JIM MORRISON - American Poet(1943-1971)
Louis Bardel reports...
(12/9/08) LA showed him love, gave him an education, and imparted vision.
In return Morrison gave us a musical legacy that remains strong to this day. His image on walls and t-shirts attests to that fact. His abounding voice still resonates on radio speakers across the city.
That's why music-lovers gathered at Barney's Beanery, in West Hollywood, on December 8, 2008, Morrison's 65th birthday. They wanted to celebrate the god of rock and cock who would now be an official senior citizen.
Morrison liked to frequent Barney's and chase away the hair of the dog after nights partying on the Sunset Strip.
In attendance were The Doors pianist Ray Manzarek and master guitarist Robby Kreiger. Drummer John Densmore, who over the past several years has been in deep disagreement with Manzarek over the use of Doors' songs in advertisements, did not show up.
I took a few pics of the night and will try to offer a little background to the pics.
Barney's Beanery is around the corner from the Alta Cienega hotel where Morrison lived for two years in the late sixties. Morrison was a naughty night bird, more interested in poetry than paying the bills, and lived an essentially nomadic life until he died of a heroin overdose in Paris.
The legendary Ray Manzarek, bass organist for The Doors and some argue mastermind behind the band, sports a friendly smile. When asked later in the evening what the greatest influence on the band was, he said without hesitation "peyote".
As for him being the mastermind behind the band, remember Oliver Stone's take on it in the 1991 movie "The Doors". It is Manzarek's idea to start a rock band after hearing Jim sing a few lyrics at Venice Beach. Those lyrics, biographers claim, were composed when Jim had just graduated from UCLA, was homeless and living on a rooftop in Venice. Tripping out on massive quantities of what was then legal acid, Morrison described a fantastic opera going off in his head at which he was merely taking notes. Imagine the beautiful California sunsets he witnessed as he sat stoned on that rooftop.
Located on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, the Whiskey a Go Go was where The Doors played night after night in '65 and '66 perfecting long standards such as "The End" and "When the Music's Over".
Crowds begin to gather outside Barney's Beanery early in the evening. The road stretching out in the background is Santa Monica Boulevard.
A red hot rod parked outside of the Beanery.
Before the night was over I went to the Cat Club on the Sunset Strip and listened to a German Doors cover band. The front man didn't look like Jim but he had a really good style.
This picture was taken early in 2008. It is an ad for one of the many retrospective Doors albums. The ad could be spotted all over town. Here, Jim resembles Emperor Caesar with his arm stretched out saluting the public. His hair was purposely fashioned to look like the hairstyle of Alexander the Great. Morrison was a student of philosophy and history and loved to toy with popular images.
Posthumously released, Wilderness is a collection of poetry and notes that Morrison compiled in his many notebooks. He did not authorize it. It was released by his parents and the parents of his common-law wife Pam Courson. The only collection of poems released in Morrison's lifetime was The Lords and the New Creatures and it is a superior volume.
