"WAKE UP!" AND "STRANGE DAYS": JIM MORRISON'S POETRY ENTERS ROCK MUSIC

 

The importance of poetry in the Doors' career is recognized and well known, particularly with its evocative presence within the concerts. A feature of Jim Morrison and his innovative genius, they are verses at once damned and sublime that set the California group's shows apart from all that had come before in modern music.

A lesser-known aspect of this unrepeatable expressive manifestation is the timing with which poetry emerges between the folds of the music played by the Doors. Starting in November 1965 they began their history as a band performing almost no-stop in hundreds of concerts until December 1970.

Until the fall of '66 Morrison maintained a relatively restrained attitude during the band's live shows, still not fully expressing his personality on stage. A second phase, which ends in the spring of 1967, sees a new intellectual dynamism assert itself in the singer's behaviour.

It is enough to generate the first poetic improvisations placed at the center of the songs or as a connection between them. With the spring of 1967, poetry becomes a primary element of the experiments that absorbed the frontman live; in fact, it is at this point that it gains increasing importance, soon becoming among the most intense moments of The Doors' shows.

From mid-1967 Morrison's interest would shift more and more to the poetic and theatrical aspect of the concerts, as confirmed by an interesting excerpt from an interview he gave in June of that year to an American newspaper.

Here he explains that: "I want audiences to feel the same catharsis that the ancient Greeks felt at their plays". We are at a time when the group was intent on recording its second wonderful LP "Strange Days". A period where Morrison's poetic vein was quickly growing, along with the heavy psychedelic influence that was shaping the songs on the record just mentioned.

This poetic-theatrical dimension gradually took the appearance of a precise section of the concerts, dedicated both to poems previously written by the singer and to improvised verses created on the spot. It does not take an entirely established form yet, leaving room for the inspiration that each evening suggested to Morrison. However, some of its parts will remain constant over time, such as, for example, the famous shout that introduces it, "Wake up!"

This exciting section led the concert into the dark and intoxicating meanderings made up of poetic verses and short poems. In this way, a shocking succession of disorienting moods and roaring vocal explosions took place on stage.

The rest of the band too entered the sphere of creative improvisation, following Morrison's words and screams with discordant sounds full of pathos. At the end of this unsettling journey, a sharp thump to the snare drum by John Densmore decisively set off the introductory theme of "Light My Fire".

So, in the summer of 1967 we witness the genesis of this astounding sequence, which, however frequent it would become live, would never be fixed on vinyl. Placing it in this period are two live recordings, the only ones from that months where we have the chance to hear "Light My Fire" played in concert.

The first one is a valuable bootleg that captures much of the performance dating back to July 4, 1967 in San Bernardino, California (also available on YouTube). It shows that the song starts directly, hence without being preceded by the series of poetic verses we have just described (listen at min. 23.14).

While this song was present in every concert, to be able to listen to it is much more difficult, because of the rare recordings that were made at the time. In fact, the next time in which we can hear "Light My Fire" in a recording is in Danbury (Connecticut) on October 10, 1967. Thanks to another bootleg, also available on YouTube, we can see how the incredible sequence has already fully taken shape (listen from min. 28.58 to min. 30.48 of the mentioned bootleg).

Although difficult to decipher in detail because of the low sound quality, the disruptive magic of the moment nevertheless clearly shines through. We must warmly thank those who, in their time, recorded these two little-known but immeasurably valuable artistic, historical and musical happenings.

Between these two recordings we have no other evidence that can make us further narrow down the time period that we have defined as precisely as possible: the summer of 1967 (from July to September).

However, one thing is certain: the creative process leading Morrison to introduce well-defined moments of poetry into the Doors' concerts coincides with the studio recordings of "Strange Days" (April-August 1967).

This coincidence is made even more appropriate when we note that this LP also features poetry without any kind of arrangement or musical structure. We are talking about "Horse Latitudes", track number five on "Strange Days". Incidentally, it is worth noting that this last composition had also become part of the concerts since the summer of '67.

So, this brief musical inquiry ends with the context in which the Doors' first poetic sequence (from "Wake Up!" to "Light My Fire") took place: the second half of the recording sessions of the "Strange Days" album. A timing not always taken into account when thinking about the introduction of poetry inside the Doors' live repertoire and into Rock music in general.

Thanks to mildequator.com for the newspaper article from which the sentence in italics is extracted.