“PALACE IN THE CANYON” BY THE DOORS: A HIDDEN GEM

Of all the songs not recorded on The Doors albums but played live, none is as little known and little celebrated as "Palace In The Canyon”.

We are in the final phase of Jim Morrison's journey within the band: December 1970. About four months later he would leave for Paris and the other three members would never see him again (he would die in the French capital on July 3^rd).

On December 11^th ‘70, The Doors played in Dallas, Texas, a concert that was fortunately recorded as a bootleg.

This live show is part of a series of concerts designed to introduce the public to the new LP ("L.A. Woman"), which was actually recorded between the end of December '70 and the beginning of '71.

Although the sound quality is not good, the Dallas performance is an important document in the band's history. In fact, it is the last live recording available before Morrison's death.

Also featured on this historic live performance is an unknown and unusual song, "Palace In The Canyon", which was never mentioned during the recording sessions for the album that, as mentioned above, they were putting down on vinyl in that same period.

Moreover, no trace of the song appears at any other time in the quartet's career, either onstage or in the studio, leaving the December 11^th, 1970, Dallas concert as the only documented evidence of its existence.

A kind of discographic mystery that in no way diminishes the desperate beauty and heartbreaking magic evoked by this enchanting hidden gem in The Doors' repertoire.

The conception of the piece can be attributed to Morrison, first in the form of a poetry and then by sharing it with the rest of the group to give it its final shape.

The arrangement of drums, electric organ and electric guitar built around the singer's poem is remarkable in at least two ways.

The first is the striking musical innovation it represents; the second is the gloomy charm it exerts on the listener.

Song or poetry set to music? In this case, the answer can be left to personal preference, as we are faced with a declination of the rock genre unheard of in 1970 (and beyond).

Lacking a well-defined form, "Palace In The Canyon" unfolds through a succession of verses, along which the performance becomes increasingly agitated and intense.

The sound atmosphere created by the band is based on two main elements.

The first is the solemn funeral march, repeated by John Densmore on drums, which accompanies the unfolding of the composition with constant and sad resignation.

The second element is found in the elongated chords of Ray Manzarek's electric organ, which seem to expand space and time, as if to free the listener's perception from all constraints.

On this instrumental background, Robby Krieger's electric guitar, to which is applied the so called "wha wha" distortion, intervenes with short and recurring phrases with a sad and bitter taste.

In the finale, these guitar phrases become more incisive, almost becoming a solo, capable of underscoring the anguished rage that characterizes the final minute of the tune.

Of course, what fills "Palace In The Canyon" with the haunting sadness that makes it so wonderful is Jim Morrison's vocal performance.

The latter  stands at the evocative intersection of singing and dramatic acting. A musical territory never before explored by any voice in such a way, in which the frontman manages to combine love, disappointment, drunkenness, disillusionment, frustration, tenderness, despair and rage.

The vocal part follows an upward trajectory in power and harshness throughout the three and a half minutes of the song, hand in hand with the progressive overlapping of the human side with the purely artistic side of the singer.

In the final moments of "Palace In The Canyon" we hear the heartbreaking, painful and angry cry that Morrison hurls at the microphone and the sky at the same time.

It represents the focal point of the piece: the tragic conclusion of a journey of life and music that began 4 years earlier, with the energetic and mysteriously sensual scream we hear at minute 1:50 of The Doors' first released single, "Break On Through (To The Other Side).

The lyrics of “Palace In The Canyon” sketch the loneliness of a poet whose soul is torn apart by an impossible and fatal love (for life and for Pamela Courson), yet lived to its unbearable agony.

The melancholic lyrics are perfectly combined with the beautiful melody and the original vocal line in a grim poetic ceremony suspended between fire and tears.

With the gloomy and stern presence of death already upon him, Morrison delivers to posterity, with a blank look and a burning heart, the testament of a cursed and bright genius whom career was nearing its sad end.

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