatever. But by this time, I mean, he's, he's like that he is who he is. You know, he is. You know, he is. He might as well be like the hobo on he went from being like you know the Greek god on the beach to being like the guy camping in the tent on Venice Beach. You know, he's he's just like he's come full circle by the time he's 26 or 27 and you hear it, I think in his voice. You know, there's just, you know, I would say like there's just like it sounds like there's like razor blades in his voice. It's unthinkable. You know, we talked about it earlier, but it's like it's unthinkable that someone could sound like that. That's at your young age. Totally. I mean, but he lived like 10 lives, you know. Totally. Yeah. And they also, yeah, so they go to the Dors Workshop, which is now, like, you know, in the heart of, you know, super gentrified West Hollywood. And I think that gives them a certain level of comfort and familiarity. And they're going every day to the Sandy Kofax, Tropicana Motel, like eating omelets and, you know, like just they're in their kind of comfort zone. And I think, again, that speaks to the blues. You know, the blues is not like a fancy thing. It's like as no frills as they come. And I think that really benefits them to record in kind of their home studio there at their home base. Yeah, and I think also, like, to pick you back up something you said about Morrison Hotel, where they're like, you're like, you can really hear that they're not getting along.

That's the opposite here. Like, they're really are getting along and they're really like co-creating. And like you can, there's the evidence of that is that they go back to splitting credits completely equally like they had in the beginning, which they weren't doing the last couple of albums. Yeah. It's, and I love that they bring in Jerry Schaff, who was Elvis's bassist to play. So sick. Because Jim. He gets his dream.

Jim was really stoked, yeah, because he's a big Elvis guy. And you can actually hear that. Graham Parsons, who also brought in Elvis's backing band because he was a big Elvis fan. Yeah, I mean, if you think about it, I mean, I think like probably the two most, other than like maybe like a Howlin Wolf, you know, you can hear Elvis and you can hear Sinatra a lot in Jim Morrison's vocal tone. Totally. This album, well, we do. need to play the song before we talk about how it was received because I think it has a lot to do

with both like how big it got and how it was received. We must hear the Riders on the Storm. Yeah. Let's do it. This is Riders on the Storm. That was Riders on the Storm. And that beat little number. Sorry, that's a good song. I don't care. I know. I know everyone's heard it 300,000 times and it's inescapable, but it's a fucking good song. Well, I mean, that's the thing, right? And I, you know, I've been writing over the last few years about stuff that I, you know, listening when I was a kid and kind of going back. And like, obviously, like, your brain is sort of is hardened to these songs. But if you actually kind of just, like, can, like, remove kind of the, like, the calcification of, like, 60 years of rock radio or whatever and kind of listen with clean ears. I mean, that, like, little guitar riff that he's playing, you know, like, it is amazing, you know.

this was like rooted out i think was based in ghost writers in the sky like the old kind of cowboy song great great use in the basketball diaries movie as well one of my favorites so good they like they actually took the wrong pills and like they took the downers to play in the basketball game and marky mark who's like a five five power for it is just like collapsing on the court and uh also jim morrison again in the same category as i mean maybe maybe i'm basic for it but i with jim carroll you know great underrated Irish poet, you know, and... Totally.

You know, it's like one of those things where it's like people try to denigrate artists like Adores or, you know, Jim Carroll's basketball diaries are going back to, you know, Kerouac for on the road because someone at 14 years old could like it. But isn't that kind of the greatest thing in the world that it can be accessible to a 14 year old, but it's not dumb? All these references are going to fly over. I mean, they flew over all my head at 13 years old when I discovered it. But it's cool to kind of go back and be like, oh, that's where they got it from. that's where they got it from, you know. And I think if you strip things from the myth, it still holds up.

You know, I think, and I think the myth probably hurts the doors among kind of the critical cognizanty or whatever, you know, it works among the casual fan. Obviously, it's made them an iconic band 50 years later, but, you know, conversely, like they don't, you know, maybe they got that respect from the first Rolling Stone crowd. But then, you know, when punk came in, you know, when the Gen X's came. And they were like, oh, this is just kind of lame, corny bullshit. Yeah, I mean, listen, there's no denying that the doors suffer from hot topic syndrome. But that doesn't mean they're not good. And it doesn't mean that music that is in stories that are the most accessible to teenagers are bad. I think that's like a real prejudice, you know, against teens.

And it's like, although who can say. I mean, I wish teachers. I mean, I wish music now for teenagers. has had all these like kind of more complicated references that I mean because I think like I always think about art as like the best art is stuff that can work on at least two levels right where like you can speak to people that are like more informed and it can just like you can just be like like the doors I think work because like you can have like your average bro be like I don't know the woman slaps but at the same time like you know if you want to dig into like arto or like

howling wolf or Coltrane or you know John Resci the list goes on, then you can do that. I mean, I first heard City of Night, which is, again, one of my favorite books ever from LA Woman. And I don't know if I would have noticed it. I wouldn't know if I would have ever discovered it otherwise. And, you know, there are these things that people, you know, we were talking about McCausky earlier, but they selectively overlooked the good to focus on the most overwrought example. But it's sort of an intellectual dishonesty, I think, on some level. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Um, this album is

a banger. It does not ever they never have another album hit number one that just doesn't happen again but it still does really well melody maker you know says that it's the best album they've ever done which I think you would agree with Robert Criscao gives it I think the highest grade he's given

any of them an a minus cars has by my window man's error was like this is noir you know and like you know like i get like woman yeah stay of the locust that voice is sort it's just undeniable like it's so rich and and not just that voice right the pain behind the voice that's what the blues is about right and like on both counts i think Morrison qualifies you know totally and yeah i mean he he lived his raps right like he dies right afterwards it's not he's not like oh he didn't go to like an expensive malibou rehab and then like at a christian Janity. You know, there is no next chapter for Jim Morrison, which is probably best for the fans, but obviously not best for Jim Morrison.

Not for Jim Morrison. Yeah, I mean, I like to think about Jim in the 80s. Like, that would have been a really ugly era because, you know, like just like dressed like, I always think of that. I don't think it's emotional rescue, but I was the good, it's the dirty war cover. I think of the Rolling Stones album where it's like Jim Morrison like in fluorescence. Or he just like joins the flock of seagulls or something. So what he does do is move to. to Paris with Pam. I think while L.A. woman, before it even comes out, right? It's still being mixed. And he lives there for a while. Cool move. Great move. James Morrison had died in Paris last Saturday, Paris, France. Efforts to confirm the report in Paris were not immediately successful.

The official cause of death for him was a heart attack, but they didn't do an autopsy, so there's probably no way to know what actually killed him. So I wanted to talk a little bit about the influence of the doors, right? The like kind of enduring and maybe like unexpected or maybe not thought about influences. In 1981, Rolling Stone put Jim Morrison on the cover. I mean, this man's been dead now for whatever, 10 years. They put him on the cover. The cover line is he's hot, he's sexy, and he's dead.

It's very classy. And the article is like essentially like kind of being like, why are the doors all of a sudden so popular again? Because they have this like insane resurgence 10 years later and it's teens, right? And I found it so interesting. Like basically the group is bigger than they ever were when he was alive. The vice president of PR for Electra says like we've sold more doors records this year than in any year since they were first released. That's great. Yeah. I mean, and what's crazy also. is, you know, by like 74 or 75, I think, I forget which I think it was either Robbie or John, but like, I think John was talking to me about it. And it's like at some point, like they're divorce. There was like a divorce settlement for one of the members. And they were like offering doors royalties to her. But like they weren't worth anything. I mean, they're like, whatever. What are these doors royalties? Because they put out to, I don't want to say they're embarrassing. But they, they, they, they, they, they, They obviously aren't up to the caliber. Their posthum is obviously aren't the calendar. Yeah. I mean, it's kind of sad, right?

Punk hasn't come in. You know, Pink Floyd is the biggest band in the world. And it's also like the arena rock, like kind of, you know, post-T-Rex era. Right. This article is written by Rosemary Brezlin. And she has this quote where she says, the extraordinary distance between his life, his stardom and their own youth, talking about the teenage fans, likely fuels the worship.

Maybe if these kids saw Morrison today, they wouldn't be. So certain all his activities were godlike, but in death, he remains their ageless hero, the biggest of them all. And this is, again, you can extend this exact same thing to Kurt Cobain. There's, like, many people, I think, that fit within this paradigm. For sure. Imagine if Eminem dies in 2001. Like, think about it. You know what I mean?

Like, that's probably. No, totally. He would have been, you don't have recovery. You don't have them getting sober. You don't have these weird, awkward appearances on Monday night football that you can't get out of your brain. I mean, you know, Eminem, you know, his music for the last 15 years has not been very good, according to most critics and myself. Are you advocating for early death of artists? I mean, I think I said this earlier, but it's, it really is that famous quote of like the Gore of Hidal about your makeup out.

What it grows, death was a great career move. Yeah. There probably isn't enduring relevance to Jim Morrison because, you know, there's no, there's no fat Elvis photo, right? There's just Jim Morris. I mean, the closest thing you have is maybe the cover of LA woman. But even then, you just have like Jim as this like Alexander the great kind of iconic, iconographic Jesus like figure. Yeah.

And I think even past like the aesthetics, but that is I think a really important point. You know, being a teenager is suffering. Like it just is. Like there is no getting through teenagehood without like profound suffering. And it might be like kind of like, I think the further we get away from it, the more we like forget how hard it was. and we can kind of brush it away or minimize it and be like, oh, whatever, you know, like, that's silly. But it's not silly. It's incredibly hard to be a teenager.

You know, it's, it's harrowing. It's for every, it's like, it's such a hard time to try to be a person. And I think they really connect with people whose whole life was sort of predicated on it's hard to be a person, you know, which Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain. Teenage in just paid off well. you know, like it. Well, and this is, it's, it's a connection. I want to take this moment to make my case that without the doors, I don't think we would have American punk rock in the same way that we have it now. I think they butterfly affected American punk rock in a really meaningful way.

Yeah, I mean, I think if you, if you consider Jim Morrison Biggie Pop's biggest influence, which I think is probably hard to argue with. I mean, if not his biggest. He said it. He said he was inspired to start the Stooges after seeing The Doors Live. Yeah. 1967. Yeah. And the presence is pretty similar. Totally. And then there's all sorts of other. I mean, like, you know, people really probably forget this. Ray Manzor, like, iconic. I think he was like their mentor. The iconic Los Angeles punk band, they even do a cover of Soul Kitchen on that album.

That's kind of fucking bangs. close now. And, you know, there's other people, the weirdos covered Break on Through. Besides what we've talked about, where I will die on the hill that Jim Morrison was spiritually punk, like, very clearly so. They also just had this trickle-down effect. There's also all sorts of other singers that cite Jim Morrison as, like, one of their biggest, if not their biggest inspiration. Eddie Vedder is one of them. Scott Weiland was one of them.

Marilyn Manson, Lane Staley. But a lot of like bands that aren't corny really were inspired by them. I mean, I think Joy Division being the number one. Like how do you square like this like ultimate hipster darling or whatever? I don't know. Whatever the hipster was.

You know, Hipster 2005 era. Like where it's like we all remember when like Interpol was everyone's favorite band. And they were like, I mean, a direct line to Joy Division. Joy Division inspired almost every band of like every, cool band of the 2000s in some way.

The doors are just they are such a quintessential L.A. band, and I think often people's dislike of these like, you know, sudden-stunned stereotypes sort of kind of just like gets in the way of actually appreciating. But I think if people actually listen to the whole catalog and kind of remove their expectations of what they think the doors are, I think there's really a lot to love even in the staining. Thank you for coming to Jeff Weiss's TED Talk about the doors.

Well, Jeff, we're not done yet. It's time to hear from other people that do agree with you about the doors, me and you. We found some Doors mega fans. Let's hear from these riders on the storm, shall we? Okay, the Doors. So where do we start? I discovered them by way of apocalypse now when I was at school. and after diving into my dad's record collection,

I became well and truly hooked. My ultimate thoughts on the doors is I think they're cool, and I don't care if that's lame. I don't know why I was made to feel like it's lame to like the doors, especially in my early 20s. If I had a friend come over,

I was like, oh, I can't put the doors on. They're going to think I'm like, not cool. But, like, what's up with that? When Morrison crooned about the rooftops of Venice or being called by the blue bus, I could see those rooftops and had ridden that bus. And, you know, the doors knew that salty air

in the strangest parts of my section of Los Angeles. People forget or maybe just kind of listen to it for their music to know. They have some super sick slow jams. The doors actually, like, get deep into this, like, level of, like, kind of psychedelic, tortured soul, neurosis. And there's, like, level. of glamour and like, you know, all these other elements of rock.

There's a wannabe intellectual teenager obsessed with American calendar culture. It pretty much slotted perfectly into my life. I began to realize that the doors captured hellings, grotesque, yet alluring carnival, better than any band I'd heard. Like, yeah, Jim Morrison is, like, kind of, you know, a little bit of a buffoon, and maybe his poetry wasn't the best. the tortured soul, but like, aren't we all, right? The doors seemed determined to find spiritual or existential meaning

beyond the self-destructive madness awaiting on the Sunset Strip or the Venice Boardwalk. I'm pretty sure Ian Curtis had a bit of a Jim Morrison thing, which totally tracks with the voice and the sort of theatrical darkness of the doors was definitely a for a four-runner for a bunch of a post-punk band. Jim Morrison was pretty influential, to the career of Iggy Pop, so much so that Iggy has talked about it in various interviews

throughout his career. A lot of juvenile and shallow people between the ages of 20 and 30 weren't searching permitting beyond the bars, and a lot of them hated the doors. Maybe there's a connection. If you ever want to suss out, if you're like potential fuck boy, potential dude you're dating, or like potential best friend, whatever, is the one. Surprise, sign them up at karaoke for the end. Just see what happens.

Advice for creative people I've heard on many occasions is to allow yourself to be delusional. I think maybe being a Dawes fan is probably one of the most delusional things you can do. Well, well, well, what do we have here? Just a bunch of echoing of our brilliant sentiments. They get us. They feel us. I love the British guy because I feel like that's like totally like representative of like the Mojo magazine contingent of we love the doors. We love American music.

Yeah. I mean like they, I think like British people generally love L.A. and what is more like of a the myth of L.A. than like the doors. You know, it's. I mean, even like starting like meat on the beach, you know, and like such a trite thing. Like I mean, if you if you told that story now, like I mean, imagine if a new band was like, we all men on Venice Beach. What? Okay. Well, this is the end, my beautiful friend, Jeff. We must wrap this up. Thank you so much for coming on Bansplaine to talk about beloved doors. I learned a lot today. Thanks, I appreciate it. We're going to end on the end. That was a low hanging fruit and I did not grab it. The Blue Bus is calling us. Come back every Thursday for a new episode. of Bansplain. Father? Yes, son? Here's the end. If you liked what you heard today, subscribe for more episodes of Bansplaine, only on Spotify.

Our excellent guest today was Jeff Weiss. Follow him on Twitter at Passion Weiss and check out The Land Magazine at The Land Magazine. Huge, huge thanks to the Doors mega fans you heard on this episode. Isabella Garcia, Chris Shaw, Jonathan Heath, and Max Bell.

Bansplain is a Spotify original show. This episode was produced by My Writer on the Storm, producer Dylan, aka Dylan Tupper Rupert, and edited by Michael Hardman, with help from Casey Simonson and Tari Miller. Executive producers for Bansplane are Gina Delvac and me, Yossi Salix. Our gorgeous and catchy theme song was composed and performed by Bethany Cossentino and Jennifer Clayton and graciously recorded by Carlos Delagarsa in Los Angeles, California.

Special thanks to Philippa Giermino, Robert Adler, Leah Edwards, David McDonough, Dana Meyerson, Jessica Hopper, and the TV show One Tree Hill. Come back every Thursday for a new episode of Bands Playing, only on Spotify. I am sweating. It is 95 degrees.