When Doors keyboardist and Chicago native Ray Manzarek talks about his band's legacy and its new touring incarnation as The Doors 21st Century, he doesn't separate the two thoughts.
"Jim would love The Doors of the 21st Century, because he's a poet and his words are being spoken out one more time to a new audience. What more does a poet want?" Manzarek says, eating bratwurst and sipping root beer in the Loop's Berghoff Restaurant.
Ray Manzarek
Raymond Daniel Manzarek (born February 12, 1939 in Chicago) was the keyboard player in the rock and roll band, The Doors, from 1965 to 1973 and again since 2001.
Manzarek also recorded a rock adaptation of Carl Orff's "Carmina Burana" with Philip Glass, produced Los Angeles band X, and played with Iggy Pop and backed San Francisco poet Michael McClure's poetry readings.
Rick And The Ravens was the band Ray Manzarek was in before he joined The Doors. Because of his voice Ray was also known as "Screamin' Ray Daniels" ."Rick" was Manzarek's brother.
He is also currently directing a movie called Riders on the Storm, due to be released in 2005.
Raymond Daniel Manzarek, born February 12, 1939, in Chicago, is The Doors keyboard player. He attended UCLA Film School.
"I grew up in Chicago and left when I was 21 for Los Angeles. My parents gave me piano lessons when I was around nine or ten. I hated it for the first four years—until I learned how to do it—then it became fun, which is about the same time I first heard Negro music. I was about 12 or 13, playing baseball in a playground; someone had a radio tuned into a Negro station. From then on I was hooked. I used to listen to Al Benson and Big Bill Hill—they were disk jockeys in Chicago. From then on all the music I listened to was on the radio. My piano playing changed; I became influenced by jazz. I learned how to play that stride piano with my left hand, and knew that was it: stuff with a beat—jazz, blues, rock.
"At school I was primarily interested in film. It seemed to combine my interests in drama, visual art, music, and the profit motive. Before I left Chicago I was in theater. These days, I think we want our theater, our entertainment to be larger than life. I think the total environmental thing will come in. Probably Cinerama will develop further.
"I grew up in Chicago and left when I was 21 for Los Angeles. My parents gave me piano lessons when I was around nine or ten. I hated it for the first four years—until I learned how to do it—then it became fun, which is about the same time I first heard Negro music. I was about 12 or 13, playing baseball in a playground; someone had a radio tuned into a Negro station. From then on I was hooked. I used to listen to Al Benson and Big Bill Hill—they were disk jockeys in Chicago. From then on all the music I listened to was on the radio. My piano playing changed; I became influenced by jazz. I learned how to play that stride piano with my left hand, and knew that was it: stuff with a beat—jazz, blues, rock.
"At school I was primarily interested in film. It seemed to combine my interests in drama, visual art, music, and the profit motive. Before I left Chicago I was in theater. These days, I think we want our theater, our entertainment to be larger than life. I think the total environmental thing will come in. Probably Cinerama will develop further.
| "I think The Doors is a representative American group. America is a melting pot and so are we. Our influences spring from a myriad of sources which we have amalgamated, blending divergent styles into our own thing. We're like the country itself. America must seem to be a ridiculous hodgepodge to an outsider. It's like The Doors. We come from different areas, different musical areas. We're put together with a lot of sweat, a lot of fighting. All of the things people say about America can be said about The Doors. |
| Nothing about Ray Manzarek's career has been ordinary. Keyboardist with The Doors, record producer (notably the rock band X), solo artist: in these and other pursuits, Manzarek has studiously avoided any hint of compromise or predictability. It's only appropriate, then, that his first album for A&M Records is another extraordinary effort: a contemporary interpretation of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana. |
| Carmina Burana, written in 1935 and first performed in 1937, is a vocal and instrumental cantata based on a series of medieval poems (most likely dating from the 13th Century) written in Latin by a group of renegade monks. Manzarek was aided by the noted composer Philip Glass (who co-produced the album) and some of Glass' closest musical associates. Manzarek chose to perform the work in an instrumental setting that would have been impossible in Orffs time: instead of working with an orchestra, he arranged the music for an electric jazz-rock band, including members of a group called the Fents and Manzarek himself on keyboards. |
| The details of Manzarek's career have been well documented by now. In 1966, after graduating from UCLA, he and classmate Jim Morrison decided to form a rock 'n' roll band. That band, The Doors, went on to become America's premier rock band, record eight platinum albums' (and three platinum singles') worth of material before Morrison's death in 1971. Manzarek and fellow remaining members went on to make two more Doors albums before disbanding for good in 1973. |
| Manzarek then made two solo albums, The Golden Scarab and The Whole Thing Started with Rock 'n' Roll, Now It's Out Of Control. In 1976 he put together Nite City, his first working band since The Doors; they recorded two albums, only one of which was released in the United States. The late 70's was a period of intense activity for Manzarek. He participated in the completion of An American Prayer, an album of Jim Morrison's poetry and the Doors' music. He was asked to write some of the music for Francis Coppola's "Apocalypse Now," a task that Ray's schedule ultimately did not permit him to fulfill, (eventually Doors' music would be used for the soundtrack). He witnessed a remarkable Doors renaissance, as renewed interest in the group resulted in the reappearance of several of their albums on the charts, heavy airplay, various TV and film documentaries and a best-selling Morrison biography (co-written by Ray's personal manager/publicist, Danny Sugerman). |
| Manzarek himself was at the center of the new music scene that sprang up in Southern California. He produced X's Los Angeles, an album that brought both group and producer considerable acclaim; he has also produced the three subsequent X albums. All in all, Ray Manzarek has not been lacking things to do. |
| Carmina Burana, Ray says, "is a piece I've always loved. Four or five years ago, I went out and bought the piano and vocal score. I wanted to find out exactly what Carl Orff was up to in one particular section, as far as the rhythmic structure. The section was called 'The Dance'; I tried to keep my foot tapping along with it, but the rhythm kept turning around, and I wondered what he was doing . . . it was brilliant. So I got the music, and once I'd checked it out I was hooked. |
| "The aspect of Gregorian chants with strong rhythm - which is essentially what Carmina Burana consists of - is something you don't normally hear," Manzarek adds. "I think that's what intrigued me about it in the first place . . . the power and passion . . . But, I heard it with even more emphasis on the rhythmic foundation, and that's what I set out to do with it." |
| Manzarek, with production assistance from A&M's David Anderle, made demos of four Carmina Burana sections. Those tapes found their way to Philip Glass, a composer whose many works have included the opera Einstein on the Beach (1976), the musical theater piece The Photographer (1982) and soundtrack music for such films as "Koyaanisqatsi'' (1982). Glass expressed an interest in Manzarek's project; he and Kurt Munkacsi, who has co-produced all of Glass' recordings (and who has also produced the Waitresses and engineered for John Lennon, Brian Eno, Ornette Coleman and others), agreed to produce Carmina Burana. Michael Riesman, another frequent Glass collaborator, played synthesizer and conducted the 10-member vocal ensemble used on Manzarek's album. |
| "Once the Carmina Burana team was assembled, Manzarek discovered an almost inexplicable affinity among the project's various components. The whole minor overtone in Gregorian chants is, in essence, Doors music," he explains. "And that plugs into the modal idea of late '50's jazz - like Miles Davis' Kind of Blue one of my favorite records. That's the way I like to play. And working with Philip Glass was perfect. He plays like I do; I play like he does. We have a very similar harmonic, rhythmic and melodic approach, based on working off of chord structures. We're coming from the same place, only he comes from the classical end and I come from the rock end. |
| "Philip Glass, Carl Orff, Ray Manzarek: We're all revolving around the same central point of rhythm and harmony. It's a marriage made somewhere . . . I don't even control it." |
| Other than reducing Orff's 25 parts to 16, Manzarek and company stuck to the original score. But the instrumentation differed considerably: where Orff used strings and orchestral percussion instruments, Manzarek used synthesizers and a standard trap drum kit. "It is totally contemporary," he says. "Even though the piece is nearly 50 years old, it doesn't sound dated; it really could have been written today. I think it's timeless. |
| "The fact that the Iyrics are in Latin might be difficult for some people," Ray continues. "But the voices are simply another rhythm instrument, and they should be regarded that way. In essence, this is an instrumental album; there are human voices, but they're chanting across the top of this rhythmic foundation we've established for them." |
| A one-hour "video opera" based on Manzarek's Carmina Burana is currently in progress. Produced in cooperation with Los Angeles' Mark Taper Forum, it will include a complete script written by Louis Valdez (' Zoot Suit"). Manzarek calls it a "psychic journey through life, death, and rebirth, sort of a modern Tibetan book of the dead." Ray Manzarek. ================ |
| From the Chicago Tribune New tour opens up The Doors to criticism Jim, of course, is Jim Morrison -- the self-styled "lizard king" and charismatic Doors frontman who died at age 27 in 1971. For the first time in three decades, Manzarek is back on the road, touring with Doors guitarist Robby Krieger and vocalist Ian Astbury (The Cult) as The Doors 21st Century. Predictably, the tour has drawn a barrage of stones and roses -- mostly jagged, high-velocity stones from critics and a lawsuit from original drummer John Densmore. "`The [expletive] arrogance of the man to come back and play music again!'" says Manzarek, 64, lampooning but perhaps accurately summarizing critical sentiments. " `Who the [expletive] does he think he is to come back without [Morrison]? Who do you think you are?' " In a concert-going climate where reformed rock groups from the flower-power era are grossing more than their teeny-bopper contemporaries, the new Doors lineup isn't doing anything new. "In general, acts from the '60s and '70s are the high-powered tours. Year after year, those are the ones that end up on the top of the heap," says Gary Bongiovanni, editor-in-chief of concert trade magazine Pollstar. Among the top 20 highest grossing tours last year, 13 artists had roots extending back to the '60s and '70s. Paul McCartney ($103.3 million) and The Rolling Stones ($87.9) topped the list, although reconstituted '60s acts such as The Eagles (No. 10 with $35.4 million), Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (No. 11 with $34.8 million) and The Who (No. 13 with $30.2 million) did markedly well against supergroup N'SYNC (No. 12 with $34.8 million) and Britney Spears (No. 14 with $30.1). Perceptions of reformed acts cashing in or expanding on their legacies vary wildly, however, depending on the makeup of the reconstituted bands. Depends on the band A reunited Fleetwood Mac, minus singer/songwriter Christine McVie, is touring behind a new album this summer with high expectations. The rhythm section from Credence Clearwater Revival has been touring for some years as Credence Clearwater Revisited on the county fair circuit. The Who has toured successfully with principal founding members Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend after the deaths of Keith Moon and recently John Entwistle -- but Manzarek and Krieger face the unenviable task of playing in Morrison's substantial mythic shadow, against a legend they've nurtured and build up. "Any time you have a group who you had one person as the focal point, it's going to be difficult," Bongiovanni says. "They'll always think of Jim. It's just like The Rolling Stones, you wouldn't be able to think of the them without Mick Jagger." Sitting in the sunlit Berghoff last month, Manzarek wears a tan linen suit over a pink, pocketed T-shirt. Gel-spiked gray hair adds a little to his 6 feet -- although Manzarek doesn't use his height to intimidate. Rather, he seems conscious of his stature, and often leans forward to put his interviewer at eye level. Later that day, Manzarek will play for a sold-out crowd of 3,600 at the Chicago Theatre, the same place his father used to take him to see movies. In 1953, Manzarek and his brothers came from their South Side home to see Vincent Price's 3-D horror extravaganza "House of Wax." More than a decade later, he'd be enrolled in UCLA's graduate film program and meet aspiring filmmaker/poet James Douglas Morrison on Venice Beach in 1965. Although the keyboard player once called talking about Morrison and The Doors a "golden albatross," he seems to genuinely enjoy expounding on the band's legacy. "For me, it's all an avenue to proselytize, to somehow get America to once again consider hallucinogenics and psychedelics," he says. Different visions Not all band members share the same vision of the Doors, however. It seems as if each see himself as keeper of a different flame. For instance, although the trio signed off on Oliver Stone's movie "The Doors," Manzarek railed against the project, saying it inaccurately portrayed Morrison as humor-free, drunken lout. His attacks led to Stone calling Manzarek the "chief enemy" of a film his bandmates supported. "He still hates it," says Krieger.. Even today, original drummer Densmore is suing both Manzarek and Krieger for breach of contract and trademark infringement for the Door 21st Century tour. The Morrison estate -- Morrison's parents and the parents of his common-law wife Pamela Courson -- also filed suit in April in Los Angeles Superior Court, calling the new tour "a deliberate scheme" to make money and "confuse the public." Densmore's injunctions have been twice denied, and a third attempt to stop name use is pending. (Attempts to contact Densmore and the Morrison estate for this article through their lawyers were unsuccessful.) "We still to this day invite him to play with us," says Manzarek. Previously in the conversation, Densmore's name had been surrounded by four-letter configurations. But, again, none of this is new. The drummer and keyboardist have been publicly trading barbs for the past few years, privately for much longer. After Densmore portrayed Manzarek as a pompous blowhard in his 1990 autobiography "Riders on the Storm," Manzarek returned the verbal volley eight years later in his book "Light My Fire," calling Densmore the band's "resident whiner," among other things. Densmore has repeatedly opposed commercial use of Doors songs, despite arguments to the contrary by his bandmates. Recent Cadillac commercials scored with Led Zeppelin's "Rock and Roll" featured the tagline "Break Through." Originally, the automakers wanted The Doors' hit "Break on Through" as the anthem for the spots, which Densmore vetoed. (Similarly, Morrison opposed use of "Light My Fire" in 1967 for a Buick commercial.) The drummer also wrote an essay in The Nation detailing his distaste for the marriage of rock and advertising, shortly after turning down $1.5 million for Apple's use of "When the Music's Over" for a computer commercial. "I think it's a different perception nowadays, using rock in ads," says Krieger. Manzarek maintains that Densmore's Nation article was "mainly to let the people know that he is good and is stopping a commercial use of the Doors music." "I believe that as a rock band, as an artist, you should get in bed with industry, get in bed with politicians. Help the things you believe are good," Manzarek says of the philosophical split. "Jim was no dummy. He'd be the first one to say, `Let's get our music on TV.'" And when opposition doesn't come from within the band, it comes from outside. After a sold-out show in New York City's Roseland in April, Daily News critic Jim Farber accused the band of "necrophilic worship" and wrote: "This show was cold. It was sexless. It was dead." The New York Times' Jon Pareles was only slightly kinder, calling the new lineup "a passable Doors tribute band holding an invaluable trademark." "How can we be a tribute band?" asks Manzarek rhetorically. "Robby is the guy that wrote `Light My Fire' and I'm the guy who came up with the organ opening!" Although there have been some positive reviews, critics on both coasts have equated the reunion minus Morrison as sacrilege. Under fire under Morrison But memories are short in rock `n' roll. Krieger wrote many of the band's hits, including "Love Me Two Times," "Touch Me" and "Spanish Caravan." Even with Morrison at the helm, though, the Doors came under heavy fire. Manzarek still remembers the headlines. "`Morrison fails to light fire in Boston,'" he says. "There were writers that loved us, of course. But outside of a handful of writers . . . .Poor Jim, they savaged him. God, did he take hits." But again, what people don't know or don't remember is that The Doors made two albums without Morrison, "Other Voices" (1971) and "Full Circle" (1972) -- one-fourth of its total studio output. The records never made the jump to CD, however, and are not featured on the official Doors Web site. The Doors themselves sometimes have difficulty with the timeline, tending to focus on Morrison's six studio albums with them. Densmore's biography carries the subtitle "My Life with Jim Morrison and The Doors" and Manzarek's reads "My Life with The Doors" -- although both books feature cover photos of the authors with Morrison, minus other members of the band. Does Manzarek think this emphasis on Morrison by the band itself might be fueling some of the venom by critics over this new tour? "Maybe," he says." Of the books themselves, he says: "There are so many photos of the Doors on the inside. There was no intention of slighting anyone. Most of it is about Jim. I never even really thought of that. That's interesting. Maybe I should have." "It was hard, man, it was hard without Jim," Manzarek says of those two albums. "We didn't get a lead singer for the first one. You want to be loved? Die. Jim was dead, and all of the sudden he was a [expletive] genius. To put somebody in that role, it was just going to be hell on that person. Little did we know, it was going to be hell on us too." And in some ways, it still is. Chicago's Steve Albini produced Robert Plant and Jimmy Page's first studio album (1998's "Walking into Clarksdale") since their Led Zeppelin years. High-profile reunions face a special set of challenges, he says. "The biggest problem of anybody that has an extensive history runs into is that the principal audience has a fixed perspective on their historical stuff," Albini says. "It's met with equal parts anticipation and nostalgia. Those situations like these are almost always a setup for disappointment of one type or another." He continues: "In special cases, and this sounds harsh, some [reformed acts] are ad hoc bands put together to exploit a built-in audience. And then there are people who don't have any real need to perform, from a financial sense, for any other reason for satisfying creative impulse." Relighting the fire For their parts, Manzarek and Krieger consider themselves the latter camp, trying to recapture and re-create the Doors. Negative press, says Krieger, has even been a sign that "we're doing something right." Krieger remains optimistic and thinks Densmore will tour with them eventually -- even though the drummer expressed a disliking for Astbury. He wanted David Bowie in the lineup. "I think if he [Densmore] actually saw the show, he'd want to be involved. I don't know why he doesn't want to play. It's not because of Ray," Krieger says. "We did the VH1 ["Storytellers"] thing even when he and Ray were on the outs." Manzarek says he quit reading reviews after the first three gigs, but Astbury still reads everything. He's very protective of his bandmates. "I don't think they deserve a lot of the criticism that's been thrown at them," he says. "They are authentic musicians. Trying to get Robby off stage during sound check is impossible." Whatever the climate, musical or political, Manzarek doesn't see himself stopping soon. The new lineup is already working on new songs with lyrics by Beat poet Michael McClure, John Doe of the band X and "Basketball Diaries" author Jim Carroll. Manzarek says this incarnation of The Doors has a few more years before it's put to bed for good. "We've been doing it since 1965; to stop doing it is inconceivable. What . . . were we supposed to do? Die? Die with [Morrison]?" Manzarek says. "True love isn't dying, it's living. This is what we do." ------------------------------- |
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