Thoughts On The Morrison Myth

[TheWallsScreamedPoetry]

This piece was from a nice lady who I met in Stockton Library's Internet cafe and who spoke to me as I had a Doors T Shirt on. She did not like the other Doors and was just a fan of Jim. She did several articles for Scorpywag but then moved away and I lost touch with her.

Through a Glass Darkly: Thoughts On The Morrison Myth
by Kynaston’s Bride from Middlesbrough, England.

Is Jim Morrison alive and well and living somewhere in Oregon on a farm making CDs and do we actually care?
How much disappointment would the revelation that Jim had in fact ‘really’ faked his own death and set off on a sojourn around the world finally settling into the life of a ‘son of the soil’ have on The Doors community. Personally I think that would really spoil the day of the majority of Doors zealots.
The Doors Thought Police who religiously guard the memory of one of rocks most treasured icons (and one of rocks most bankable) would shit in their pants at the thought of Jim Morrison seeing what his ‘fans’ had done to him. We tend to like our rock-stars lean, mean and preferably dead so we can worship them without the added embarrassment of them making assholes of themselves in old age as with Mick and Rod.
The recent publication of Ray Manzarek's lamentable Poet In Exile simply fuels the fire of the Morrison Myth and is one of the more disgraceful aspects of the ‘Jim is alive and well and living in Bolivia’ sect.
Let’s face it none of this is new as Morrison spotting began before the body had even cooled. From the earliest days of ‘Phantoms Divine Comedy’ and the famous radio show where ‘Jim’ appeared for a chat before disappearing into the ‘American Night’ we have been inundated with sightings and theories as to how he died or didn’t. The Oregon Farm story is just one of a number of insane sites on the internet which claim to belong to the ‘still alive’ Jim Morison's friends or business partners, he currently even has his own web-site... such is the insanity surrounding the mans death.
In the 70’s someone in South Africa made an urgent call to Elektra for a couple of thousand dollars to hire a helicopter to rescue Jim who was lying on the Congo riverbank with two broken legs. Then some crafty Aussie asked for his royalty cheques to be forwarded to the Outback where Jim was living, later Jim was seen opening a bank account in Frisco. Jim is secretly Morrisey!
It never ends.
Books like Bob Seymore’s ‘The End’ which claimed to have found the answers to the mysterious demise of The Lizard King instead simply created more questions. Such as….. if Bob could have located such a wealth of paperwork relating to Jim’s death 20 years on then how easy would it have been to clear up this mystery in 1971?
Cynics would argue that Morrison was worth more as an icon whose death confounded and confused fans for 30 odd years rather than a sad burn-out who croaked from overindulgence and neglected health.
The so-called reliable witnesses who keep crawling out of the woodwork to remember in such startling detail how Morrison snorted half a tonne of Heroin thinking it cocaine whenever they smell a book deal simply add confusion to an already enigmatic debate.
The band themselves with their arcane ‘if anybody could do it Morrison could’ references fuel the fire and rack up the dollars in T Shirt sales and ‘Best Of’ albums with Jim’s Young Lion look adorning the cover.
How often do the band, their organization or we fans consider Jim himself.
The man wanted to be remembered as nothing more than a poet with a lot of opinions on life and some rather fine words.
He would be appalled to find that he was now nothing more than a T-shirt, lunch pail or a fridge magnet remembered now for flashing his cock at Miami and getting pissed a lot.
His contempt for the ‘Light My Fire’ set at Doors concerts culminated in Miami when in his own words he ‘put an end to it in one glorious night’ little knowing how this one act of defiance would define him as an artist for the next four decades.
Even his last resting place can turn a buck as organised trips to Paris to see Jim’s grave and take in the atmosphere of ‘Morrison's Paris’ are more popular than EuroDisney. With every July 3rd Paris is invested with loonies of every kind trying to outdo each other in the insanity stakes who mingle with those well meaning fans who are truly devoted to ‘Jim Morison Poet’ rather than ‘Jim Morrison insane bastard’. Recently some one was selling a pendant made from a chip taken from his headstone I’m surprised that nobody has as yet dug the guy up and sold his bones on E-bay as cuff-links.
On the DCM site you can buy parking tickets that Jim won by getting drunk and forgetting where his car was or go to
E-Bay where you can purchase copies of ‘Weird Scenes’ autographed by Jim the year after he died.
Psychics are never slow to get in on the act and I have seen have several magazine articles where Jim has given his thoughts on Hip-Hop and whether Stone’s movie was any good or not.
So we have psychic messages from beyond the grave from a guy who has his own website and is selling CD’s from an Oregon barn! Weird!
Then we have the famous footnote to ‘No One Here Gets Out Alive’ where Danny hints that Jim may not be dead but have faked his death to escape Florida’s insane idea of justice. Is this Morrison Myth seriously out of control? Without a doubt. Ray’s recent book which turned Jim into Yoda fanned the flames of the ‘he’s still alive set’ whilst The Doors movie sent the zealots into an overdrive of indignation which still prowls the internet today waiting to pounce on anyone not subscribing to their ‘mantra’.
My host has been the victim of these people on several occasions receiving a death threat for subscribing to the idea that The Doors Movie was actually a work of note ………...
(not an idea I subscribe to but I respect the guys right to the opinion.)
Am I guilty of this as anyone.? Of course, I am as guilty as anybody of buying into the Morrison Myth and lapped it up in the 70’s and am still fascinated by it today. I have visited the Paris site on several occasions and seen first hand the crazies who drip blood and wine on the Poets grave, the posers in their leather trousers trying to emulate Morrison and instead looking like sad little lost clowns. I have witnessed the Doors ‘tribute’ bands in Paris bars and danced the night away to Doors discos. Last year I was present at the Ray & Danny show and was both fascinated and appalled at the scenes I was a passive spectator to.
Thirty years on and it seems to me that to quote Matt Johnson ‘we’ve forgotten the message and worship the creed’. And I find that so sad!
Jim Morrison was one of the finest rock poets of his generation. True he was never able to fulfil his potential due to the nature of the times he lived in but he left a legacy that deserves better than those who keep that legacy alive.
His three band-mates and their cronies make the joke about Yoko Ono and dead beetles pale into insignificance as they sell and sell Jim Morrison ‘The Young Lion’ on albums, T Shirts, posters and any bloody thing else they can fit the photo onto.
Does it not occur to them why did Jim deliberately put on weight and grow a beard? He was sickened by what he had become. Teen Idol! He hated that.
His efforts to distance himself from that hated image of himself probably contributed to his death as the drink, depression and pressure of living up to the impossible image that today is as prevalent in record stores and book stores as the McDonald ‘M’ is to our town centres.
Would Jim approve of all these excesses? Most probably as he would get a laugh out of the insanity of it all. After all didn't he once say that it wasn’t meant to be taken seriously. And what do we do? We take it so seriously Jim is in danger of beating ‘Jedi’ as the worlds next official religion.
So am I accusing people of hypocrisy? Not at all for to do so would be foolish as I have bought in to the same hype and have actively pursued the same trail as any long standing Doors acolyte….
the grave site, the endless ‘Best Of’ albums, the movie, the myriad collection of books. I was as angry as any at Oliver Stone. What this goes to show is history is not always best found in the library and certainly not the video store and sometimes ‘history’ tells ‘lies’. Will we ever know the truth about who Jim Morrison really was? I doubt it as the lure of lucre has long since eroded any possibility of a serious examination of the ‘man’ behind the ‘myth’. Jim sells and that is all that matters now to the Doors industry. What chance would we have of hearing his poetry without the added interruption of Ray and Co. Not much when The Doors would rather just re-package another ’Best Of’ CD with a picture of Jim from 66/67 on the front. The ‘Man’ had been overtaken by the ‘Myth’ even before his grave was filled in and I doubt if that will ever change.
The sickening news of his band mates taking The Doors name out on the road with rock asshole Ian Astbury only adds to the disquiet and makes me sad that The Doors will now ultimately be remembered as a bunch of sad old guys trying to rediscover the fire that burned in 1967 rather than the most dynamic and thought provoking rock outfit to ever to grace a stage.
A sign of the times I guess but it makes me so angry and so sad.
What I am saying is do not hold Jim Morrison up as some sort of religious icon and stop selling the guy out whether on E-Bay, DCM or from the hallowed halls of Doors central. He was first and foremost an artist.
He believed in his art and lived that belief don’t take away his integrity for the sake of a few bucks!
I leave the final word to the Man himself …...
“It’s all done tongue-in-cheek. I don’t think too many people realise that. It’s not supposed to be taken seriously. It’s supposed to be ironic.” KB.

From TheDoors4Scorpywag September 2002