Jim Morrison in Paris: 50+ years on, I finally clocked why the legend bugs me
I was 19 in a record shop in Austin when the guy at the counter put on the Doors and went on about the Lizard King like it was scripture, and I nodded along for two more albums before something clicked. The thing that tipped me off was when he tried to sell me a bootleg of the Paris apartment tapes for $80 and swore Morrison was secretly writing a masterpiece. Then I actually read what he was scribbling, and it was a few loose lines and a lot of drinking. They keep selling the mystery of the guy who died in a bathtub at 27, not the guy who put out six uneven albums. The poetry that gets printed up like holy text reads like a stoned diary. So what am I missing, is it the voice, the drama, or is the whole thing just a story we like telling more than the songs?