Customer Reviews

Light My Fire

5 star:		(51)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(16)
2 star:		(18)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Of all the books I've read about The Doors, my favorite has always been "No One Here Gets Out Alive," by Jerry Hopkins and Danny Sugerman. Until now. Now, unequivocally, it's "Light My Fire: My Life With The Doors," by Ray Manzarek, the keyboard player and co-founder (along with Jim Morrison) of The Doors. What makes this book so great is that Manzarek has a way of making you feel like you're there with him, and Morrison and the others, as he recounts that magical, psychedelic period of time between 1965 and 1971. As he puts it: "In that year we had an intense visitation of energy. That year lasted from the summer of 1965 to July 3, 1971." And as he writes, he as much as welcomes you into their lives, sharing their most intimate and personal moments. You're there with them on the beach in Venice, California, when Morrison first mentions to his friend Ray that he's been writing some songs; and it is in that moment that "The Doors" are born, and you're there, and it's as if it is one of your own memories. Manzarek writes with such obvious joy and fondness of this period of time in his life; of his memories of Jim Morrison, the charismatic and enigmatic poet whom he loved as a brother and still misses to this day; of his then girlfriend (now wife of all these many years), Dorothy Fujikawa, whom he adores; of finding guitarist Robby Krieger and drummer John Densmore and making The Doors a reality; and it's all done with such a Bradburyesque style and flair that by the time you're through you feel as though you're one of them, part of that unique inner-circle of friends. Of course, there's the down side, too, about which he is equally as candid as he is about the rest of it. How devastating it was, for example, to watch Jim Morrison's decline, his descent into the void of the bottle; how it began and why, and the reasons neither he, nor anyone, could help Morrison. He discusses quite frankly how his friend, Jim, the gentle poet with an exuberant love for life, would become "Jimbo," the self-destructive, counter-productive redneck. But throughout, Manzarek manages to remain upbeat and positive, concentrating on the love and good times, debunking many of the myriad myths about Morrison and the others, while painting an intimate portrait of who The Doors really were, and are. "Light My Fire," is poignant, incisive and alive; it is one of those books you are sorry to see come to an end. Like the short life of Jim Morrison, it's a shame there isn't any more.

Since this book appeared in 1998, The Doors--sans John Densmore, who had an iota of self-respect--have played Las Vegas. Thank God Jim Morrison didn't live to see his bandmates mutated into an embarassing lounge act, singing his songs in the performance graveyard that is Vegas.

It's clear Ray Manzarek does not like Densmore. It's clear now and it's bitingly clear in this book. Ray Manzarek has a real go at the history of The Doors, rewriting it exactly as he'd like it to sound in his mind. Ray conveniently ignores entire albums, tours, and other events in favor of waxing on about the chi, about how unbelievably incredible The Doors were and still are. He has a lot of love for Jim Morrison, but even this is tinged with a nasty shade of green. Instead of facing the fact that Morrison had a serious drug and alcohol problem, Manzarek creates an alter ego for Morrison known as 'Jimbo'. See, it's all 'Jimbo's' fault. Jimbo is the redneck alcoholic idiot that Morrison would become at random times, not the regular Jim Morrison who was a brilliant poet and all around nice guy.

You can imagine why he hates Densmore. Riders on the Storm, Densmore's version of the story, clearly shows that the drummer felt guilt over Morrison's spiral downward. Densmore came off as honest; he didn't beat the reader over the head with endless babble about Dionysus or the Age of Aquarius and the massive amount of acid Ray appears to have taken.

Meanwhile Manzarek would rather attach some kind of cosmo-spiritual explanation to Morrison's decline. He claims to have seen the spirit literally leaving Morrison's head the night of the final Doors performance in New Orleans in 1970. It's embarassing, it's manipulative and it speaks volumes about Ray's character.

Ray always looked like an erudite. He was well-spoken and he loved Morrison, backing his friend up as a serious poet.

However, Ray comes off as vindictive, clouded, and plain silly in this book. He has a serious beef with Oliver Stone, referring to him as a fascist, a term Ray still throws around like it's 1968. Ray was horrified at another version of The Doors' story by another artist since Ray wants it told according to hiw own memory. Unfortunately, what Ray remembers is very selective. This book spends eternity to reach the release of the first Doors album in 1967 and the same year follow, Strange Days. Ray just doesn't want to get too involved in the REST of The Doors' days. He hardly makes mention of the fact that after Morrison died the band kept going, releasing two studio albums and touring. Conveniently, those two albums STILL have never been released to CD. As with their impressive resume of doctoring live albums, The Doors are unmatched in selling the same material over and over while keeping the stuff fans really want tucked away (hence the boxset delay and its underwhelming content).

I would recommend this strictly as an offical version of the story from one of the band. However, be very careful in reading Ray's story. He wants everyone to remember The Doors only as he does...

I give this book 2 stars for the occasional first person insights into the Doors. But there is too little of it. There is too much of the rantings of a man who is apparently trapped in the 6os, and is undergoing a personal mind battle between himself as a flower child and a business man. He often comes on as one or the other of these two conflicting images.

Often he rants about the establishment and their love of power and money, but at the same time he exudes great excitement when he describes the business and money aspect of his music career; like the big bucks he got when 'Light my Fire' hit the charts and the new car and beach house he was able to then buy. Or when he describes getting his first royalty check from Elektra and "Grinning and Dithering" while he makes his wife guess at the figure. Then she "squeals" and they hug and yell "We're rich!" A few pages later he goes on ranting about power and money hungry people.

I found too much hypocrisy in his writing like when he keeps using the phrase "I hope the lovers win the war. Don't you?" Then a few pages later he comes on as anything but a lover with his nasty second-hand gossip about Morrison allegedly telling him that he didn't like John Desmore. Uh, wouldn't a true lover and person who preaches peace and goodwill amongst each other, have kept that to himself rather than basically telling the world "Jim liked me more than John." I mean, what does that serve other than hurting another man's feelings? Nasty stuff from a self professed lover of people.

"Break On Through" is a much more supperior book on this topic. And it is a shame. Because with Manzarek's personal insight into the group, he could have provided the greatest story....But instead he chose to hog the spotlight and put too much of himself, his hypocritical pseudo hippy rantings, and his mean spirited jabs at others who were a part of this chapter in his life, into this book. I was hoping for more. Instead he delivered mostly junk.

After reading this book I was left with the impression that Manzarek has a very narrow definition of what a poet should be. Thus he attempts to recreate Morrison to fit into this definition. Any of Morrison's personality traits which don't fit into Manzarek's image of a poetic genius (There seems to have been many in Morrison's case) he lamely dismisses as the bufoonish behavior of an alter ego he creates and calls 'Jimbo.'

Manzarek often refers to Morrison's associates, who do not share his own passions in life, as 'losers' and 'degenerates.' He describes a friendship Morrison had with two such individuals whom he shared an interest with in horseback riding and target shooting. Obviously, in Manzarek's view, such all-American activities should not be pursued by poets. Thus he forcefully confronts these men and tells them "Jim does not f***ing ride horses."...Only 'Jimbo' would ride horses.

He also describes Morrison as a nonviolent advocate of peace. Thus when he relays such incidents of Morrison getting into a brawl with Chicano low-riders or whacking a woman with a board, he dismisses this as the actions of 'Jimbo.'...Jim would never do such things.

I also get the feeling that Manzarek was not supportive of any artistic ventures that Morrison undertook independently of the Doors. He makes very brief mention of Morrison's poetry publication and, oddly I feel, offers no personal insight into this collection of works. When Morrison collaborates with several friends in the filming of a Doors documentary, Manzarek is skeptical of this artistic endeavor because only 'Jimbo' would lend his creative vision to a group of 'degenerates' who were unimpressive in film school. Manzarek also quickly dismisses Morrison's independent film project called "Highway" as a silly attempt at art... Only something 'Jimbo' would do.

I give this book 3 stars because I feel that Manzarek, unkowingly, provided deep insight into what was a very complex and often combustible relationship between himself and Morrison. It is obvious that Manzarek had great respect for Morrison as a creative genius and lots of love for him as a person. But reading between the lines I get the feeling that this relationship was not unlike that of a responsible individual and his rebellious and wayward kid brother. I also get the feeling, that like most relationships of this sort, along with the mutual love there is also a strong hint of mutual resentment.

Morrison was obviously a very complex person with many facets to his personality. One of which was a two-fisted Celtic boozer with a bit of 'good old boy' American South in his blood. And obviously those aspects of Morrison were (and still are) very difficult for Manzarek to accept. Thus he picks and chooses the traits of Morrison that he himself feels an artist should convey and attributes those to a man he loves and respects called 'Jim.' But any Morrison traits that do not neatly fit into Manzarek's own ideals of who a poet should be, he easily dismisses and attributes these to a man whom he resented and could not understand, called 'Jimbo.'

you get the sense in "light my fire" that manzarek is trying to put a little bit of a false happy spin on the brief stay of the doors in rock's ivory tower, but there is also a lot here that seems genuinely sincere and interesting. this is obviously happier and less dark than densmore's truly depressing "riders on the storm", but methinks that perhaps manzarek wanted to do his deceased friend jim morrison a favor by not completely spilling the unpleasant beans as densmore did. from both books we get the sense of morrison as a truly unhappy and tortured soul who had serious trouble relating to people and had an almost pathological urge toward self destruction. the tragic thing is that no one, however much they wanted to help morrison or save him from himself, ever seemed to really connect with him or get to the root of his self hatred and utter despair. one can only imagine what happened in morrison's shadowy past before he burst into the spotlight that would cause him to behave the way he did. with most people who eagerly destroy themselves in this way it usually turns out that things such as sexual abuse, parental rejection, or perhaps a chemical imbalance fuel their decadence, shuts them off from others and put the nails in their proverbial self made coffins. some people simply write off morrison's drug/alcohol abuse and hostility toward any kind of limits as a product of his genius and individual temperament, but this is too easy and far too romantic. like so many of the enigmatic legends of pop culture, morrison's motivations and the driving force behind his bizarre lifestyle and character is and will probably always remain a mystery. at the end of "light my fire" we are as in the dark about things as we are before we started it, but it is entertaining and at times informative and vivid. i would certainly recommend this book over oliver stone's horrendous film and the truly hoky "no one here gets out alive", both of which are sensationlistic, money grubbing examples of dishonor to the memory of this fascinating figure. read it.

There were two different Jim Morrisons, says Ray Manzarek, whose vision along with Morrison's created the group, and whose organ playing helped distinguish its sound.

There was the Good Jim. Poetic. Artistic. Polite. So unselfish he suggested the group split all royalties and songwriting credits equally although he wrote most of the songs and was responsible for the group's singular image. Drenched in the modern and avant-garde culture of the previous century. Possessor of a huge literary bookshelf which he knew so intimately he would win repeated bets that he could identify a book pulled from its shelf, just by hearing a few lines read from it at random. Possessed of a special Dionysian spirit that Ray saw as one of the unique forces of the 1960s, and of a desire to lead others to it. Ray thought an artist ought to be president some day, and that Morrison, with his good looks, WASP roots and Native American shaman vision, might just be the guy.

Then there was the Bad Jim, a persona Manzarek dubs "Jimbo" - a drunk with a mean streak and racist tendencies, who sought to destroy the Good Jim's poetic voice. Manzarek, married to a Japanese-American, felt this acutely. Alcohol brought Jimbo to the fore. Over the Doors' short lifespan - releasing albums from 1967 to 1971, with their touring curtailed after Morrison's 1969 obscenity bust in Miami - his bandmates found him increasingly difficult to work with, and never knew on a given day if poetic Jim or drunk Jimbo would show up.

When Morrison died in Paris in 1971, a death certificate attested merely that he'd died because his heart had stopped. Most likely, he had by age 27 drunk himself to death, perhaps aided by heroin. Jimbo had won out.

The good Jim is worth remembering. Doors music still resonates 40 years later because it was truly creative, and Jim Morrison was a large part of what made them special. Art rock as a movement is usually placed in the 1970s, but the Doors were ahead of the wave, with a sound and vision spawned in 1965 while the Beatles and Beach Boys were still dominating the airwaves with teen music.

Manzarek and Morrison met at the UCLA Film School. Primarily a musician, Manzarek says he was drawn to film as a medium because it drew on all the arts. His wife was an artist. Morrison, with no musical background, was a poet. The three of them, living together for a spell, drenched themselves in art of every sort. Early stoners and acid heads, they were genuinely in pursuit of the muse.

There lurks a suspicion nowadays that modernism, in every genre, is bogus, allowing the untalented, unschooled and unskilled to rip off the unsuspecting. Think of every ridiculous modern "artwork" whose creator ever conned an art museum into devoting prime space to it - when all it was, was an entire canvas painted orange. Or a red one with a green dot in the middle. Or a sneaker nailed to a canvas. Something that made you think, "I could have done that. But why would I have wasted the time?"

The Doors remind us it doesn't have to be like this. Manzarek and Morrison were avant-gardists but also well schooled, drawn together initially through their mutual appreciation of modernist jazz master John Coltrane. Manzarek had played classical piano as a youth, had grown up in Chicago where he was exposed firsthand to the Chicago blues during its heyday in the 1950s, and had a comfortable familiarity with rock and other pop genres. Morrison had no musical background but had mastered a good century or so of avant-garde literature - Rimbaud, Celine, Jean Genet, Kerouac, the other Beats and many more. While in school, they dug all those New Wave film directors. Drummer John Densmore was a jazz drummer and also a Coltrane fan. Guitarist Robby Krieger had a background in flamenco and folk, picking the guitar with his nails instead of using a pick.

Their sound was their own - blues, jazz, rock, flamenco. Morrison's unique poetry reflected his own personal search for the beyond; their very name alluded to a William Blake poem and to their desire to strip away the barriers to true perception of reality. The Doors were modern but still artists, succeeding because they had a strong foundation in modernism of every genre and a background in classical work as well.

The Doors, artists trying to break the commercial pop or rock band mold, faced an uphill battle. Numerous record companies rejected their sound as too different and too threatening. The Doors couldn't coast; they had to be good.

They pursued their art the way artists in more classical genres go about it, standing on the shoulders of those who had gone before, immersing themselves in the modernist oeuvre - that's not an oxymoron - as they set out to create its next step.

Morrison sought for man to become free, personally and sexually. His work hasn't dated because he focused on timeless themes like sex, death, life, and rebirth, using universal imagery such as sun and water. Manzarek concurred and hoped this freedom would effect a social and political transformation. Ecstatic liberation is more likely to yield chaos, as the Doors learned the hard way in Miami when their stage nearly went down amidst thousands of surging fans. And while according to Manzarek, Morrison never actually flashed Mr. Mojo Risin' at the crowd - instead taunting and teasing the crowd with their own crude desire that he do so - his irony was easily lost on the judge and jury that convicted him.

Manzarek's telling is overripe with California New Age speak, a mish-mash of Eastern and Western religious influences, constant references to "chakras" and other mystical gobbledygook, and an obsession with finding "fascism" everywhere. Whatever one may think about it in light of later events, though, it's true to its time. This is what 1960s ferment was about. The Doors went where no one had gone before. That's what artists are supposed to do.

It absolutely blew me away when I realized that this book goes from around 1967 to 1971 in scarcely more than 50 pages!!! The preceding 300 or so are from before 1967, including setting up the Doors, Ray's life, etc, etc. But to blow from Strange Days to the death of Jim Morrison in 50 or 60 pages?! Ray, you have got to be kidding me. It's as if the book was going too long, the author was told to get it done, so he breezed through five albums, tours, Miami, the trial, etc. No talk about the 1970 tour? All the different shows? So many stories? THAT'S what the people wanted to hear. Not eight hundred thousand references to Dionysus and the chi and why LSD is so great. The amount of pro-drug talk in this book should get Ray put away in the clink! I think the last thing the author needs is more acid. I like dealing with whole albums and all of the songs in one chapter, yet from Venice Beach, 1965, when Ray hears Jim sing "Moonlight Drive" to him up until the first album takes FOREVER to get to. (I'm sure Ray can really remember half of it.) I thought this had the potential to be the BEST Doors book out there, but it doesn't even come close. Another lackluster Doors book on the shelf...

I think the drugs have seeped too far into Ray Manzarak's brain. The man is clouded. Trying to get through his mythological and Dionyssian explanations for Jim Morrison and the music of the Doors is laughable at best. Not only that, while I used to think that Ray was the most articulate member of the band, I am shocked when he writes with such lack of elegance and class. With his comparisons to various gods and spirits and dieties maybe Ray should have been an anthrolopoligist. Sadly, I think the aura of the Doors, and the heavy drugs have fried this man's feeble mind.

Manzarek is enthusiastic, and this enthusiasm is sometimes catching. However, it really can't overcome the noxious combination of arrogance and mean-spiritedness that run throughout the book. The Doors--according to Manzarek--were the most ground-breaking, mind-blowing band ever, and anybody who doesn't like them unreservedly is to be viewed with utter scorn. And then there are his vicious little attacks on various people: Oliver Stone (whose sin, it seems, was portraying the Doors as men rather than gods), Andy Warhol (more talent than you ever had, Ray), and, perhaps most tellingly, John Densmore (I'm temted to attribute this to a dislike of Densmore's Riders on the Storm, but that seems a bit too simplistic, given the level of meanness on display here--who knows, really?). This last one really disturbs me quite a bit: he tries to conceal it most of the time, but his contempt for the Doors' drummer is all-too-obvious. The best bit in this manner is a scene that has no significance in terms of the rest of the book, but instead serves to say, in essence, "Jim never liked you anyway". Nasty stuff. His respect for Morrison is obviously real, but it's equally obvious that he is, shall we say, whitewashing certain aspects of the singer (and the band in general, of course). A full studio version of Celebration of the Lizard was never recorded because "it wasn't ready to be set down," or something to that effect--not, I emphasize, because Jim was never sober enough to go through the whole thing. Mm hm--following on that note, it's incredible how he glosses over much of the band's career--The Doors and Strange Days receive loads of detail; Waiting for the Sun through L.A. Woman receive almost none. Also interesting to note is the fact that he somehow "forgets" to even mention in passing the two albums that the band recorded after Morrison's death--evidently he can't rationalize this, so he chooses to ignore it. Peachy! All in all, Manzarek isn't a bad writer, and this could have been a truly brilliant memoire, but the large amounts of bile and revisionist history get in the way. Densmore's account had a ring of honesty and truth to it: this emphatically does not.

While I agree with other reviewers who cite Manzarek's mean-spirited attacks on Oliver Stone and John Densmore, I still reveled in this book. It captures the feel of the era better than any other I've read but for possibly Alice Echols' study of Janis Joplin's life and times, Scars of Sweet Paradise.

Unlike Echols, Manzarek writes with the vibrancy and immediacy of someone who was not only there but in the midst of "where it's happenin' now." I found myself alternately laughing and crying at his ability to recapture what life in the 60's could be like.

Don't pass this one up just because it's marred by the author's bias. After all, the Doors' story is HIS story too, so I'd say he's entitled to grind a few axes if he wants.