Post by darkstar on May 3, 2006 12:58:30 GMT
FROM THE DOORS GOOGLE MESSAGE BOARD - COMMENTS FROM DANNY SUGARMAN:
From: DSugerman
Subject: re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/18
After staying out of this conversation, I decided to jump in and
simply go on
the record, semi officially. First off, I want to say, before there
was the
movie, before there were the books, before there was any market for
the Doors,
Ray Manzarek and I were working to introduce people to the Doors and
the story
and the brilliance of Jim Morrison. That was my job in 1974. And
it's still
my job. I also try and protect the Doors copyrights, which might
not jibe well
with other Doors website but they have to understand while I
understand they
are doing their own tribute, they are competing with the Doors own
website
which is trying to get a new line of never before released
materials, including
25 titles never before relleased of music, radio specials,
interviews, etc.
Now, I don't have anything against anyone who loves the Doors. But
the Doors
and I both have problems with fans who try and profit illicitly off
the
Doors--people like Rainer Moddemann who has never been a Doors rep
but who is a
liar, and a thief. He helped us get in touch with one tv station
and gave us
the phone number of a photographer. Compared with what he's taken,
and
bootlegged, he should be satisfied. But he's not. He wants the
glory. And he
deserves none. He rips fans off with crappy bootlegs. Robby
Krieger let him
do some pr when Robby was in Germany five years ago. Rainer has
nothing to do
with the Doors and if I had my way he'd be in jail. A lot of nasty
shit gets
said about people on this site and I think Jim Morrison would be
disqusted with
the pettiness and name-calling.
Despite what you may have heard, I knew Jim and Jim knew me. Jim
hired me,
with the rest of the Doors and their manager Bill Siddons when I was
a kid.
Pam had nothing to do with it. I didn't get a chance to know Pam
until shortly
before she left for Paris. I knew her sister, Judy, who ran
Pam/Jim's store,
Themis...so this business I read about Jim hiring me cause Pamela
asked him to
is bullshit. I got hired in ten minutes one afternoon after I'd
been thrown
out of the office for getting in the way (I was 14 years old).
Also...No One Here Gets Out Alive was dedicated to Jim and Ray. Jim
for
believing in me as a writer and for telling me to write what I know,
which at
the time was him and the Doors. And Ray for supporting me while I
wrote it and
put together the Doors Greatest Hits and coordinated An American
Prayer. The
idea was introduce Jim as a poet with AP, tell his wild story of a
poet who
veered between genius and madness, and whom I loved deeply (I guess
no onewill
ever know what I meant to him but I can tell you this and I can back
it up: He
gave me all his privately published editions of poetry to send to
fans who sent
him poetry and to send to the rock writers I'd become friendly
with); delete
the quad Best Of, the Weird Scenes (new fans couldn't tell the
difference
between Strange Days and Weird Scenes) and 13 (which Jim hated) and
release a
traditional Greatest Hits album. That would, I believed, help put
the Doors
catalog into top condition, shave all off the fat, and hopefully
lead to some
sort of new recognition of Jim and the Doors. That it worked as
well as it did
was overwhelming. But I wasn't surprized. I believed in what I was
selling.
And I didn't do No One Here for the money. Hopkins and I split
$1,200.
Jim believed and I believe that if you do something for the love of
it and it's
successful, you're set, but if you do something for money you don't
love,
either way, you're unfulfilled. I followed his advice.
So don't believe what people say. You can write to me or the Doors
or myself
c/o thedoors.com anytime. I personally read all the mail.
I don't think I'll be back here. Except maybe to nail Rainer to the
wall.
Break on through,
Danny Suger,man
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990729210524.13372.00003451%40ng-
bd1.aol.com#link21
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
The Doors don't have to release anything. They're set for life. We
didn't
know the material even existed until Paul Rothchild passed away--no
one
questioned him. As it turned, he'd accumulated quite a stash of
unreleased
Doors material. We don't want to flood the market with everything
recorded
(like Hendrix has), but we do want to make the material to serious
fans who are
fed up with bootlegs and would like to hear the real thing. Hence,
the
forthcoming Doors website record label, soon to be announced at the
Doors
official site. To ev en presume the Doors do it for the money is a
stupid,
insensitive remark. If they release something rare, they're ripping
people off
and if they don't release something then they're accused about not
caring about
Doors fans, like you. How can they win? They don't try. But they
do try to
please the fans and give them what they want, and, like I said,
hence the
forthcoming website record label which will have over 23 Doors
releases of
never before released material, via our official website starting
sometime
early next year.
DS
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=37BC1F27.49FCB583%40brucec.mv.com#link31
From: DSugerman (dsugerman@aol.com)
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
THE DOORS NEVER SOLD LIGHT MY FIRE TO BUICK. OR FORD AS THE MOVIE
STATES. WE
TURN ALL COMMERCIAL DEALS. TURNED DOWN OVER 30 MIL IN THE PAST
TWENTY YEARS.
DANNY SUGERMAN
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=37BF4393.40514028%40joerossi.com#link51
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
Fuck youl. The Doors never sold any song to Buick or Ford, we get
millions in
commercial but you don't hear Michelin tires Riders on the Storm
they offered 6
mil for. We just want the web site to support itself. We building
it to
offer you the best in downloads, artwork, photos, constantly
updated, a staff
of 8...We didn't sell anything via the Website for almost trhree
years. Just
trying to cover the costs. Umm, it is business. Shows how little
you know
about the Doors. The scene in the film was fiction. We turn more
money in
commercial offers then most bands make in a decade.
Danny Sugerman
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823220252.18406.00002203%40ng-
fj1.aol.com#link61
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
COUNT AGAIN I DON'T WANT TO BADRAP HENDRIX BUT HE'S HAD OVER 30
ALBUMS
RELEASED. AND WE'RE RLEASING THE NEW MATERIAL IN THE TRADITIONOF
WHAT HENDRIX
IS DOING ON DAGGER RECORDS--MAKING THE MATERIAL AVAILABLE TO DOORS
COLLECTORS
ONLY. AND WE'LL RE BE LRELEASING THEM OVER 10 YEARS.
SUGERMAN
YOU GUYS ARE IMPOSSIBLE TO PLESE.
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990822113024.23599.00002383%40ng-
fs1.aol.com#link71
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
IN FACT WE TURNED DOWN AN OFFER FOR MORRISON/DOORSW WINE. SWINE.
DANNY
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=7ps0mn%24aj%241%
40autumn.news.rcn.net#link81
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
The Doors have just changed print music publishers and there will be
a new line
of books out sometime soon.
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=7ps0mn%24aj%241%
40autumn.news.rcn.net#link81
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
A LOT OF LIES AND BS WAS OUT HERE. I JUST WANTED TO SET THE RECORD
STRAIGHT.
IF YOU GO OVER WHAT I'VE WRITTEN I BELIEVE I HAVE
DANNY SUGERMAN
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823092937.28252.00002538%40ng-
ci1.aol.com#link91
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
There is no "Doors Incorporated". There's the Doors Music Co. And
Robby, Ray,
John, The Morrison Estate, our Webmaster Todd Gray, the Doors
lawyers, all care
very much. That's why I'm here answering these questions. I used
to answer
the Doors fan mail. It's a new age. But I don't think I can do
this anymore.
As amanager I simply don't have the time. But I wanted to answer
this:
Everyone involved, from Bruce Botnick, to Elektra's president Sylvia
Rhone, to
the paralegals--we have The Doors photo archivest, the film and audio
archivest. We've got a great team.
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823092937.28252.00002538%40ng-
ci1.aol.com#link91
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
As I said, the doors changed print music publishers and there should
be some
new books out soon. We're no longer with Columbia.
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823092937.28252.00002538%40ng-
ci1.aol.com#link91
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
I am talking about photos, lyrics, v ideos, anything the Doors own
which is
stolen from us (like photos from our book or even our own web site),
the Doors
logo (which we wouldn't give to Oliver Stone, that logo means you get
authorized Doors product, that means up to the Doors standards of
excellence.
And yes bootlegs, too. The Doors are getting ripped off--we want
people to c
ome out site where we are careful to put up rare photos (see photo
gallery),
the latest news, and authorized merchandise. Because of rip offs,
we've had to
make the photos smaller. There are sites giving away what the Doors
are
selling, ie, photos, videos, lyrics, etc. ALL OF THIS MATERIAL IS
AVAILABLE AT
THE DOORS SITE www.thedoors.com
Answer your question?
Danny
Source:http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823092937.28252.00002538%40ng-
ci1.aol.com#link91
The Doors Release Archival Material
JAMBANDS.COM News
December 6 2000
The Doors have announced plans to release a series of 36 CDs from its archive through it’s new label, Bright Midnight Records. The three remaining members, John Densmore, Robby Krieger and Ray Manzarek, have selected material from live performances recorded in the late 60s and early 70s to be released exclusively through the band’s website. Three new CDs will be made available every six months for the next six years. "Our goal is to give serious Doors fans the material they want, including professional eight-track recordings of concerts, some previously available only as overpriced and inferior sounding recordings," the band said in a statement. The first CD is titled The Bright Midnight Sampler: 14 Songs/8 Concerts and features live material recorded in eight different U.S. cities in 1970.
For more information, visit www.thedoors.com.
www.jambands.com/news/news42.html
THE DOORS ROCK AGAIN ON THE INTERNET
By: Blair Jackson
MIX Professional Audio And Production Magazine
Mar 1, 2001 12:00 PM
“There's gold in them thar' tape vaults!”
Old and new bands alike are increasingly finding that the relatively low cost and high-profit margin of manufacturing CDs and marketing them primarily on the Internet is a good way to get music that might not ordinarily be heard out to their hardcore fan bases. In a sense, it's easy money — but it's also a godsend to fans to be able to tap into a mother lode of an artist's previously unheard live or studio tapes…or at the very least, replace mediocre bootleg tapes/CDs with sonically superior, formally mastered CDs.
One of the most interesting recent examples in this area is Bright Midnight Records, an Internet-only venture by The Doors, whose career effectively ended when lead singer Jim Morrison died in Paris in 1971, but whose legacy still generates millions of dollars for the surviving former members. During Morrison's lifetime, The Doors released only seven albums — six studio LPs and a live set — and in the three decades since his death, there have been only a few peeks into the band's archives: a couple of authorized videos, a Morrison poetry album (American Prayer, which included some new music from the living Doors), a single live disc and 1997's Doors box set, which included a live disc culled from three shows in New York in early 1970.
The interesting thing about surround sound is that there isn't one way to go about handling it. Tricks may be fun to play with in your studio, but are they advancing the idea behind the music?
— Bob Clearmountain
The fact is, there aren't a lot of live tapes of The Doors in circulation, because the band didn't record their shows on a regular basis. There are some soundboard and monitor tapes in The Doors' archives and, thanks to their fans, some bootleg audience tapes that have survived. But the best quality recordings The Doors have in their vault come from the winter 1970 tour (supporting Morrison Hotel) that became the basis for the double-LP Absolutely Live. These shows will be the heart of Bright Midnight's ambitious release program: The company is committed to putting out three titles a year for the next six years — mostly complete, unedited concerts, remixed from the original 8-track masters by the man who originally recorded them, Bruce Botnick (who engineered all of The Doors' studio albums, as well). They are being sold exclusively through the band's official Web site, www.thedoors.com.
The first batch of three CDs (each is sold separately), which came out at the end of last year, is a little different than what will come out subsequently. It includes one full concert — a fascinating double-CD of an alternately rambling and explosive show from Cobo Arena in Detroit; a historic four-hour radio program, called No One Here Gets Out Alive, featuring extensive interviews and plenty of rare Doors music (it was put together 20 years ago by L.A. radio personality Jim Ladd to coincide with the release of the popular Danny Sugarman book of the same name); and a superb single-disc sampler showcasing tracks from some of the concerts that will be released on Bright Midnight, as well as a number of live rarities from other tape sources. It's quite a bounty for Doors fans.
According to Botnick, “The philosophy behind this is to bring to the fans everything we've got on multitrack from that tour — the good, bad and the ugly. And there was some bad and ugly stuff in there. Not all concerts were great, of course. Sometimes Jim was inebriated, sometimes he wasn't. A lot of it is really great, though, and deserves to be heard. We recorded everything on 8-track, and the goal now is to mix these shows as well as we can today and get them out there, because people have been listening to bootlegs that really sound lousy, and why should they have lousy in their house when they can have a lot better?”
Botnick says that the tapes were all in great shape. “They're playing just fine, which I suppose is a testament to BASF,” he says. There was a problem to overcome on the Detroit tapes, however. “A person who previously worked on the tapes when I wasn't around had pulled pieces out of the masters and they're gone. So I had to go back to the live 2-tracks I had recorded at the same time to fill all the holes. It didn't end up being too big of a problem.”
In the case of that May ’70 Cobo Arena show, Botnick was set up in a remote truck provided by Fedco Audio Labs, and he recorded the concert onto a Stevens solid-state, 1-inch 8-track and an Ampex 351 2-track. The truck was equipped with a custom console. Because The Doors were just three musicians and Morrison, he needed relatively few mics: AKG C-12As on guitarist Robbie Kreiger's and keyboardist Ray Manzarek's amps, and a Neumann U87 on Manzarek's piano bass. John Densmore's drums were captured by a Shure SM57 on the snare, an Altec “salt shaker” on the kick and Sennheiser 405s as overheads. Morrison sang into an SM57, and the audience was picked up by a Neumann SM69 stereo mic. The 8-track tape was BASF LR56 at 15 ips; the 2-track 3M 126. By today's standards, that list probably looks downright primitive, but the fact is, the tapes sounded great.
Each of the live releases (with the exception of the sampler) has detailed technical information by Botnick, who notes, “I figure there are a lot of fans out there who want to know all that stuff. When I was growing up, I got a lot of my information from reading the back of albums. You'd occasionally find someone saying, ‘I used a U47 on the trumpets,’ so when I got to do recording, I sometimes tried the things I read about. So I'm continuing in that tradition.”
Botnick is mixing the tapes in his L.A.-area home studio, using a Sony DMX-R100 digital console as the heart of his system. Though the first concert set, Live in Detroit, was prepared at 48k, downsampled to 44.1 for CD (via db Technologies 3000s), Botnick has loftier intentions for other releases in the series: “The problem we have is that we're still stuck in the CD area, so I can't give everyone what it really sounds like because of the limitations of the CD. But all the future ones are going to be high-bandwidth — 96k, 24-bit — and will be 5.1 as well as stereo. And we're hoping that we can release them in both SACD multichannel and DVD-A. I also really like the way DSD sounds. Those will all be much closer to the way it should sound.” Other equipment in Botnick's arsenal for these CDs includes the new TC Electronic 6000 reverb, Ayre Acoustics V-1 amplifiers, db Technologies A/D converters, and an HD Sonic Solutions System for editing and mastering.
For Botnick, the project is both business and nostalgia. The Doors have been a major part of his livelihood since he was a teenager recording that first Doors album in early 1967. Every time he goes into the vault to listen to a studio or live multitrack — and there has been a plethora of hits and other releases over the years — he's hearing himself at work as a young man. “In a way, when I'm mixing these tapes now, I'm trying to be 23 years old again,” he says with a chuckle. “And that's hard. I'm not the same person today that I was in 1970. I have a different sensibility and obviously I've been listening to lots of different things through the years. Recording equipment has changed, of course. But what we're trying to do [on these CDs] is capture the music as accurately as we can so we can bring the best to the fans. That's really who it's for.”
mixonline.com/mag/audio_doors_rock_again/
DOORS NOT CLOSED JUST YET
New Musical Express
Published: 05-06-2001-14-34
The 30th anniversary of DOORS frontman JIM MORRISON's death is set to be marked by a brand new DOORS live album 'BRIGHT MIDNIGHT - LIVE IN AMERICA', due for release on June 25.
The album features 13 tracks, including Doors classics 'Light My Fire', 'Break On Through', 'Love Me Two Times', 'Roadhouse Blues' and 'The End', recorded during eight different shows from 1969-70. It also marks the first of a series of Doors releases set to appear over the next five years.
"Our goal is to give serious Doors fans the material they want, including professional eight-track recordings of concerts, some previously available only as overpriced and inferior sounding bootlegs," remaining members Robbie Kreiger, Ray Manzarek and John Densmore said in a statement.
Jim Morrison died in a bath in Paris on July 3 1971.
www.nme.com/news/32044.htm
For Harmonious Truth, Rarely Heard
Journal Record
The (Oklahoma City)
February, 2002
FORT WORTH (NYT) -- A recording of the famously raucous, bluesy 1970 Doors concert in Detroit -- the longest show the band ever played -- can't be found in stores. Nor can Jimi Hendrix's blistering show from the Oakland Coliseum in 1969, which featured an 18-minute version of Voodoo Chile and a fiery take on Cream's Sunshine of Your Love. And you won't find the Grateful Dead's sparkling, two-and-a- half-hour 1968 show from Lake Tahoe, Calif., either. But they can be found on the World Wide Web. The Doors', the Dead's and Hendrix's official Web sites are offering previously unreleased live recordings that show rare, sometimes surprising glimpses of the three pioneering `60s acts.
The mail-order CDs come complete and unedited, offering a purity that many hard-core fans cherish. While traditional live rock albums have been in stores for decades, they are typically studio-enhanced efforts. Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek says the Internet releases feature the shows "as they went down." "It's a way to relive the concerts -- there we are in Boston, Detroit and New York City," Manzarek says in a phone interview. "The idea was just to make the concerts available to fans, and it's growing."
For `60s acts, the niche can help them stay commercially relevant in today's industry. Superstar acts such as the Dave Matthews Band, Radiohead and Phish all released live albums in 2001, along with popular charity efforts such as The Concert for New York City. But while bands like Dave Matthews rule the sales roost with today's chart-topping music, the Doors, the Dead, Hendrix and other classic- rock acts can offer history. The Doors have eight mail-order releases available -- two volumes of interviews, a radio show, a disc of 1969 rehearsal recordings, a disc of concert highlights, and three concerts from 1969 and 1970. There are four Hendrix releases -- two 1968 concerts, one 1969 show and a disc of demo recordings from 1969 and 1970. Hendrix's father and sister are releasing the discs through the Web site and company they established after winning the guitarist's copyrights in 1995. The family formed a label, Dagger Records, for the live releases.
"There is a huge base of fans out there who want more than the official (major label) releases B that's why there's bootlegs," said executive producer John McDermott, who helped launch both the Doors and Hendrix Web sites in 1998. "This was a way to look after the legitimate interest of those fans, without confusing the larger audience who want official releases."
www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4182/is_200202/ai_n10150635
From: DSugerman
Subject: re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/18
After staying out of this conversation, I decided to jump in and
simply go on
the record, semi officially. First off, I want to say, before there
was the
movie, before there were the books, before there was any market for
the Doors,
Ray Manzarek and I were working to introduce people to the Doors and
the story
and the brilliance of Jim Morrison. That was my job in 1974. And
it's still
my job. I also try and protect the Doors copyrights, which might
not jibe well
with other Doors website but they have to understand while I
understand they
are doing their own tribute, they are competing with the Doors own
website
which is trying to get a new line of never before released
materials, including
25 titles never before relleased of music, radio specials,
interviews, etc.
Now, I don't have anything against anyone who loves the Doors. But
the Doors
and I both have problems with fans who try and profit illicitly off
the
Doors--people like Rainer Moddemann who has never been a Doors rep
but who is a
liar, and a thief. He helped us get in touch with one tv station
and gave us
the phone number of a photographer. Compared with what he's taken,
and
bootlegged, he should be satisfied. But he's not. He wants the
glory. And he
deserves none. He rips fans off with crappy bootlegs. Robby
Krieger let him
do some pr when Robby was in Germany five years ago. Rainer has
nothing to do
with the Doors and if I had my way he'd be in jail. A lot of nasty
shit gets
said about people on this site and I think Jim Morrison would be
disqusted with
the pettiness and name-calling.
Despite what you may have heard, I knew Jim and Jim knew me. Jim
hired me,
with the rest of the Doors and their manager Bill Siddons when I was
a kid.
Pam had nothing to do with it. I didn't get a chance to know Pam
until shortly
before she left for Paris. I knew her sister, Judy, who ran
Pam/Jim's store,
Themis...so this business I read about Jim hiring me cause Pamela
asked him to
is bullshit. I got hired in ten minutes one afternoon after I'd
been thrown
out of the office for getting in the way (I was 14 years old).
Also...No One Here Gets Out Alive was dedicated to Jim and Ray. Jim
for
believing in me as a writer and for telling me to write what I know,
which at
the time was him and the Doors. And Ray for supporting me while I
wrote it and
put together the Doors Greatest Hits and coordinated An American
Prayer. The
idea was introduce Jim as a poet with AP, tell his wild story of a
poet who
veered between genius and madness, and whom I loved deeply (I guess
no onewill
ever know what I meant to him but I can tell you this and I can back
it up: He
gave me all his privately published editions of poetry to send to
fans who sent
him poetry and to send to the rock writers I'd become friendly
with); delete
the quad Best Of, the Weird Scenes (new fans couldn't tell the
difference
between Strange Days and Weird Scenes) and 13 (which Jim hated) and
release a
traditional Greatest Hits album. That would, I believed, help put
the Doors
catalog into top condition, shave all off the fat, and hopefully
lead to some
sort of new recognition of Jim and the Doors. That it worked as
well as it did
was overwhelming. But I wasn't surprized. I believed in what I was
selling.
And I didn't do No One Here for the money. Hopkins and I split
$1,200.
Jim believed and I believe that if you do something for the love of
it and it's
successful, you're set, but if you do something for money you don't
love,
either way, you're unfulfilled. I followed his advice.
So don't believe what people say. You can write to me or the Doors
or myself
c/o thedoors.com anytime. I personally read all the mail.
I don't think I'll be back here. Except maybe to nail Rainer to the
wall.
Break on through,
Danny Suger,man
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990729210524.13372.00003451%40ng-
bd1.aol.com#link21
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
The Doors don't have to release anything. They're set for life. We
didn't
know the material even existed until Paul Rothchild passed away--no
one
questioned him. As it turned, he'd accumulated quite a stash of
unreleased
Doors material. We don't want to flood the market with everything
recorded
(like Hendrix has), but we do want to make the material to serious
fans who are
fed up with bootlegs and would like to hear the real thing. Hence,
the
forthcoming Doors website record label, soon to be announced at the
Doors
official site. To ev en presume the Doors do it for the money is a
stupid,
insensitive remark. If they release something rare, they're ripping
people off
and if they don't release something then they're accused about not
caring about
Doors fans, like you. How can they win? They don't try. But they
do try to
please the fans and give them what they want, and, like I said,
hence the
forthcoming website record label which will have over 23 Doors
releases of
never before released material, via our official website starting
sometime
early next year.
DS
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=37BC1F27.49FCB583%40brucec.mv.com#link31
From: DSugerman (dsugerman@aol.com)
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
THE DOORS NEVER SOLD LIGHT MY FIRE TO BUICK. OR FORD AS THE MOVIE
STATES. WE
TURN ALL COMMERCIAL DEALS. TURNED DOWN OVER 30 MIL IN THE PAST
TWENTY YEARS.
DANNY SUGERMAN
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=37BF4393.40514028%40joerossi.com#link51
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
Fuck youl. The Doors never sold any song to Buick or Ford, we get
millions in
commercial but you don't hear Michelin tires Riders on the Storm
they offered 6
mil for. We just want the web site to support itself. We building
it to
offer you the best in downloads, artwork, photos, constantly
updated, a staff
of 8...We didn't sell anything via the Website for almost trhree
years. Just
trying to cover the costs. Umm, it is business. Shows how little
you know
about the Doors. The scene in the film was fiction. We turn more
money in
commercial offers then most bands make in a decade.
Danny Sugerman
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823220252.18406.00002203%40ng-
fj1.aol.com#link61
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
COUNT AGAIN I DON'T WANT TO BADRAP HENDRIX BUT HE'S HAD OVER 30
ALBUMS
RELEASED. AND WE'RE RLEASING THE NEW MATERIAL IN THE TRADITIONOF
WHAT HENDRIX
IS DOING ON DAGGER RECORDS--MAKING THE MATERIAL AVAILABLE TO DOORS
COLLECTORS
ONLY. AND WE'LL RE BE LRELEASING THEM OVER 10 YEARS.
SUGERMAN
YOU GUYS ARE IMPOSSIBLE TO PLESE.
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990822113024.23599.00002383%40ng-
fs1.aol.com#link71
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
IN FACT WE TURNED DOWN AN OFFER FOR MORRISON/DOORSW WINE. SWINE.
DANNY
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=7ps0mn%24aj%241%
40autumn.news.rcn.net#link81
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
The Doors have just changed print music publishers and there will be
a new line
of books out sometime soon.
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=7ps0mn%24aj%241%
40autumn.news.rcn.net#link81
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/26
A LOT OF LIES AND BS WAS OUT HERE. I JUST WANTED TO SET THE RECORD
STRAIGHT.
IF YOU GO OVER WHAT I'VE WRITTEN I BELIEVE I HAVE
DANNY SUGERMAN
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823092937.28252.00002538%40ng-
ci1.aol.com#link91
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
There is no "Doors Incorporated". There's the Doors Music Co. And
Robby, Ray,
John, The Morrison Estate, our Webmaster Todd Gray, the Doors
lawyers, all care
very much. That's why I'm here answering these questions. I used
to answer
the Doors fan mail. It's a new age. But I don't think I can do
this anymore.
As amanager I simply don't have the time. But I wanted to answer
this:
Everyone involved, from Bruce Botnick, to Elektra's president Sylvia
Rhone, to
the paralegals--we have The Doors photo archivest, the film and audio
archivest. We've got a great team.
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823092937.28252.00002538%40ng-
ci1.aol.com#link91
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
As I said, the doors changed print music publishers and there should
be some
new books out soon. We're no longer with Columbia.
Source: groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823092937.28252.00002538%40ng-
ci1.aol.com#link91
From: DSugerman
Subject: Re: Danny Sugerman
Newsgroups: alt.music.the-doors
Date: 1999/08/20
I am talking about photos, lyrics, v ideos, anything the Doors own
which is
stolen from us (like photos from our book or even our own web site),
the Doors
logo (which we wouldn't give to Oliver Stone, that logo means you get
authorized Doors product, that means up to the Doors standards of
excellence.
And yes bootlegs, too. The Doors are getting ripped off--we want
people to c
ome out site where we are careful to put up rare photos (see photo
gallery),
the latest news, and authorized merchandise. Because of rip offs,
we've had to
make the photos smaller. There are sites giving away what the Doors
are
selling, ie, photos, videos, lyrics, etc. ALL OF THIS MATERIAL IS
AVAILABLE AT
THE DOORS SITE www.thedoors.com
Answer your question?
Danny
Source:http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&th=a69cd4cca3147b38&seekm=19990823092937.28252.00002538%40ng-
ci1.aol.com#link91
The Doors Release Archival Material
JAMBANDS.COM News
December 6 2000
The Doors have announced plans to release a series of 36 CDs from its archive through it’s new label, Bright Midnight Records. The three remaining members, John Densmore, Robby Krieger and Ray Manzarek, have selected material from live performances recorded in the late 60s and early 70s to be released exclusively through the band’s website. Three new CDs will be made available every six months for the next six years. "Our goal is to give serious Doors fans the material they want, including professional eight-track recordings of concerts, some previously available only as overpriced and inferior sounding recordings," the band said in a statement. The first CD is titled The Bright Midnight Sampler: 14 Songs/8 Concerts and features live material recorded in eight different U.S. cities in 1970.
For more information, visit www.thedoors.com.
www.jambands.com/news/news42.html
THE DOORS ROCK AGAIN ON THE INTERNET
By: Blair Jackson
MIX Professional Audio And Production Magazine
Mar 1, 2001 12:00 PM
“There's gold in them thar' tape vaults!”
Old and new bands alike are increasingly finding that the relatively low cost and high-profit margin of manufacturing CDs and marketing them primarily on the Internet is a good way to get music that might not ordinarily be heard out to their hardcore fan bases. In a sense, it's easy money — but it's also a godsend to fans to be able to tap into a mother lode of an artist's previously unheard live or studio tapes…or at the very least, replace mediocre bootleg tapes/CDs with sonically superior, formally mastered CDs.
One of the most interesting recent examples in this area is Bright Midnight Records, an Internet-only venture by The Doors, whose career effectively ended when lead singer Jim Morrison died in Paris in 1971, but whose legacy still generates millions of dollars for the surviving former members. During Morrison's lifetime, The Doors released only seven albums — six studio LPs and a live set — and in the three decades since his death, there have been only a few peeks into the band's archives: a couple of authorized videos, a Morrison poetry album (American Prayer, which included some new music from the living Doors), a single live disc and 1997's Doors box set, which included a live disc culled from three shows in New York in early 1970.
The interesting thing about surround sound is that there isn't one way to go about handling it. Tricks may be fun to play with in your studio, but are they advancing the idea behind the music?
— Bob Clearmountain
The fact is, there aren't a lot of live tapes of The Doors in circulation, because the band didn't record their shows on a regular basis. There are some soundboard and monitor tapes in The Doors' archives and, thanks to their fans, some bootleg audience tapes that have survived. But the best quality recordings The Doors have in their vault come from the winter 1970 tour (supporting Morrison Hotel) that became the basis for the double-LP Absolutely Live. These shows will be the heart of Bright Midnight's ambitious release program: The company is committed to putting out three titles a year for the next six years — mostly complete, unedited concerts, remixed from the original 8-track masters by the man who originally recorded them, Bruce Botnick (who engineered all of The Doors' studio albums, as well). They are being sold exclusively through the band's official Web site, www.thedoors.com.
The first batch of three CDs (each is sold separately), which came out at the end of last year, is a little different than what will come out subsequently. It includes one full concert — a fascinating double-CD of an alternately rambling and explosive show from Cobo Arena in Detroit; a historic four-hour radio program, called No One Here Gets Out Alive, featuring extensive interviews and plenty of rare Doors music (it was put together 20 years ago by L.A. radio personality Jim Ladd to coincide with the release of the popular Danny Sugarman book of the same name); and a superb single-disc sampler showcasing tracks from some of the concerts that will be released on Bright Midnight, as well as a number of live rarities from other tape sources. It's quite a bounty for Doors fans.
According to Botnick, “The philosophy behind this is to bring to the fans everything we've got on multitrack from that tour — the good, bad and the ugly. And there was some bad and ugly stuff in there. Not all concerts were great, of course. Sometimes Jim was inebriated, sometimes he wasn't. A lot of it is really great, though, and deserves to be heard. We recorded everything on 8-track, and the goal now is to mix these shows as well as we can today and get them out there, because people have been listening to bootlegs that really sound lousy, and why should they have lousy in their house when they can have a lot better?”
Botnick says that the tapes were all in great shape. “They're playing just fine, which I suppose is a testament to BASF,” he says. There was a problem to overcome on the Detroit tapes, however. “A person who previously worked on the tapes when I wasn't around had pulled pieces out of the masters and they're gone. So I had to go back to the live 2-tracks I had recorded at the same time to fill all the holes. It didn't end up being too big of a problem.”
In the case of that May ’70 Cobo Arena show, Botnick was set up in a remote truck provided by Fedco Audio Labs, and he recorded the concert onto a Stevens solid-state, 1-inch 8-track and an Ampex 351 2-track. The truck was equipped with a custom console. Because The Doors were just three musicians and Morrison, he needed relatively few mics: AKG C-12As on guitarist Robbie Kreiger's and keyboardist Ray Manzarek's amps, and a Neumann U87 on Manzarek's piano bass. John Densmore's drums were captured by a Shure SM57 on the snare, an Altec “salt shaker” on the kick and Sennheiser 405s as overheads. Morrison sang into an SM57, and the audience was picked up by a Neumann SM69 stereo mic. The 8-track tape was BASF LR56 at 15 ips; the 2-track 3M 126. By today's standards, that list probably looks downright primitive, but the fact is, the tapes sounded great.
Each of the live releases (with the exception of the sampler) has detailed technical information by Botnick, who notes, “I figure there are a lot of fans out there who want to know all that stuff. When I was growing up, I got a lot of my information from reading the back of albums. You'd occasionally find someone saying, ‘I used a U47 on the trumpets,’ so when I got to do recording, I sometimes tried the things I read about. So I'm continuing in that tradition.”
Botnick is mixing the tapes in his L.A.-area home studio, using a Sony DMX-R100 digital console as the heart of his system. Though the first concert set, Live in Detroit, was prepared at 48k, downsampled to 44.1 for CD (via db Technologies 3000s), Botnick has loftier intentions for other releases in the series: “The problem we have is that we're still stuck in the CD area, so I can't give everyone what it really sounds like because of the limitations of the CD. But all the future ones are going to be high-bandwidth — 96k, 24-bit — and will be 5.1 as well as stereo. And we're hoping that we can release them in both SACD multichannel and DVD-A. I also really like the way DSD sounds. Those will all be much closer to the way it should sound.” Other equipment in Botnick's arsenal for these CDs includes the new TC Electronic 6000 reverb, Ayre Acoustics V-1 amplifiers, db Technologies A/D converters, and an HD Sonic Solutions System for editing and mastering.
For Botnick, the project is both business and nostalgia. The Doors have been a major part of his livelihood since he was a teenager recording that first Doors album in early 1967. Every time he goes into the vault to listen to a studio or live multitrack — and there has been a plethora of hits and other releases over the years — he's hearing himself at work as a young man. “In a way, when I'm mixing these tapes now, I'm trying to be 23 years old again,” he says with a chuckle. “And that's hard. I'm not the same person today that I was in 1970. I have a different sensibility and obviously I've been listening to lots of different things through the years. Recording equipment has changed, of course. But what we're trying to do [on these CDs] is capture the music as accurately as we can so we can bring the best to the fans. That's really who it's for.”
mixonline.com/mag/audio_doors_rock_again/
DOORS NOT CLOSED JUST YET
New Musical Express
Published: 05-06-2001-14-34
The 30th anniversary of DOORS frontman JIM MORRISON's death is set to be marked by a brand new DOORS live album 'BRIGHT MIDNIGHT - LIVE IN AMERICA', due for release on June 25.
The album features 13 tracks, including Doors classics 'Light My Fire', 'Break On Through', 'Love Me Two Times', 'Roadhouse Blues' and 'The End', recorded during eight different shows from 1969-70. It also marks the first of a series of Doors releases set to appear over the next five years.
"Our goal is to give serious Doors fans the material they want, including professional eight-track recordings of concerts, some previously available only as overpriced and inferior sounding bootlegs," remaining members Robbie Kreiger, Ray Manzarek and John Densmore said in a statement.
Jim Morrison died in a bath in Paris on July 3 1971.
www.nme.com/news/32044.htm
For Harmonious Truth, Rarely Heard
Journal Record
The (Oklahoma City)
February, 2002
FORT WORTH (NYT) -- A recording of the famously raucous, bluesy 1970 Doors concert in Detroit -- the longest show the band ever played -- can't be found in stores. Nor can Jimi Hendrix's blistering show from the Oakland Coliseum in 1969, which featured an 18-minute version of Voodoo Chile and a fiery take on Cream's Sunshine of Your Love. And you won't find the Grateful Dead's sparkling, two-and-a- half-hour 1968 show from Lake Tahoe, Calif., either. But they can be found on the World Wide Web. The Doors', the Dead's and Hendrix's official Web sites are offering previously unreleased live recordings that show rare, sometimes surprising glimpses of the three pioneering `60s acts.
The mail-order CDs come complete and unedited, offering a purity that many hard-core fans cherish. While traditional live rock albums have been in stores for decades, they are typically studio-enhanced efforts. Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek says the Internet releases feature the shows "as they went down." "It's a way to relive the concerts -- there we are in Boston, Detroit and New York City," Manzarek says in a phone interview. "The idea was just to make the concerts available to fans, and it's growing."
For `60s acts, the niche can help them stay commercially relevant in today's industry. Superstar acts such as the Dave Matthews Band, Radiohead and Phish all released live albums in 2001, along with popular charity efforts such as The Concert for New York City. But while bands like Dave Matthews rule the sales roost with today's chart-topping music, the Doors, the Dead, Hendrix and other classic- rock acts can offer history. The Doors have eight mail-order releases available -- two volumes of interviews, a radio show, a disc of 1969 rehearsal recordings, a disc of concert highlights, and three concerts from 1969 and 1970. There are four Hendrix releases -- two 1968 concerts, one 1969 show and a disc of demo recordings from 1969 and 1970. Hendrix's father and sister are releasing the discs through the Web site and company they established after winning the guitarist's copyrights in 1995. The family formed a label, Dagger Records, for the live releases.
"There is a huge base of fans out there who want more than the official (major label) releases B that's why there's bootlegs," said executive producer John McDermott, who helped launch both the Doors and Hendrix Web sites in 1998. "This was a way to look after the legitimate interest of those fans, without confusing the larger audience who want official releases."
www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4182/is_200202/ai_n10150635
