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The Doors Unhinged: Jim Morrison's Legacy Goes On Trial (2013)

by John Densmore(Favorite Author)

3.64 of 5 Votes: 4

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Percussive Press

review 1: Only for hardcore Doors fans, this stream of consciousness book is clearly his own view, and not fine writing or editing either. It would be easy to criticize him for making money off a book when he was stridently opposed to his bandmates making millions selling out to commercials and touring as The Doors. But the difference as he writes it is, he was fine with them touring as "of The Doors," he just didn't want them advertising & touring as THE DOORS. I do admire his (costly) stand against "the Greed Gene" - as captured in a quote from Tom Waits, "there are some of us...who still have principles and cannot be bought. John is one of them. He is not for sale."
review 2: The central topic of Densmore's book is that of "selling out". Densmore uses the book as ... morehis vehicle to argue against selling out - a topic which became important to him in the late 1960s as he witnessed Jim Morrison go bizerk after Manzarek, Densmore and Krieger all sold one of the Doors' songs to Buick for a car commercial without Jim's approval. Morrison was 100% against letting their music be used for advertising purposes and Morrison threatened to jack hammer a Buick on stage if the contract wasn't rescinded - which it eventually was. This topic of not allowing your artwork to be used for commercial advertisement is a very interesting issue with many nuances on both sides of the argument. Densmore makes the case for his side - against using art for commercial advertisement - without getting too deep into the woods in regard to the other side of the argument. He basically dismisses the other side as being the devil child of the "Greed Gene" and admits that had also once been a victim of the greed gene. This rather simplistic black and white B-movie view of the opposition prevents Densmore's argument from being very strong. There are a lot of angles to the opposition's perspective which he could have tackled, but Densmore basically avoids them and generally falls back on his WWJD (What Would Jim Do) rationale for his behavior. Maybe if Jim actually was still alive then Morrison would have the eloquence and spirit to take on the opposition's many nuanced positions. But Densmore is not Morrison. Denmore keeps it simple - which makes for a mediocre read. less

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