Jim Morrison and The Doors Term Papers

In the twentieth century, popular music has been shown to be one of the most powerful galvanizing forces for social change. Music has unified and defined scores of political movements, social protests, and cultural groups.  Many of the artists and songs that have been pivotal in inciting some sort of social change have accomplished this end through the use of overtly political lyrics and imagery.  Conversely, the maverick rock band the Doors launched an attack on the conservatism and narrow morality that pervaded the consciousness of mainstream America in the 1960’s without promoting a specific political agenda.  Rather, the group relied on their innovative expansion of the limits of linearity in popular music and incendiary live performances to promulgate social change.

The Doors were founded in 1965, when vocalist and lyricist Jim Morrison and keyboardist Ray Manzarek met as students at UCLA’s film school. After recruiting Robbie Kreiger to play guitar and John Densmore to play drums, the quartet took their band’s name from a quote from Aldous Huxley’s “The Doors of Perception.”  The band’s early performances were relatively reserved, with Morrison succumbing to persistent stage fright and often delivering his vocals with his back to the audience or with his eyes closed.

Eventually, bolstered by the burgeoning popularity of the band’s live performances and his increased use of hallucinogenic drugs, Morrison’s delivery style began to develop into a radically innovative hybrid of rock singing and performance art.  Based on word-of-mouth and positive critical response, a large following began to be drawn to The Doors’ legendary performances at the Whiskey A Go-Go, which relied heavily on musical and dramatic improvisation.

With the release of their first album, The Doors, in 1967, the band puzzled music critics who admired their talent but were unsuccessful in their attempts to neatly categorize the music.  Although the group clearly had the capacity to produce the requisite FM-radio hits, such as “Light My Fire” and “Break On Through (To The Other Side),” they simultaneously displayed an unprecedented capacity for diversity in their music.  ON The Doors, the band included songs by German composers Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht ("Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar)") and blues traditionalists Willie Dixon and Howlin’ Wolf ("Back Door Man"). The influence of literature and philosophy was also highly visible in these songs.  Notably, Morrison employs elements of William Blake on "End of the Night," and Freud and Sophocles on “The End.”

It is “The End” that signals the advent of the Doors commitment to revolutionizing the face of popular music in America.  In this eleven-and-a-half minute epic, the Doors completely transcend the conventional notion of what defines an acceptable rock song.  In successfully doing so, the band resisted the coercive demands of the dictatorial music industry, which usually required a high degree of conformity and homogeneity among musical acts.

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