The Doors Unhinged
Jim Morrison's Legacy Goes on Trial
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- £3.99
Publisher Description
In The Doors Unhinged, New York Times bestselling author and legendary Doors drummer John Densmore offers a powerful exploration of the 'greed gene' - that part of the human psyche that propels us toward the accumulation of more and more wealth, even at the expense of our principles, friendships and the well-being of society. This is the gripping account of the legal battle to control The Doors's artistic destiny. In it, Densmore looks at the conflict between his bandmates and him as they fought over the right to use The Doors's name, revealing the ways in which this struggle mirrored and reflected a much larger societal issue: that no amount of money seems to be enough for even the wealthiest people.
The Doors continue to attract new generations of fans, with more than one hundred million albums sold worldwide and counting, and nearly twenty million followers on the band's social media accounts. As such, Densmore occupies a rarefied space in popular culture. He is beloved by artists across the decades for his fierce, uncompromising dedication to art. His writing consistently earns accolades and has appeared in a range of publications such as the Los Angeles Times and Rolling Stone. As his friend and American novelist Tom Robbins recently advised him, 'If you keep writing like this, I'll have to get a drum set.'
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The Doors drummer Densmore (Riders on the Storm) rockets through his tumultuous six-year lawsuit against former bandmates Ray Manzarek and Robby Krieger in this no-holds-barred account. Much has changed since the garage band from Venice, Calif., started writing lyrics that came to define a generation, and with lead singer Morrison long dead—and the band broken up in 1973, two years later—its members were left to negotiate their commercial interests in the years to come. Backed by the Morrison estate, Densmore sued guitarist Krieger and keyboardist Manzarek in 2003 over their unauthorized use of the band's name, logo, and images, to promote their newly formed the Doors of the 21st Century. Manzarek and Krieger countersued, alleging that Densmore owed them an estimated $40 million in lost profits because he'd too often vetoed licensing the band's songs for promotional purposes—a practice Jim Morrison vehemently opposed. The resulting mud-slinging court fiasco, rife with attacks on Densmore's "communist" political beliefs and even the opposing counsel's implication that he was a "supporter of Al Qaeda," ended with Densmore winning against his former bandmates in 2009. Throughout, the author's initial question—at what point does money cheapen art's original message?—remains salient, even if he hammers it home a bit repetitively. Devoted fans will be eager to get their hands on this deep dive.