1
The Doors revival is now forty years old.
The early eighties saw the introduction of U2, Soft Cell and Human League, and then MTV. There was a schism between what came before and what came thereafter, the late seventies were seen as calcified, with corporate rock and disco, finally the scene was reinvigorated. And the Doors came back?
Let's be clear, Led Zeppelin didn't come back. They hadn't been forgotten, but there was not a renaissance. The sixties still existed in the brains of those who lived through them, but the music was fading away, except on oldies stations, as for the early eighties...this was before the creation of classic rock radio, never mind the appellation. Why the Doors? Could it have been "Apocalypse Now"?
You had to go to the movies in the seventies, but not to see superheroes, yes, it was the beginning of the blockbuster, with "Jaws" and "Star Wars," but those were phenomena, not de rigueur. You can exist quite easily without ever going to a movie theatre today, even be considered hip and cool, to the degree anybody is in today's multifarious society, but if you wanted to be in the know, participate in conversation, evidence your bona fides, in the seventies you went to the movie theatre.
Francis Ford Coppola sat atop the pyramid, because he'd made the "Godfathers." I believe "Godfather II" is the best movie ever made, all I can say is if you proffer a twenty first century flick as a contender I'm going to stop listening to you. Best TV show? That's positively modern, but best movie? It's somewhat ancient.
So Coppola was both an auteur and popular, he could sell tickets, his work impacted the culture, and for years we heard he was making the definitive Vietnam movie, and I don't believe "Apocalypse Now" ultimately lives up to that billing, but there were moments that have entered the culture, that are definitive, like the surfing and water skiing and Robert Duvall's comment about napalm, but ultimately the journey up the river did not reach a satisfying conclusion, despite ending up with the grand poobah himself, Marlon Brando.
But the beginning, oh the beginning...
Movies used to be platformed, as in they opened in New York and L.A. and after weeks they went elsewhere, in steps, there was no thousands of theatres on opening day, you see culture truly started on the coasts, that is untrue today, everybody's got cable TV and the internet, there is no flyover country, except maybe politically. And sometimes works in progress were released, films the director was still tinkering with, that might have played film festivals but were not completely locked, it was usually a one week run, and "Apocalypse Now" played for a week at the Cinerama Dome on Hollywood Boulevard.
Needless to say, tickets were precious. We ended up going to a noon screening. And publicity told us there were no titles, but we were not prepared for the opening, the helicopters swooshing and...
The Doors' "The End."
I have a vinyl copy of the soundtrack album. But this version is not on streaming services. It's slightly remixed, a little more in your face and...you can see it all on YouTube: bit.ly/38lyI0d
So, the theatre goes dark, the curtains open, and helicopters start flying around the Dome, as a result of multichannel sound, you felt like you were in Vietnam yourself, the mood immediately changed, this was serious, you left your regular life behind.
"Can you picture what will be
So limitless and free"
That certainly isn't 2020, that certainly isn't the modern era, that was the sixties, when life was easier, assuming you were not a minority, and it was all about possibilities, experiences, fulfillment, discovering who you should be and then pursuing your dream.
And I certainly owned "The End," I knew it, but now I had to go back to the apartment to play the track again, and again. It had new meaning. And at this age I truly understood the Oedipal angle.
But "The End" was not what they were playing when I went to the Forum. Maybe it was Genesis. The between act songs were by THE DOORS?
2
The Doors broke through, were put-down, were laughed at, and then executed an unexpected comeback with their last Morrison LP, "L.A. Woman." Producer Paul Rothchild had exited, it was now 1971, the Doors were on a downswing. Yet, they surprised everybody and dominated the airwaves with the title track, "Love Her Madly" and the modern day standard, "Riders on the Storm." Yes, the seven plus minute album closing cut comes on the radio whenever it rains, wherever it rains, you expect it, at least I do, and although I've heard it too many times, I can still luxuriate in Ray Manzarek's Rhodes, the haunting feel of the track, akin to Steve Winwood's "Night Train" ten years later. The album wouldn't die, it played regularly for a year, even "The WASP (Texas Radio and the Big Beat)". Jim had died in the summer as a has-been and now people were lionizing him, they wanted more.
The second album, "Strange Days," was respected by the critics, maybe because it had no hit singles, and the first LP had broken through organically. Sure, you might have heard "People Are Strange" and "Love Me Two Times" on the radio, but they got a fraction of the airplay of what had come before. However...they were part of the renaissance, the swinging songs, the dramatic songs were, not the dreamy ones.
"Waiting for the Sun" delivered a monster hit single in advance of its release, "Hello, I Love You," just when AM started to play FM's music. But the critics started to sour on the act as a result.
When it came to "The Soft Parade," the critics puked, the Doors went from heroes to zeros. They were seen as bombastic, slick, above ground instead of underground, and the title track was seen as bogus, especially compared to the extended cuts that closed the first two LPs. I love "Runnin' Blue," which no one ever talks about, and the following "Wishful Sinful" and "The Soft Parade" too...hell, one of the opening lines became a standard utterance in college, albeit with a different conclusion:
"YOU CANNOT PETITION THE LORD WITH ________!"
As for "Morrison Hotel," it was written off, too basic, not innovative enough, history has been rewritten, now it's seen as a modern classic, a genius return to the band's roots, and "Roadhouse Blues" is bedrock in the aforementioned classic rock canon, "Peace Frog" too, although I'm not sure when Jim is referring to "blood in the streets in the town of New Haven" the hoi polloi know what he is talking about.
But really it's all about the debut, the eponymous "The Doors." And not "Light My Fire" as much as "Break on Through," this was the essence of the Doors revival, a breath of fresh, energetic air in an era where everything else was obvious as opposed to dark. "Break on Through" was made before video, when it was solely about the music itself, it was a tear, you wanted to be, needed to be, in the club when the band was performing it, even though Jim was now dead ten years when "Break on Through" started to permeate the culture. Yes, the first Doors album came out in 1967, the same year FM underground radio was born, long before the ubiquity of the FM Superstars format in the seventies that was heard in every hamlet and burg, and by this time it was Yes, Jethro Tull, Alice Cooper, et al, playing to arenas, mass audiences, whereas when "Break on Through" was released as a single it got so much traction it made it all the way to number...126. You had to own the album to truly know it.
Not that "Light My Fire" was not part of the renaissance too, but now it in its extended version, listening to the Doors was no longer casual, the unexpurgated version was dominant. And these truly L.A. songs, the ones straight to the heart and brain, were the ones younger generations were exposed to, that they cottoned to, they were not self-conscious, it wasn't about outfits, publicity, it was just the music, and in this case that was more than enough.
And eventually "Rolling Stone" did a story about the comeback of the defunct band, and there was a movie too, but the turning point, what probably cemented the band in the public consciousness, was the Cadillac commercial...THEY REFUSED TO DO IT! For a payday of $15 million. Who would turn that money down? John Densmore. He said Jim wouldn't approve. It was against the ethos of the band.
And that's why the Doors survive when so many of their contemporaries do not, credibility, putting the music first. In a world where conventional wisdom is you sell out, you take the money, it makes no difference, it takes a special few to go against the grain, but they truly know the score, leave the money on the table, show your cojones and your career lasts LONGER! Ask Neil Young, but decades hence I believe the Doors will be bigger. A band that was ultimately reviled by the critics survived all of them, just like Led Zeppelin, which took less money to do the aforementioned Cadillac commercial, but now Zeppelin's music is bigger than the band itself, boosted primarily by the internet, that's what accessibility delivers, do you think kids would have discovered Zeppelin in droves if the music weren't freely available online?
3
There's not a clunker on the Doors' debut. And some minor cuts are major in the culture, like "Twentieth Century Fox" and the band's cover of the blues classic "Back Door Man." And it's these loud and direct cuts that dominate today, but my favorites are the quiet ones, like "The End" and "The Crystal Ship."
"Before you slip into unconsciousness
I'd like to have another kiss"
By this time I had been kissed. Not that I was completely comfortable with it. It had happened at summer camp, when that was what you were supposed to do if you had a girlfriend, as well as dance with them at the socials and sit next to them on bus trips. Not that I was not dreaming about kissing thereafter. We evolved from the AM transistor era to album rock on FM. Album rock was completely different, most people did not know it, it wasn't mainstream, and your relationship was directly with the LP, assuming you bought it, to a great degree radio was a sampling service, if you heard it and liked it you took a risk and went deeper.
Not that I purchased the Doors' debut when it came out. That happened a year later, in March of '68, I heard it at Sally's house below the base lodge at Stratton, we went there for lunch and laughed and then ultimately played bumper pool as the record player spun the Doors' debut. Sure, it was a magical moment, one emblazoned upon my brain, but the music matched it and enhanced it, I bought the album as soon as I got back home, and my favorite cut was always "The Crystal Ship."
"Another flashing chance at bliss
Another kiss, another kiss"
That's where we're always dreaming of slipping back to, that is elusive, that moment, akin to orgasm, that is exquisite and fulfilling but brief. And bliss is positively post-coital, when you're spent and all you can do is let your body take over as your mind slowly drifts.
"The days are bright and filled with pain
Enclose me in your gentle rain"
Being a teenager was completely different in the sixties, you weren't connected with everybody, you did not have all these outlets of self-expression, there were only three TV networks...no, you spent most of your time unfulfilled, dreaming of something better, freedom. Being a teenager was painful, let's just say high school was painful. And sure, today parents talk about bullying, but back in the sixties if it occurred you had to suck it up and endure it, no parents ever went to the principal about it, and, if they had, you might not have lived another week, truly. We were all looking for a safe place, with someone else, maybe on our beds but hopefully somewhere else, free of the restrictions of society.
"The crystal ship is being filled
A thousand girls, a thousand thrills"
There might have been a thousand girls in Southern California, but not in New England, where everybody was following the rules, chafing at them for sure, but we were not transcending our society, we were not boarding a modern day ark with our brethren in the era of free love, before AIDS.
The thing about the Doors' music is it's simple. The tracks are not burdened with junk, the instruments are defined and shine, with Jim atop it all, steering the enterprise, the crystal ship.
Jim could be bombastic, but here he was being sensitive, inviting, you felt included, at least in your brain. Jim was multidimensional, as was the music. This was the power of music, yes, you could create a whole movie in your mind but even more the experience was emotional, you could drop the needle on "The Crystal Ship" and transcend your bedroom, everyday life, to a place where you were accepted and had hope.
Listening to "The Crystal Ship" was like being bathed in warm oil, delivered to your body by the object of your desire.
"Oh tell me where your freedom lies"
Right here, in the grooves of this vinyl, now digital, now streaming out of the speakers in 2020, but mostly in my mind. "The Crystal Ship" is burned into my brain, I can call it up at any time, recite the lyrics, relive the experience of listening to the track, which is mine as opposed to everybody else's. That was the power of the album track, especially when the label did not hop from single to single, four or five from one LP, trying to entrance casual consumers to buy, albums were for the hard core, either you knew them or you did not, either you were in the club or you were not, and if you were you shared this bond, you were related, and it had nothing to do with blood.
Before the average Joe was exposed to the "Billboard" chart, the music drifted down from heaven to infect a chosen few, and we didn't find so many were on the same page until Woodstock, that was the story of the festival, how many people showed up, drawn by this music that was mostly far from the hit parade. The seventies were a roundup and ultimately a victory lap, but it was not all set in stone in the sixties, we were still figuring it out, both the art and the distribution, experimentation was embraced, records surprised you.
Not everybody made it back from that era. But I did, I'm dropping a line in case you never made it onto the crystal ship, we're still taking passengers, feel free to get on board.
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