by Robert Wilkinson
December 8 is the 76th birthday of Jim Morrison, the shamanic poet, lead singer and frontman for the Doors. We also send up a big Happy to Gregg Allman and Toots Hibbert. We have amazing videos of live performances!
We begin our celebration with Jim Morrison (December 8, 1943 – July 3, 1971). A creature of great talent and great excesses, he flamed out at a very young age thanks to too much alcohol and dancing too close to the edge without a safety net or much of a sense of proportion. Still, he was a unique talent, and quite a powerful musician and poet. So for your enjoyment, here are the Doors!
From January 1, 1967, the Doors live on tv performing the song that introduced them to the world, the electrifying "Break On Through (To the Other Side)." Here's the music video of the Doors doing "Break On Through (To the Other Side)"
From July 1967 on Dick Clark’s American Bandstand, here are the Doors performing “The Crystal Ship” and “Light My Fire.”
Live on The Ed Sullivan Show, here’s an audio only clip of the Doors performing “People Are Strange”
From Dec 1967, live on The Jonathan Winter Show, ”Moonlight Drive” and “Light My Fire.”
From 1967, the Doors live in Connecticut in an audio-only performance of “the Crystal Ship”
Some of these are performances, some are set to stills. This is a live March 1967 performance at the Matrix in SF of a bunch of great songs from the Doors' first three albums. First, “Break On Through,” then "Back Door Man," followed by the haunting poetry of "Crystal Ship." From the same show, a live performance of one of my Doors favorites, "My Eyes Have Seen You."
Also from the Matrix, the Doors doing "Light My Fire," the great "Twentieth Century Fox," and “Soul Kitchen”
From the Matrix off their second album, "People Are Strange," followed by the incredible "Moonlight Drive." From the third album, "Summer's Almost Gone." We close this set from the Matrix with "Unhappy Girl," and a 13+ minute performance of "The End."
From 1967, here's the music video of the Doors doing "People Are Strange."
From the same year and album, here’s the music video of “Strange Days” (VERY surrealistic!)
And now for some live concerts! Here are Jim, Ray, Robbie, and John doing what they do best at the Hollywood Bowl in July 1968! It’s the entire 1 hour and 11 video of that legendary Hollywood Bowl live performance! For your enjoyment, the Doors at the Hollywood Bowl 1968
Because the video of the entire show disappears from time to time, here are individual clips from the show! We begin with a dark 13 minute journey via one of my all-time favorite Doors tunes “When The Music’s Over,” followed by "Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar) and “Back Door Man"
We move into the heart of the show with a clip that uses footage from several concerts, the ominous “Five to One,” followed by ”Moonlight Drive” and “Spanish Caravan.”
We move into the poetry of the “Horse Latitudes" followed by “Celebration of the Lizard,” and complete this part of the show with a grinding “Hello I Love You” followed by a great 11+ min performance at the Bowl of Jim doing some poetry before busting into the long form of “Light My Fire.”
We’ll complete this set with The WASP (Texas Radio and the Big Beat)” which we'll follow with “The End” and close with “The Unknown Soldier”
Speaking of that last song, the Doors made a truly haunting video at the time which obviously was banned from television, just as the song was banned from many radio stations. Pretty graphic and stark way of looking at the Vietnam (and any) war. If you want a haunting antiwar statement, please take 3:43 to look at this official video of “The Unknown Soldier”
The Doors Live in Europe has disappeared again. This was a fabulous 90 minute offering of that legendary 1968 tour done in 1991, but this year I could only find individual clips totaling about half that time. The first clip with autoload the others. it’s worth a look! The Doors Live in Europe 1968
Here’s an excellent 1 hour 55 audio-only show from Sweden! The Doors in Stockholm 1968
From that show, an audio only clip of “Whiskey Bar” and "Wild Child."
From the Roundhouse in London, here’s a great live 4 minute video of “Five to One”
Here’s the audio only live set from the Roundhouse of “Five to One” “Break on Through” and “When the Music’s Over”
I found it again! Here’s a great 28 min. video from Danish TV in October, 1968 of The Doors Live in Denmark 1968 (Set list: “Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar),” “Back Door Man,” “The WASP (Texas Radio and The Big Beat),” “Love Me Two Times,” “When The Music’s Over,” and “The Unknown Soldier.”)
Here’s another documentary from that Summer and Autumn tour of Europe and the UK! The footage is from their Roundhouse concert in London.
The Doors Are Open Part 5 has disappeared.
From the original Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in December 1968, the Doors performing “Wild Child”
From 1968, some very strange footage from the time of “Not to Touch the Earth”
An interesting mishmash of video images from random places set to the studio version of “Waiting For The Sun”
From a 1969 Live at the Toronto Rock and Roll Revival, a very strange video set to their opening tune, “When The Music’s Over”
Their second tune in the set! "Break on Through”
Here’s 14 minutes of the audio from the show, set to strange videos eventually becoming a fragment of the performance. “Light My Fire”
Here’s the audio-only full 56 minute set! "The Doors Live at the Toronto Rock and Roll Revival – 1969
While they were in Toronto, and went on a sound stage for this magnificent performance. This is the song from their first album that usually closed their performances which shows how electrifying they were when they exploded on the LA scene in the mid-60s. This is seriously explosive musical power! Welcome to “The End.” And in a real treat, here are Ray, Robbie, and John talking about how the song came to be. This was before “Light My Fire” was a hit. The Doors – Live in the Studio in Toronto.
From 1969, three great live performances on PBS of the Doors!
From 1969, here's all 40 minutes of the PBS special. The Doors PBS Soft Parade Television Concert
Live in 1969 at the Aquarius Theater, the rehearsals of “Build Me A Woman” and “Peace Frog” and “Blue Sunday”
Here’s the studio version set to various footage!
Here’s the title track from the album “The Soft Parade”
Here are the original studio versions of one of their first hits, the darkly poetic “Crystal Ship” and one of their last hits, “Love Her Madly”
From 1969, the legendary Rock is Dead studio session! The Doors Rock is Dead session pt 1 (10+ min)
The Doors Rock is Dead session pt. 2 (10 min)
Here’s the audio-only The Doors - “Without A Safety Net”
From 1969 in Miami, here's an audio-only live performance of the Doors doing their menacing "call to arms" from their third album, "Five to One."
Here’s a great live performance set to video footage from 1970 in Honolulu of the harrowing “Five to One”
From the Felt Forum in 1970, a live audio-only performance set to stills of the Doors doing "Gloria" and "My Eyes Have Seen You." From the same show, “Peace Frog/Alabama Song/Back Door Man/Five to One”
This year I found several links to their multiple Felt Forum shows! These are entire sets which will autoload, so enjoy the Doors at their peak! The Doors at the Felt Forum – First Show
The Doors at the Felt Forum – Second Show The Doors at the Felt Forum – Third Show The Doors at the Felt Forum – Fourth ShowHere’s one last live performance video from the legendary 1970 Isle of Wight Festival! “The End”
Two years ago I had a 38 minute documentary on the Doors called Feast of Friends but the whole thing can’t be found this year. However, I did find this!
The Doors – Feast of Friends Pt 1 (9+ min)
The Doors – Feast of Friends Pt 2 (10+ min)
The Doors – Feast of Friends Pt 3 (10+ min)
The Doors – Feast of Friends Pt 4 (8+ min)
Here’s the 12+ minute The Road of Excess – A Documentary on the Doors
For your enjoyment, VH1 Legends – The Doors pt. 1 (10 min) and VH1 Legends – The Doors pt. 2 (10 min)
The hour plus clips of this have disappeared. Instead, here a link which will take you to various segments of VH1 Storytellers – The Doors (features various lead singers backed by the surviving Doors)
I found it again! Here’s an interesting 42 minute documentary titled Doorstown – Jim Morrison and the Doors
This one appears and disappears! This is a great hour and 21 documentary narrated by Johnny Depp titled When You’re Strange – The Documentary
Last year I didn’t have the full documentary but found it in 8 parts, so I’ll leave it up in case the whole story disappears again. For your enjoyment, “When You’re Strange – The Documentary Pt. 1
When You’re Strange – The Documentary Parte 2 When You’re Strange – The Documentary Pt. 3 When You’re Strange – The Documentary Pt. 4 When You’re Strange – The Documentary Pt. 5 When You’re Strange – The Documentary Pt. 6 When You’re Strange – The Documentary Pt. 7As a fitting close to this birthday tribute, I found Jim's last performance. Broadcast on Australian TV from LA, 1971, it’s rehearsal footage of The Doors doing "Crawling King Snake." (And yes, it does sound like “Back Door Man.”)
Happy Birthday, Dead Shaman. As you once wrote, "There will never be another one like you, there will never be another one who will do the things you do...." Optical Promise or Optical Brahmins? And it's true that nobody before you ever did what you did, and nobody has ever done it since.
When you Sagittarians flame on, you really do it in a big way. I suppose that shooting stars are only with us a short while. Aum Namah Shivaya!
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Today is also the birthday of the great Gregg Allman (December 8, 1947 - May 27, 2017), brother of Duane and co-founder of the Allman Brothers Band. If you want to hear his keyboard work, please check out the recent birthday tribute to his Scorpio brother, Happy 2020 Birthday to the Skydog, Guitar Wizard Duane Allman, where you'll find plenty of Gregg's work. If you want a small bite of their greatest period, here's 25 minutes from September 1970! The Allman Brothers Live at the Fillmore East - 1970
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Last but not least, we now close our show with some pretty funky reggae from a pioneer in the genre who just checked out a few weeks ago, Frederick Nathaniel "Toots" Hibbert (8 December 1942 - 11 September 2020). One of the originals from Jamaica, this singer and songwriter gave us some of the best reggae and ska music ever made, and invented the word “reggae” in the late 60s. Considered to be the purest and best music ever made in Jamaica, Toots and the Maytals have an infectious sound, and make you want to sheik yerbouti! This music is as happy as the Doors were dark, so enjoy Toots and the Maytals!
We begin with some studio cuts! Here’s the first record ever to use the name “reggay.” For your enjoyment, the birth of a sound! “Do the Reggay”
From the soundtrack of The Harder They Come, the infinitely danceable groove of “Sweet and Dandy.”
Live and acoustic, this is a great video performance of "Sweet and Dandy."
Also from that great movie, another smash hit! From the same excellent acoustic set as the last clip, Toots takes us to church with one of his biggest, "Pressure Drop."
Here's the original studio version of “Pressure Drop”
One more time for this classic, this time live on tv in 2004 giving us a very smooth performance of “Pressure Drop”
They also scored big with “Monkey Man”
Here’s Toots live on Jools Annual Hootenanny in 2010 giving us an uptempo performance of “Monkey Man,” and from the same gig, “Pressure Drop”
Another hit for the Maytals! “Take Me Home Country Roads”
Here’s a live performance! “Take Me Home Country Roads”
I found it again! Here’s a great one hour BBC documentary titled Toots and the Maytals Live at the BBC
Rare footage! From 1962 at the Club Sombrero, 5 minutes of early Maytals doing ska! Toots and the Maytals Live at the Sombrero Club
For your enjoyment, a great 54 minute concert! Toots and the Maytals Live at the Markthalle – 1982.
A real score! Live at Winterland in 1975, an hour of the best! Toots and the Maytals Live at Winterland 1975 (Set list: “Monkey Man,” “Time Tough,” “In The Dark,” “Pressure Drop,” “54-46 That's My Number,” “Funky Kingston,” “I've Got Dreams To Remember,” “Broadway Jungle,” “Take Me Home Country Roads”)
For all of his biggest in one clip, here’s a full hour of The Best of Toots and the Maytals
For our close, a 50 minute performance! Toots and the Maytals Live at Glastonbury
The encore's a gem! From Keith Richards' album Run Rudolph Run, the bonus track Keith did with Toots and the Maytals. Toots got himself a great guitar on this one! For your enjoyment, Keith Richards with Toots and the Maytals performing "Presure Drop."
© Copyright 2019 Robert Wilkinson
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