Jim Morrison's Death and Me

No One Here Gets Out AliveI had never owned an album by The Doors until this month.  Of course I knew of their "hits" but I never got past that.  I liked the songs but never dug deeper.  Never felt the need to. 

I find it amazing, yet uncoincidental, that Jim Morrison died on July 3rd 1971 when he was 27 and on this past July 3rd 2005, at the age of 27, I walked into a used book store with no predetermined purpose and bought "No One Here Gets Out Alive", the biography of Jim Morrison, subsequently turning into a first time Doors fan, buying their first 5 CDs in the span of a couple weeks, watching all Doors concert DVDs I could find, buying two of Jim Morrison's books of poetry..or as he would have preferred, James Douglas Morrison's books of poetry, and I just finished watching Oliver Stone's movie The Doors...yes...for the first time. 

There are no such thing as coincidences...there are only events that have meaning.

The Lords. Events take place beyond our knowledge or control. Our lives are lived for us. We can only try to enslave others. But gradually, special perceptions are being developed. The idea of the "Lords" is beginning to form in some minds. We should enlist them into bands of perceivers to tour the labyrinth during their mysterious nocturnal appearances. The Lords have secret entrances and they know disguises. But they give themselves away in minor ways. Too much glint of light in the eye. A wrong gesture. Too long and curious a glance.

The Lords appease us with images.  They give us books, concerts, galleries, shows, cinemas.  Especially the cinemas.  Through art they confuse us and blind us to our enslavement.  Art adorns our prison walls, keeps us silent and diverted and indifferent.

From "The Lords and New Creatures" 1969

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Acadian Meat Pie (Pâté)

Image
While growing up, it seemed that at some point every December my house would be filled with the most amazing smell - my mom making her Acadian Meat Pie (Pâté). It was so good - heated up, cold, plain, with molasses, with ketchup, whatever... it was so so good.  She was so good at it that for a long time that's what she would give her sisters for Christmas each year - and it's all they wanted from her. I can remember many Christmases helping her with the preparation: cutting the meats, dicing the onions, etc, and then over the next few weeks sneaking into the fridge with a knife..sawing off another piece and drifting off to savory heaven.  Delicious. Fast forward to 2011 and my mom dies of cancer - the first Christmas afterwards was of course pretty difficult.  Seems selfish, seems petty but I sure did miss that meat pie...and um...yeah her too of course. :) Survived that first Christmas and then heading towards Christmas of 2012 I thought I would try to make her meat pie.  Went
Read more

Liquid music... or how I made my fortune

Image
Well... I've just received the Music PEI award for Musician of the Year. What an honour!  Sincere thanks for Music PEI for including this award for all current, past, and future nominees and winners.  For many music awards organizations, most of the well deserved focus goes to mainline artists and groups for their creative contribution to the music scene. Totally legit, totally great.  Music PEI is one of the few that has the musician of the year category.  Grammys, Junos, ECMAs - none of these have this specific category.  So in these larger music award organizations, many musicians like Chris Gauthier , Nathan Condon , Dan Currie , and myself don't even get the honour just to be nominated.... and they should... because these musicians and countless other musicians across Canada and around the world are responsible for creatively and professionally and passionately supporting artists in rehearsals, on stage, in the studio, etc, etc.  They really do help to make things
Read more

One bass

Image
This time of year, a little over 20 Years ago, my life changed forever.    I'm not guaranteeing this will do the same for someone else but ...I have a perfectly good electric bass that I want to give away - for free. This is why... 20 years ago I was handed an upright bass in my grade 9 general music class in Birchwood.   I didn’t want it.  I hadn’t thought of it previously.  It just happened.  But then music entered my life. If someone told me that day that “you will become a professional musician and eventually teach upright bass at a university level”, I would have exploded with laughter in that persons face.  If someone on that same day told me “If you stick with music and study it at a university level this is where you will eventually meet your beautiful wife that you will have 3 beautiful children with”, I probably would have listened, but still not believed.  You see, I hated myself.  I had zero self esteem. Probably like a good portion of my classmates b
Read more