by Ray Manzarek
“Well, it’s too late,” said Robby.
Jim wheeled on him. “Oh, yeah? We’ll see about that. I’m gonna smash a fucking Buick to dust on the stage.” He was perspiring more profusely now. “It’s gonna be part of my new act. ‘Smash a Buick to Smithereens.’ We’ll see how they like that. And then I’m gonna get Abe to sue their asses. For big fucking bucks, Ray. For a lot more than their shitty little contract. Then let’s see if they still want to use a Doors’ song to sell a sports car.”
He was pacing and sweating and clearly out of control. He stormed out of the rehearsal room and rushed up to the offices, barged into Siddons’s room and told Bill to get our new, young hotshot lawyer—Abe Sommers—on the phone. When he did, Jim got on the line and hollered at Abe to do whatever he could to stop the contract.
“Threaten them with a lawsuit,” he shouted into the phone. “Tell them I’m gonna smash a Buick with a sledgehammer onstage! Tell them anything! But stop the fucking contract!”
And in three days, Buick backed out. They simply decided they didn’t want to go with a rock and roll ad campaign after all. Nothing against the Doors or their music, you understand. They simply shifted demographic focus. It was done, finished. And Jim grinned from ear to ear. He had exercised his will against the corporate establishment and he was a contented man. He made them back down. Hell, he made them back all the way out. It felt good. And he wanted more.
And that was called…Miami.
miami
The Buick incident was behind us. Jim’s tantrum had passed and he was back to his usual creative, witty, intellectual self. The Doors were a unit again. We were hard and heavy into the recording of The Soft Parade and playing gigs around the country. We were being creative and productive. Jim was also working on the editing of our film footage with his faux Doors substitute trio. Everything seemed to be going smoothly. And then the Living Theatre came to town.
Julian Beck and Judith Malina led a very avant-garde troupe that engaged in “confrontational” theater. A form of in-your-face, antagonistic, urgent, and angry performance art. They wanted to shake their audience awake. Awake to the suppression of the system. Awake to the evils of the military-industrial complex. They wanted freedom. Liberation. And their new play was called Paradise Now.
Jim was hooked immediately. The Living Theatre was in town for six performances. He bought tickets for all of them. He went to every show. And he saw young New York theater people who looked like him, confronting the audience just as he did onstage. But they went further. They went even further than Jim. They took their clothes off. They were stark naked in most cities. However, the police in L.A. let them know ahead of time that they would be busted if anyone went nude. So the young players stripped down to jockstraps and bras and panties as they ranted their pleas for freedom. For Paradise Now they shouted, “I am not allowed to travel without a passport, I am not allowed to bathe in the sun, on the beach, as God created me…naked before the world,” they implored. “I must pay taxes to support an unholy war against people who only want to unite their country. I don’t believe in the war in Vietnam!” They were in everyone’s faces, including Jim’s. “We demand freedom! We want the Garden of Eden! We want paradise…now!”
Jim was mesmerized. He even joined the troupe onstage for the last performance. Ranting and raving himself. Leaping about the stage and shouting out his cries for freedom and power. “We want the world, and we want it now!” He was exhilarated. He loved this confrontational theater. And then the idea struck him. He was going to do the same thing! He was going to confront his audiences with these cries for freedom. He was going to confront the Doors fans! And he was going to do it at our next gig. And that was…Miami.
It was a hot, southern, Tennessee Williams night in Dade County—the County of the Dead—Florida. Fifteen thousand people had been shoehorned into a decommissioned naval (appropriate) seaplane hangar that safely held ten thousand. The audience was moody and restless. The air was humid and slightly fetid. It smelled of the swamp. Of rot. There was an agitation in the mob. An expectation. They eagerly, almost hungrily, awaited the “Kings of Acid Rock.” “The Kings of Orgasmic Rock.” They were keenly aware that the “Lizard King” himself was going to take the stage that night. Their own Florida native son was returning to his mother state after undergoing a metamorphosis in the crazed hippie land far off to the West. They didn’t know what to expect. And Robby, John, and I had no idea of what Jim was planning. He never said a word about a “confrontation” with the Miami audience. And he certainly never said a word about taking his clothes off.
And that’s exactly what he tried to do onstage. He was overly fortified with alcohol. He had used the spirits to screw up his courage, but he had gone too far and was all semi-sloppy-drunk. But, Lord, was he ranting! He was at once berating the audience for their cudlike acceptance of both authority and the status quo, and at the same time imploring them to love one another…and him.
“Love, love, love,” he shouted. But he also shouted, “You’re all a bunch of idiots! How long are you going to let them rub your face in the shit of the earth?” He was livid and apoplectic. “Maybe you like it. Maybe you love getting your face stuck in the shit. Maybe you love getting pushed around.” And the band played like maniacs. Making unearthly noises. Making the sounds of tormented slaves. Of souls in hell.
“You’re all a bunch of slaves!” he continued, inspired by our sonic anguish. “Letting everybody push you around. What are you gonna do about it? What are you gonna do about it?” He said it over and over and over, as if he had gone insane, screaming a mantra to himself and to the world and maybe even to God. “What are you gonna do about it?!” And we crashed on our instruments as the audience pushed and shoved against the rickety, temporary scaffolding stage. Attempting to get closer to him. To touch him. To be somehow electrified by the placing of hands against his energy. Seeking the blue spark. I felt the stage begin to list. It was going to go. I knew it was only a matter of time. We were in a near riot situation. And, quite frankly, I loved it. It was Jim at his drunken best. If he was going to be a rummy, at least this was a boozer with balls. With something to say. Even if he was completely mad. John, of course, hated it. But he stuck it out to the bitter end and played like a possessed madman himself.
And then Jim’s mood abruptly changed and he was talking about love again. “Hey, I’m not talkin’ about no revolution! I’m not talkin’ about no demonstration. I’m not talkin’ about no riot in the streets. I’m talkin’ about dancing. I’m talkin’ about love your neighbor! [Sound familiar, maybe like the rabbi from Galilee?] I’m talkin’ about grab your friend. I’m talkin’ about love! Love, love, love!”
And so it went. Back and forth. Between love and hate. At one point Jim dropped a clue as to the Living Theatre inspiration for this chaos. “Now listen,” he said to his assembled multitude, “I used to think the whole thing was a big joke. I used to think it was something to laugh about. And then the last couple of nights I met some people who were doing something. They’re trying to change the world, and I wanna get on the trip. I wanna change the world!” And the audience cheered and shoved and swirled in the fetid heat of that overstuffed seaplane hangar in the County of the Dead. It was Suddenly Last Summer and Sebastian was about to be devoured. And the band played on. Into that crazed night.
“There are no rules! There are no laws!” he continued. “Do whatever you want to do! Do it! Be free!”
And we tried “Touch Me” and “Love Me Two Times” and “When the Music’s Over.” But the audience didn’t care. They just wanted more! More of everything. More chaos, more madness, more show. More ranting and raving. More insanity. Jim had become a crazed prophet in the desert at the dawning of a new age. Calling for each of us to become the Messiah. There would be no leader this time around. No second coming. No moshiach this time around. The Piscean Age was over. Aquarius was dawning. And we would all have to live as our own authorities. Beholden to no one but t
he Creator. And we are all the Creator. Aren’t we?
“I’m talkin’ about havin’ fun,” he shouted. “I’m talkin’ about dancing. I want to see you people dancing in the streets this summer. I want to see you have some fun. I want to see you roam around. I want to see you paint the town. I want to see you wring it out. I wanna see you shout. I wanna see some fun. I wanna see fun from everyone!” And he started to take his shirt off as the audience screamed their approval and solidarity with this John the Baptist of the New Age. I thought, Oh shit, he’s gonna get naked. It’s so fucking hot in here, the drunken skunk is gonna take all his clothes off. And I knew that was a bust.
“Vince, stop him,” I shouted to our equipment chief. Vince divined the situation immediately and wrestled with Jim in front of the multitude. The shirt did come off but the pants stayed on. And, oddly, there were boxer shorts beneath the leather pants. Jim was wearing cotton boxer shorts. And the top was up above his navel as the leathers rode his hips. It was not a good look. Why was he wearing those stupid boxers? He quickly folded them down to the top of his leathers and jammed them in. And then he said the fateful line. As he was stuffing his boxers into his leathers he said…“Hey, anybody want to see my cock?” The audience roared its approval. Lions were going to eat Christians.
“Oh, I see. You want spectacle, don’t you.” He was on to them and the lust of their eyes. “You didn’t come to hear a pretty good rock and roll band play its music. You came to see something, didn’t you?” A surge in the wave of humanity forced itself against the scaffolding, and the stage moved ominously. The crowd had become an amoeba, filling every available space around us. If the stage were to collapse, it would crush hundreds of people. They would be pinned and wedged between metal bars and crushed by the weight of amplifiers and speakers and instruments and roadies and musicians and wooden planking. And the ship of fools’ deck was listing, hard. We had left Tennessee Williams country and entered the pages of Nathanael West’s Day of the Locust. And Jim continued over the roar of the lions.
“You came to see something greater than you’ve ever seen before. You want to watch, don’t you?” They shouted their agreement. “You came to watch me do something. You didn’t come to listen. You didn’t come to listen to music. You came to the circus!” He paced the stage with his shirt in one hand, dragging it, and the mic in the other. “Well, what can I do? What can I show you?” He placed the mic on its stand and held the shirt in front of his crotch. He had the idea. He was going to top the Living Theatre. “How about if I show you my cock? How about if I whip it out…right here!” And he began fumbling behind his shirt, as if he were opening his button fly. No one could see a thing. His shirt covered everything. “Okay, I’m gonna show it to you.” And he fumbled some more and appeared to take it out of his pants. And then he took the shirt in both hands, holding it like a bullfighter’s cape, in front of his groin. “Okay, watch now…here it comes!” And he pulled the shirt/cape quickly aside—swish—and then back in place. “Did you see it? Did you see my cock?” Again the lions roared. But they hadn’t eaten their Christian meat, yet. “Do you want to see it again? Watch close now.” And Manolete did another pass with his cape. The shirt was whipped away and then back in place, concealing everything. Exposing nothing. “There, I did it! Did you see it? Are you happy now? Want to see it again?” The audience went mad. They roared, howled, surged, pushed, crushed, and screamed. The stage bobbed and shook and listed. The musicians pounded and flailed. Great fear was in John’s eyes, but he kept playing. Robby’s face had gone pale blank, but his guitar kept howling. I was caught between fear for the crowd, fear for Jim’s possible arrest, fear for my own safety, and a crazed, rebellious exhilaration. This was what rock and roll was all about. I was experiencing the end times. The end of this damnable kali-yuga. It was the apocalypse…now!
“Now, look close, I’m only gonna show you my cock one more time,” he shouted into the mic. And he moved back from the lip of the stage. Back to John’s drums, all the while holding his cape in front of him. And then he did a pass. And a great “Olé!” rose up in my mind’s ear. The corrida roared and applauded. “Olé!” And the bastard did it again. The bull charged and Manolete swished his cape and the crowd roared. And nothing could be seen! Nothing! That son of a bitch Jim Morrison had teased and taunted and cajoled that crowd into believing he had shown them his cock. Hell, he had hypnotized them. He had created a religious hallucination. Except this time the Holy Mother or her crucified son was nowhere to be seen. This time it was snakes! The audience saw snakes where there were no snakes. They saw his cock—and swear to this day that they saw his cock—where there was no cock. The lying dog Jim Morrison had conned them. Had conned us, had conned the whole damned County of the Dead.
Folks, he never exposed himself. But it’s become a myth, hasn’t it? It’s become an American rock and roll myth. And it’s a lot more fun to believe the myth, isn’t it? So we do.
And Manolete’s cape became Jim Morrison’s shirt as Jim stopped playing Lilly St. Cyr and got dressed. He slipped easily into his sleeves after appearing to put his tool away and rebutton his pants. And it was done. We broke into “Light My Fire.” The crowd loved it. It was the song they had come to hear and Jim Morrison had hypnotized them into believing they had seen his cock. It was everything they wanted. The only thing left for them to do was to devour the band. It was now time for the blood sacrifice of Dionysus and his musicians. And they began to surge onto the stage as Jim called to them, “Hey, come on. I need some love. Come on up here and love my ass. Come on! All those people sitting way over there, man. Why don’t you all come down here and get with us, man. Come on! Everybody! Come on. Come on down here. Get closer! We need some love!”
And they followed his orders and began to take the stage. It listed more. It was going. The ship was sinking. And the security force—University of Miami football players and a handful of Dade County police—took up defensive positions and began shoving and throwing the stage climbers back into the audience. Bodies were flying everywhere. Chaos reigned. Jim was ecstatic. John had left the stage, unable to take any more. Robby was holding his guitar close to his chest to prevent its being destroyed in the mělée. And I played the riot. I smashed and pounded on the Fender Rhodes and jammed the Vox pedal to maximum volume as I mashed on the keys. Someone had to score the collapse of Western civilization. And bodies kept hurtling and charging and flailing about. Jim even got into the act. He pushed a security guy off the stage! Not the kids, but a security guy. What an anarchist. One of the beef monsters saw it happen and grabbed Jim and threw him off the stage. Oh, shit, he’s gonna break his neck, I thought. But the inventor of the stage dive was saved once again. The maenads caught the flying Dionysus and gently lowered him to the ground. Whereupon, he began to dance with them in a swirling vortex that shape-shifted into a snakelike conga line as Jim worked his way through the crowd, his followers behind him. And that damned satyr was there, too, cackling and hopping on his goat hooves. What a night for that little beast. Exactly the kind of action he had come back for. And Jim headed toward the stairway that led up to the second-floor dressing room. He hit the stairs, the security held back the snake line, he rushed up, stood at the top step, waved to the crowd, and disappeared into the sanctuary of the dressing room. “Dionysus has left the building!”
My job was finished. I stopped playing as, sure enough, the stage listed to starboard and very slowly pointed its nose down to the ground. It was all in slow motion. No one got hurt. And everyone had a grand time. What a concert! What a night! What craziness!
Of course there would be a price to pay. The authorities would not allow the Doors—those damnable self-proclaimed “Kings of Acid and Orgasmic and Lizard King Rock”—to have that much fun and create a mass hallucination in fifteen thousand young people, and think they could simply walk away from such madness scot-free. Oh, no! Someone was going to pay for unleashing snakes and maenads and satyrs. And that someone was…Jim Morri
son.
We were busted four days later. We were all in the Caribbean. Jim, Robby, and John in Jamaica, and Dorothy and I on the French island of Guadeloupe. My wife and I did Adam and Eve naked-in-Paradise walks on a deserted beach at the end of the butterfly-shaped island. We stood naked in the soft azure shore break and watched a baby octopus in a tidal pool expand and contract itself as it swam from rock to rock, flaring its tentacles like an unearthly underwater alien. It was beautiful. Rainbow-hued reef fish darted through the crystalline pools, and the sky was filled with great, rolling cumulus clouds. Huge cotton-candy puffs of whiteness set against a penetratingly clear blue sky. It was paradise.
“I love you, Mrs. Manzarek,” I said as I wrapped my arms around her supple, golden body.
“I love you, too…husband.” And she kissed me. Her essence kissed me. The I Ching’s female principle kissed me. It was overwhelming.
And I became the male principle. And we made love. On that deserted beach, somewhere below the Tropic of Cancer.
Tropic corridor,
Tropic treasure,
What got us this far to this
Mild equator?
Our marriage was truly consummated. And we were finally having our honeymoon. Dorothy and I ate fresh-caught lobster, flambeéd in cognac, and drank planter’s punch. We bought little trinkets in the charming capital town of Pointe-à-Pître. We stayed at L’Auberge de la Vieille Tour, an old sugar mill converted to a luxe resort hotel. We basked in the sun and in the soft, sensuous love of each other’s arms. It was paradise.