Ray Manzarek
3. 7. 2007
Alan Ginsberg was fabulous. The man is so filled
with energy. He's 65 years old and he's just loaded with energy and
charm and wit and his mind is constantly racing.
Any poet getting used to working with electric instruments and then, to do it by yourself, it just wasn't quite the same.
Doors' songs would go through a metamorphosis. Doors songs would go through these various permutations and changes before they finally appeared on record.
Drugs shouldn't be used for recreation although they can be, but ultimately the point of psychedelics is to put you in touch with the powers of the universe.
Films couldn't exist without technology.
Five minutes before it's time to go on stage, and there goes Jim being carried out by two people. They put him into an ambulance, hit the siren and drove off.
Full length, a feature, make a feature. My feature film debut, and I get to direct a feature film.
I actually studied music. I sat at the piano and read music, yes.
I appreciate everyone liking what I did, but without any one member of the band, The Doors wouldn't have been The Doors.
I certainly appreciate everyone liking what I did but again I'll have to keep coming back to the fact that without any one member of the band, The Doors wouldn't have been The Doors.
I do a lot of Samba stuff. I love the rhythms of Brazil.
I got a bachelor's degree in economics at De Paul University, and went to law school at UCLA, where I stayed for about two weeks.
I guarantee you, corporate takeovers will destroy this planet. This is the only one we got. You destroy this planet, and this planet is gonna turn into Mars.
I love French food, but after a week and a half of French food, it's a little effete.
I need three million dollars to make a low-budget, intellectual, artistic, exciting, erotic movie with a great soundtrack.
I think I'm a very poor piano player.
I think Jim died too early for us to complete our seven year cycle. It was five years into it and we needed another year or two to complete a seven year cycle and it was over with.
I think Jim died too early for us to complete our seven-year cycle. It was five years into it. We needed another year or two.
I think that's what makes The Doors special in that everybody in the band was into the same sort of thing.
I thought I would get an advanced degree in philosophy.
I thought we were gonna open up the world of poetry and music to all kinds of things, and yet, I can't really think of anyone who's done anything like it since.
I wish people would get hip to it already, so I don't have to talk about it anymore and explain what the '60s were all about and explain psychedelic and all of that.
I'll never forget seeing Jim Morrison carried out on a stretcher. We were in Germany, playing with Canned Heat.
I'm basically a cocktail jazz kind of pianist. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a very good keyboard player. People think I think I'm good. I think I'm a very poor piano player.
I'm basically a cocktail jazz kind of pianist. That's what I play, you know.
I'm surprised the Germans would get anything wrong.
If Jim had come back from Paris, that might have been the next step in The Doors' career. There was just so much going on. We probably would've got very strongly into making films but never had the chance.
If there was no black man there would be no Rock'n'Roll. The beat, the rhythms of Africa are what created Rock'n'Roll and Jazz.
In Amsterdam, we did our best. The power existed in every member of The Doors. We all understood that sinking into the rhythm of the music. It was invariably an incredible show.
In college I was involved in economics at De Paul University and then I went to UCLA to study film, So music has always been sort of a sideline for me.
It was 1963, I was playing in a jazz band in Los Angeles. Jim was a student in the film department. Jim wasn't a musician. Jim came to some of the gigs that we played.
It was good music and it was fun to do and we had a good time doing it but it just wasn't the same without him and to continue on without Morrison just wasn't the right thing to do.
It was great working with Philip Glass. Philip Glass composes in a similar fashion to working out arpeggios to what I like to play anyway, with a rhythmic pulse to it.
It's rare to see a poetry reading with all that intensity coming back from the audience. It was great.
Jim could say a few words and then stop and let the music take it for five minutes and then come back and he could talk for 10 minutes.
Jim had been dead for a long time and The Doors hadn't played together... some of the ferocity had gone out of us. We'd been through a lot and didn't feel a great rage inside of us.
Jim wanted to be known as a poet, first and foremost.
Jim would just read and the words kinda ran together. So we would cut in between phrases and sentences to expand it to allow some musical air to go in between.
Jim, as just a spoken poet, was not that good. He needed the music behind him. He felt a security and a sense of abandon when the music existed around him.
Let's stop working for the money and start working for the planet. The hippie stuff is a lot more fun than the cocaine and heroin that people are taking today.
Man, the drugs people take today, I cannot believe. I absolutely agree with Just Say No to drugs. Crack? The worst stuff in the world. Heroin? The worst.
Movies were very important. The art-form of the 20th century.
Music, theater, photography, all the things I was interested in all went together into film. I was always involved in theatre groups and music.
On my father's side there were two brothers who left Poland at the same time. I come out of the one who went to Chicago rather then Brazil, so I guess I've got some relatives down in Brazil.
Radio stations didn't know what to play poetry.
Rock 'n' roll is like a circus today.
Some of the songs took a long time to come together, but most of 'em were pretty quick. We were all in tune with each other.
Stop the drugs. I'm just waiting for the young people to put on their fighting boots. It's either gonna be corporate takeovers and yuppies will rule with the BMW's or it's gonna be people who love the planet.
That's perhaps one of the keys as to why The Doors played well together is that the musicians all listened to each other.
The 60s people worked together. In the 90s they work for the individual ego.
The Doors had come full circle and it was now time to close The Doors.
The Doors listened to each other. We could always hear... we knew what Jim was saying. I knew what John was doing, I could hear Robbie.
The Doors listened to each other. We knew what Jim was saying. I knew what John was doing, I could hear Robbie.
The Doors movie is a pack of lies. It did not make money. You want to make money in America? Tell the truth.
The Doors were never that good as musicians.
The Doors were never that good as musicians. Perhaps the best we could play was cocktail jazz.
The Doors were successful. It was Jim Morrison as the centre and the figure and the spokesman, the figurehead, but we were all into the same thing. That's why we were a band.
The Golden Scarab is just my baby entirely. That's all about that's the hero's journey, that's Joseph's Campbell. That's why it is called a rhythm myth.
The only thing that ultimately matters is to eat an ice-cream cone, play a slide trombone, plant a small tree, good God, now you're free.
The original contract was finished with L.A. Woman and then after Jim died and we decided to carry on, we signed with Elektra Records for a five album contract and we did two records on the contract and then we decided not to continue any more.
The power existed in every member of The Doors. We all understood that sinking into the rhythm of the music and we all tried to do that and when we all did it together it was invariably an incredible show.
There's a body there, but that's not Jim. The energy, the spirit, the intellect, the heart, the soul of Jim Morrison is not there.
They didn't really care as long as they got to hear Light My Fire.
Through all of history mankind has ingested psychedelic substances. Those substances exist to put you in touch with spirits beyond yourself, with the creator, with the creative impulse of the planet.
We did shoot a lot of footage of The Doors, mainly off stage. We've got one sequence of The Doors sitting around playing cards. Someday we'll get around to doing something with that.
We did shoot a lot of footage of The Doors... mainly off stage.
We didn't have Morrison... we did the best we could and tried to sing as well as we could. Nobody else in the band had the charisma of Morrison.
We needed Jim, Jim needed us, we all worked together, and when Jim was there he was the leader and we would go with him and allow him to go insane.
We put The Doors to bed. We didn't feel this was the greatest music. It was fun to do but to continue on without Morrison just wasn't the right thing to do.
We went on stage with the Jefferson Airplane, Jim started singing with Grace Slick and hugging her. Then he danced off the stage, went back into the dressing room and passed out cold.
We were on the beach in Los Angeles communicating with the sun.
We've got race wars in America. Lousy products. You can't breathe the air. The whole country is mad at each other. So how can you be creative? You can't. You can't even have good sex.
Well, we went to the film school and we were involved in movies.
When you're glad to be alive, good ideas come. The reason good ideas don't come today is because we're all bottled up with greed and anger. We're mad.
Yeah, right, right, on both sides, mother and father. They're both from Poland.
You just didn't get up onstage and play your part and go crazy playing your part, and not know what the singer was singing!
Any poet getting used to working with electric instruments and then, to do it by yourself, it just wasn't quite the same.
Doors' songs would go through a metamorphosis. Doors songs would go through these various permutations and changes before they finally appeared on record.
Drugs shouldn't be used for recreation although they can be, but ultimately the point of psychedelics is to put you in touch with the powers of the universe.
Films couldn't exist without technology.
Five minutes before it's time to go on stage, and there goes Jim being carried out by two people. They put him into an ambulance, hit the siren and drove off.
Full length, a feature, make a feature. My feature film debut, and I get to direct a feature film.
I actually studied music. I sat at the piano and read music, yes.
I appreciate everyone liking what I did, but without any one member of the band, The Doors wouldn't have been The Doors.
I certainly appreciate everyone liking what I did but again I'll have to keep coming back to the fact that without any one member of the band, The Doors wouldn't have been The Doors.
I do a lot of Samba stuff. I love the rhythms of Brazil.
I got a bachelor's degree in economics at De Paul University, and went to law school at UCLA, where I stayed for about two weeks.
I guarantee you, corporate takeovers will destroy this planet. This is the only one we got. You destroy this planet, and this planet is gonna turn into Mars.
I love French food, but after a week and a half of French food, it's a little effete.
I need three million dollars to make a low-budget, intellectual, artistic, exciting, erotic movie with a great soundtrack.
I think I'm a very poor piano player.
I think Jim died too early for us to complete our seven year cycle. It was five years into it and we needed another year or two to complete a seven year cycle and it was over with.
I think Jim died too early for us to complete our seven-year cycle. It was five years into it. We needed another year or two.
I think that's what makes The Doors special in that everybody in the band was into the same sort of thing.
I thought I would get an advanced degree in philosophy.
I thought we were gonna open up the world of poetry and music to all kinds of things, and yet, I can't really think of anyone who's done anything like it since.
I wish people would get hip to it already, so I don't have to talk about it anymore and explain what the '60s were all about and explain psychedelic and all of that.
I'll never forget seeing Jim Morrison carried out on a stretcher. We were in Germany, playing with Canned Heat.
I'm basically a cocktail jazz kind of pianist. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a very good keyboard player. People think I think I'm good. I think I'm a very poor piano player.
I'm basically a cocktail jazz kind of pianist. That's what I play, you know.
I'm surprised the Germans would get anything wrong.
If Jim had come back from Paris, that might have been the next step in The Doors' career. There was just so much going on. We probably would've got very strongly into making films but never had the chance.
If there was no black man there would be no Rock'n'Roll. The beat, the rhythms of Africa are what created Rock'n'Roll and Jazz.
In Amsterdam, we did our best. The power existed in every member of The Doors. We all understood that sinking into the rhythm of the music. It was invariably an incredible show.
In college I was involved in economics at De Paul University and then I went to UCLA to study film, So music has always been sort of a sideline for me.
It was 1963, I was playing in a jazz band in Los Angeles. Jim was a student in the film department. Jim wasn't a musician. Jim came to some of the gigs that we played.
It was good music and it was fun to do and we had a good time doing it but it just wasn't the same without him and to continue on without Morrison just wasn't the right thing to do.
It was great working with Philip Glass. Philip Glass composes in a similar fashion to working out arpeggios to what I like to play anyway, with a rhythmic pulse to it.
It's rare to see a poetry reading with all that intensity coming back from the audience. It was great.
Jim could say a few words and then stop and let the music take it for five minutes and then come back and he could talk for 10 minutes.
Jim had been dead for a long time and The Doors hadn't played together... some of the ferocity had gone out of us. We'd been through a lot and didn't feel a great rage inside of us.
Jim wanted to be known as a poet, first and foremost.
Jim would just read and the words kinda ran together. So we would cut in between phrases and sentences to expand it to allow some musical air to go in between.
Jim, as just a spoken poet, was not that good. He needed the music behind him. He felt a security and a sense of abandon when the music existed around him.
Let's stop working for the money and start working for the planet. The hippie stuff is a lot more fun than the cocaine and heroin that people are taking today.
Man, the drugs people take today, I cannot believe. I absolutely agree with Just Say No to drugs. Crack? The worst stuff in the world. Heroin? The worst.
Movies were very important. The art-form of the 20th century.
Music, theater, photography, all the things I was interested in all went together into film. I was always involved in theatre groups and music.
On my father's side there were two brothers who left Poland at the same time. I come out of the one who went to Chicago rather then Brazil, so I guess I've got some relatives down in Brazil.
Radio stations didn't know what to play poetry.
Rock 'n' roll is like a circus today.
Some of the songs took a long time to come together, but most of 'em were pretty quick. We were all in tune with each other.
Stop the drugs. I'm just waiting for the young people to put on their fighting boots. It's either gonna be corporate takeovers and yuppies will rule with the BMW's or it's gonna be people who love the planet.
That's perhaps one of the keys as to why The Doors played well together is that the musicians all listened to each other.
The 60s people worked together. In the 90s they work for the individual ego.
The Doors had come full circle and it was now time to close The Doors.
The Doors listened to each other. We could always hear... we knew what Jim was saying. I knew what John was doing, I could hear Robbie.
The Doors listened to each other. We knew what Jim was saying. I knew what John was doing, I could hear Robbie.
The Doors movie is a pack of lies. It did not make money. You want to make money in America? Tell the truth.
The Doors were never that good as musicians.
The Doors were never that good as musicians. Perhaps the best we could play was cocktail jazz.
The Doors were successful. It was Jim Morrison as the centre and the figure and the spokesman, the figurehead, but we were all into the same thing. That's why we were a band.
The Golden Scarab is just my baby entirely. That's all about that's the hero's journey, that's Joseph's Campbell. That's why it is called a rhythm myth.
The only thing that ultimately matters is to eat an ice-cream cone, play a slide trombone, plant a small tree, good God, now you're free.
The original contract was finished with L.A. Woman and then after Jim died and we decided to carry on, we signed with Elektra Records for a five album contract and we did two records on the contract and then we decided not to continue any more.
The power existed in every member of The Doors. We all understood that sinking into the rhythm of the music and we all tried to do that and when we all did it together it was invariably an incredible show.
There's a body there, but that's not Jim. The energy, the spirit, the intellect, the heart, the soul of Jim Morrison is not there.
They didn't really care as long as they got to hear Light My Fire.
Through all of history mankind has ingested psychedelic substances. Those substances exist to put you in touch with spirits beyond yourself, with the creator, with the creative impulse of the planet.
We did shoot a lot of footage of The Doors, mainly off stage. We've got one sequence of The Doors sitting around playing cards. Someday we'll get around to doing something with that.
We did shoot a lot of footage of The Doors... mainly off stage.
We didn't have Morrison... we did the best we could and tried to sing as well as we could. Nobody else in the band had the charisma of Morrison.
We needed Jim, Jim needed us, we all worked together, and when Jim was there he was the leader and we would go with him and allow him to go insane.
We put The Doors to bed. We didn't feel this was the greatest music. It was fun to do but to continue on without Morrison just wasn't the right thing to do.
We went on stage with the Jefferson Airplane, Jim started singing with Grace Slick and hugging her. Then he danced off the stage, went back into the dressing room and passed out cold.
We were on the beach in Los Angeles communicating with the sun.
We've got race wars in America. Lousy products. You can't breathe the air. The whole country is mad at each other. So how can you be creative? You can't. You can't even have good sex.
Well, we went to the film school and we were involved in movies.
When you're glad to be alive, good ideas come. The reason good ideas don't come today is because we're all bottled up with greed and anger. We're mad.
Yeah, right, right, on both sides, mother and father. They're both from Poland.
You just didn't get up onstage and play your part and go crazy playing your part, and not know what the singer was singing!
