|
unless you care to visit the strange world of the author's, I hate to say it, REAL hatred of Morrison, I'd skip it. Which begs my next question: WHY. The language of this book gets even more childish from there,which begs the question, HOW OLD IS THIS AUTHOR. He uses a strange plethora of "cool" language, like you're back in 8th grade, and he just walked straight out of "hep cat" heaven from the 1950s). (don't answer). This book is quite strange. He did NO research; he plagiarized straight out of "Light My Fire, Ray Manzarek's firsthand account book depicting both his personal and professional relationship with Morrison; and he even goes so far as to make up entire dialogs as if he had been a fly on the wall when these so-called conversations allegedly took place - which, unless he copped them out of other people's books, they did NOT. although I'm pretty Jim Morrison's reputation is immune to such absolute nonsense and blatant mean-spiritedness.
I went into this book really excited because I am a HUGE Morrison fan and have read everything on him as well as have loved his work seemingly as far back as I can remember. I don't know. He condescendingly calls Jim "Jimmy" throughout this book of fabrications. Waste of good money, waste of time. But, regardless of that, the author trashes EVERYONE - not just Morrison. According to this author, Morrison is the biggest loser on the planet, everyone hated him, and he had no talent. I find him to be one of the most charismatic, unique and talented rock & roll icons in the history of modern music. I feel that when he died, he took with him HIMSELF, and that his death was, and continues to be, a terrible loss for my generation who grew up with the DOORS.
This book is an absolute travesty on Morrison. it's just weird. This author seems to have a personal ax to grind here - and Morrison has been dead for nearly 40 years now, so. This author's strange (and excessively lewd for lewdness' sake), book will go down as a "weird deal." This man's mentality seems to be that of your typical 6-year-old child (no offense to six year olds). He treats Morrison with utter disdain and, yes, even contempt and possibly even hatred.
Jim Morrison is and always WAS amazing. Thanks. EVERYTHING about this author's vehement, seeming hatred of Jim Morrison rings loud and clear; but, unfortunately, Morrison's actual story does not. But for what it's worth, this book seemed to me to be nothing more than a desperate and childish (and somehow the word "disgruntled" and also comes to mind) attempt to literally ruin Morrison's reputation in some sort of in-arrears frenzy. Fortunately, I do believe Jim Morrison will stand the test of time as he ALWAYS has.
He also does this with anyone who ever knew Morrison, played music with him, was friends with him, had a professional relationship with him; and yes, who even merely contemplated Morrison's existence. Not only does this author say things like "so and so's rep was cred" (I guess that means someone's reputation was credible," or so it would seem. Which left me scratching my head wondering if this guy understands that Morrison's reputation is already pretty well set in stone.
Davis condemns Morrison in spite of himself. The book's strength is that it shows the Morrison's benders were not some effort to break on through to other side but desparate attempt by a sociopath to dull the pain he felt when he realized that all of his calls for trancendence ended in a hangover and a morning spent puking in whatever toliet was handy. Davis seems to want to have it both ways.
And yet by the end we are supposed to think of him as a great poet and a fine human being and an effective rebel against the war in Vietnam. While the book is much better than "No One Gets Out of Here Alive" Davis is still too enamoured of Morrison's mystique and the spirit of the 60's to seriously and objectively evaluate Mr. Morrison's poetry by any objective standard was an artless mish-mash of pseudo-Buddhist bathroom graffiti that even Morrison couldn't elucidate (even on those rare moments when he was sober) The music, of which Morrison did not write a note, was fantastic.
Mr. He shows his bandmates bitterly complaining (and rightfully so)about how he was almost useless as a collaborator. Mojo Risin's work and accomplishments.
He presents Morrison as an amoral and heavy disturbed alcoholic by urges the reader to take him seriously as a poet. Page after page he portrays Morrison drinking and throwing up on people.
There are several others way better than this junk. I would not recommend this book for any fan of Jim's. I have read many, many books about Jim and did not like this one at all. Thankfully I bought it used and did not spend much money on it.
It was the Morrison biography No One Here Gets Out Alive that got me excited about The Doors. I bought this book when it first came out. Unfortunately, that's not what happened.
When Davis does seem to show up for the writing of this biography, it's to claim Jim Morrison was a closeted homosexual based on the evidence that he hung out with some famous homosexual poets. After reading it, I gave the book to a cute girl neither of which I saw again. This, at best, seems ridiculous.
The program for this evening is not new, you've seen this entertainment through and through.-Jim Morrison.Stephen Davis is the author of the acclaimed Led Zeppelin biography Hammer of the Gods, so it was probably a no-brainer for someone to think he would write the definitive biography of Doors singer Jim Morrison. At times, it doesn't even seem as if Davis gave The Doors catalog a thorough listening as he claims that on Roadhouse Blues Lonnie Brooks played guitar and that you can hear Morrison yell "do it Lonnie, do it." when it's clearly "do it Robby, do it." Referring to Doors guitarist Robby Krieger. It's unfortunate about the girl.
Jim Morrison is a derivative biography relying on the interview and research of previous biographies. However, this book provokes no such excitement about The Doors.
But it is sloppy writing on Davis's part to report, as he does, on Morrison's connection with the Warhol crowd in NYC and then state that Warhol was shot "days" after Bobby Kennedy when, in fact, Warhol was shot the day before RFK was assassinated. If this is what Morrison was led to believe, then it's valid to report. This is not negativity. It's telling it like it was. But a meticulous, scrupulously informed author would be aware that Morrison was misinformed, that Dean did, in fact, die at the scene of the crash, and would note this in the text. We'd have no idea why he was arrested eleven times (should that be left out, too)., why the Doors were unable to go on lengthy tours, why so many Doors' concerts either ended up in near-riots, were canceled, cut short, or were so poorly performed that their fans (and the other Doors) were disappointed and disgusted. If you're looking for a mature account of Jim Morrison, this is your best place to start. That's the unvarnished truth.
This is easily the best-written of the Morrison biographies. Of course, a concise paraphrase addressing this topic would have passed muster and Davis probably should have done that. As a footnote, the previous Amazon reviewer prepared an itemized list of "errors" that Stephen Davis has allegedly made. It's possible for three members of a group to have three differing versions of the same event. Anything less would be a censored, Disney-fied version. Davis doesn't dwell on these episodes any more than he needs to. It's much better than the absurdly amateurish and slipshod "No One Here Gets Out Alive" which, for reasons that must be due to some type of mass hypnosis, is considered a must-read on Morrison. Some Amazon reviewers have called Davis's book "NEGATIVE." because Davis has reported Morrison's astonishing and deeply tragic alcoholism, drug use and loutish, often assaultive behavior.
Also, Morrison visited the site of James Dean's crash (over a decade later) and was feeling a connection with the dead legend until he was told that Dean actually "died at a hospital several hours" after the crash. But one cannot just lift material en masse in the way the reviewer seems to expect. First of all, the likely reason why Davis did not provide Ray Manzarek's reasons behind the adoption of The Doors as the band's name was because that would have verged on plagiarism (a sophisticated reviewer would know this). Sometimes, it's the author's fault (and then criticism is valid) but sometimes there is more than one version (Davis did some research, too, and also has a bibliography). I'm not sure if we'll ever have a truly definitive account of Jim Morrison and the Doors that will satisfy most readers (especially since Manzarek and Densmore are vying to be the official chronicler of the band's history).
Davis has not taken the time to verify or corroborate. This is indicative of someone who has not done his due diligence and it makes one wonder what else Mr. Frankly, if all this were left out, we'd have huge gaps in Morrison's story. As for all the other "factual" discrepancies (is a boot really worth that much analysis)., if you've ever read more than one book on a subject (e.g., the Beatles, James Dean, Elvis, Frank Sinatra, etc)., it's irritatingly usual for some basic details to conflict.
In the meantime, Stephen Davis's compellingly readable and polished account deserves a better rating than it's received from so many carping and griping reviewers. We wouldn't know what formed the basis for Morrison's increasing estrangement from the other band members and why the quality of their output became increasingly sub-par (with notable exceptions, of course). Charges of repetition overlook the car-wreck-fascination of these anecdotes and their essentialness in explaining the band's disintegration and Morrison's emotional and physical collapse.
|
