Post by TheWallsScreamedPoetry on Mar 5, 2010 13:47:59 GMT
Jim Morrison Fan Tribute 17
The Doors
“The strangest life I’ve ever known”
“And so it came to pass that the Erlking met the Changeling & touched him. And the Changeling turned to dust”
The 3rd July 1971, 5.00 am, 17 Rue Beautreillis, Paris, France
“No safety or surprise, The End”.
And so exits one James Douglas Morrison, The Lizard-King, The Changeling, writer, poet and human being.
I was 9 at the time & couldn’t believe that the man I had seen less than a year ago at East Afton Farm, Freshwater, I.O.W was no more. I know that it is universally agreed that this concert was far from Jim at his best, but nevertheless there was something about the man that just grabbed me by the balls and shrieked “Wake up”. However, not one to wallow in the mists of romantic rock memory, I would like to point out that aged 9 my main enduring memory of East Afton Farm was more in relation to the poor quality of toilet facilities at 2 am, rather than seeing an exhausted Morrison & co.
Nevertheless when someone is yelling “wake up” at you through a WEM P.A. system at 2.30 in the morning…you bloody well take notice!!
34 years on I still have the same passion for the man, the music and the poetry…& still a hatred for festival toilet facilities!!
It has been suggested that Morrison was “the misunderstood poet living within the constrictive confines of the rock medium”, however I have to disagree.
For me music was the perfect medium for Morrison to express himself in, well certainly in the beginning, & even Morrison himself admits that “songs are special….music liberates my imagination”.
As Douglas Adams so eloquently wrote about the effect of a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster being “like having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick”, so Morrison’s lyrics hit me with a similar force.
This is not to say that there are no shades of grey to The Doors, far from it. What The Doors create for me is images & characters in a series of vignettes…music that has no borders but is gradually faded into its background at the edges. Sometimes these images are stark reflections of someone at the end of the road, someone that has lost hope and is waiting for The End “can you give me soft asylum, I can’t make it anymore. The man is at the door”.
Other times they reflect hope,
“I’ll tell you this, no eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn”…..but always tinged with a sense of urgency.
No sitting down on your arse bitching about how life’s so unfair for The Doors, if you want to change the world then get of your arse and make it happen
“they have the guns…but we have the numbers”.
By Chris Cordell from Brighton, England.
The Doors
“The strangest life I’ve ever known”
“And so it came to pass that the Erlking met the Changeling & touched him. And the Changeling turned to dust”
The 3rd July 1971, 5.00 am, 17 Rue Beautreillis, Paris, France
“No safety or surprise, The End”.
And so exits one James Douglas Morrison, The Lizard-King, The Changeling, writer, poet and human being.
I was 9 at the time & couldn’t believe that the man I had seen less than a year ago at East Afton Farm, Freshwater, I.O.W was no more. I know that it is universally agreed that this concert was far from Jim at his best, but nevertheless there was something about the man that just grabbed me by the balls and shrieked “Wake up”. However, not one to wallow in the mists of romantic rock memory, I would like to point out that aged 9 my main enduring memory of East Afton Farm was more in relation to the poor quality of toilet facilities at 2 am, rather than seeing an exhausted Morrison & co.
Nevertheless when someone is yelling “wake up” at you through a WEM P.A. system at 2.30 in the morning…you bloody well take notice!!
34 years on I still have the same passion for the man, the music and the poetry…& still a hatred for festival toilet facilities!!
It has been suggested that Morrison was “the misunderstood poet living within the constrictive confines of the rock medium”, however I have to disagree.
For me music was the perfect medium for Morrison to express himself in, well certainly in the beginning, & even Morrison himself admits that “songs are special….music liberates my imagination”.
As Douglas Adams so eloquently wrote about the effect of a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster being “like having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick”, so Morrison’s lyrics hit me with a similar force.
This is not to say that there are no shades of grey to The Doors, far from it. What The Doors create for me is images & characters in a series of vignettes…music that has no borders but is gradually faded into its background at the edges. Sometimes these images are stark reflections of someone at the end of the road, someone that has lost hope and is waiting for The End “can you give me soft asylum, I can’t make it anymore. The man is at the door”.
Other times they reflect hope,
“I’ll tell you this, no eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn”…..but always tinged with a sense of urgency.
No sitting down on your arse bitching about how life’s so unfair for The Doors, if you want to change the world then get of your arse and make it happen
“they have the guns…but we have the numbers”.
By Chris Cordell from Brighton, England.