When someone asks me if I like The Doors, I always want to ask for more information before I answer. Because conversations beginning with that question never go the way I hope.
Example One: The Ideal Exchange
Random Person: Do you like The Doors?
Me: I like them okay.
RP: Me too.
Me: They made some pretty good records.
RP: Yep.
Example Two: The Exchange That Usually Happens
RP: Do you like The Doors?
Me: I like them okay.
RP: Have you read No One Here Gets Out Alive?
Me: I've never quite gotten around to it.
RP: Because Jim Morrison...
Here is where the person goes off on an incredibly long ramble about the genius of Jim Morrison and I have to pick the correct way to cut them off.
If it were a record store customer I would have had to choose the most polite route which would have been diverting the conversation back to the music of The Doors. I like their music and am more than willing to have a discussion about their records. If it's someone I talk to regularly I can get away with snapping, "I don't care about Jim Morrison!" and be done with it.
While that is not entirely true, I use it as shorthand to avoid a loooong discussion about how he was misunderstood, and a poet, and on and on. I think that Jim Morrison was a good singer, and from all accounts he was an excellent frontman. I like his voice and I think that The Doors made some interesting albums. But I am not ready to elevate Jim Morrison to the level of sainthood that others think he deserves. He was the singer for a rock and roll band.
When I was nineteen I had a Doors phase. I bought all the albums (including An American Prayer) and listened to them periodically. Eventually I realized that the Doors phase was not for me and I sold off all of the albums, except the Greatest Hits record I had owned since eighth grade. A couple of years later I missed their music and started re-buying the albums. Of course, the records that I had once purchased for three dollars each were now in the eight dollar range so I haven't quite finished re-acquiring them yet.
So overall, I think it is safe to say that I like The Doors. However, I do not like what some surviving members of The Doors are doing this very minute. Robby Krieger and Ray Manzarek are on the road right now, touring as The Doors. Last I checked, fifty percent of Queen is not Queen, therefore fifty percent of The Doors is not The Doors.
This is actually old news because they have been performing as The Doors for a while now. I'm thinking it's been almost a year. Quite some time ago LCG called me to gleefully announce that Ian Astbury was the new singer for The Doors. Um, no? I think that Ian Astbury is a terrific singer but if he wants to be in a Doors cover band he should go start his own. I could usually avoid this new Doors-based band, but then they scheduled a tour stop in my very own town.
I have been seeing the posters advertising the show all over the place and I am not happy with them. They are labeled as The Doors for the 21st Century and the poster art is the album cover photo from Strange Days. I checked all the mime faces to see if they had slipped Ian Astbury's face in there, but I didn't see him.
Then I heard a radio commercial for the concert. "The original Doors with Ian Astbury on vocals." Well, that wouldn't be the original Doors now, would it? I heard that John Densmore, the other surviving member of The Doors, is suing the touring members. He doesn't want them using The Doors name and I can't say that I blame him. I have also heard that both the parents of Jim Morrison and the parents of Pamela Morrison are suing Robby and Ray. I believe they all want the tour stopped because it is undermining the work of the real Doors group.
When LCG found out The Doors were coming to town, he thought it would be awfully funny if I went to the concert.
LCG: So, do you want to go see The Doors?
Me: It's not The Doors.
LCG: I know, but you like Ian Astbury!
Me: Why is he doing this?
LCG: Just go and holler for Fire Woman.
Me: So I end up getting ejected from a fake Doors concert? I don't think so. I know! I'm going to stage a protest. I am going to get me a sign that says Fifty Percent Of The Doors Is NOT The Doors and I am going to stand in front of the theater. I'll call channel nine's news tipline. They don't have anything better to do than cover a protest of one.
LCG: True. You don't have to tell them it's just you.
Me: Oh, they would still show up. Do I need to get a permit for my protest?
LCG: I don't think so.
Me: Yeah, I think protests attended by one person aren't a problem.
LCG: You should do it. It would be really funny.
Me: I dunno, it's on a weekday. If I'm going to take a night off work it's going to be for something better than the fact that Ray Manzarek pissed me off.
This is not the first time Ray Manzarek has pissed me off, that pompous blowhard. I saw him on VH1 several years ago when they still had their show called The List. It was a panel show (I think the guests changed once a week) and the low-grade celebrities would be given a topic and they had to make lists. Because it was The List. For example, maybe one night the topic would be Sexiest Video Ever Made or Best Eighties Song or what have you.
One night the topic was Most Socially Relevant Song or something like that. The sort of list that just begs to be filled with Neil Young titles. Well, one of the panelists on that show was Ray Manzarek, and his number one Socially Relevant Song (or something like that) was The End. As in The End by The Doors. Dude, get over yourself! But it seems obvious to me that at least two members of The Doors are still not over themselves, or they wouldn't be touring as The Doors.