Iggy Pop has always been known as the ‘Godfather of Punk’. With his reputation, most would tend to agree, but he was originally going to be a drummer for his career before the Doors came to his hometown of Detroit. He saw lead singer Jim Morrison perform, only the way he does and ditched the drumkit to be the centre of attention and be the frontman.
If the Godfather of Punk saw Morrison as this inspiration, then this must make Morrison the original punk. It makes sense as the singer pretty much did what he wanted when he wants. I know the punk purists think it preposterous that a hero of the counterculture has punk attitudes but the way he went about things was pretty for lack of a better word, punk. Unfortunately, this attitude can only go so far, and will usually lead to your downfall as much as your rise to the top. This week The Beat Marches On to 1st March 1969, when The Doors start a tour in Miami.
The Police had it in for Jim Morrison. They hated it when The Doors came to their town. They hated their fans who lived on the singer’s every whim. They felt like he was leading the revolution where anarchy rules. Ever since the band appeared on the Hollywood strip when they first formed the cops weren’t that far behind. There were incidents where the frontman would get pepper sprayed by a copper ‘mistaken’ him for a trespassing fan and he would be arrested just because of who he was out on the street. Just because the authorities were afraid of him. There was even an FBI file on his antics.
This wasn’t peak Jim Morrison by this time. The alcohol abuse had taken its toll on the body. Instead of the modelesque looks of a couple of years earlier that was performing on the Ed Sullivan Show before they were banned, he was more Dad-bod and had a full-blown shaggy beard.
It was an unusually hot day in Florida for this time of year. The Dinner Key Auditorium could only hold 7,000 people but the number of fans that arrived was reported as 12,000. There wasn’t any air conditioning either which made the place turn into a sweat box.
Morrison had been hitting the bottle harder than usual. So much so that he had to have people watching him while he was performing, but what happened at this particular concert was the start of the end of The Doors.
Due to his drunkenness, Jim missed his flight from LA to Miami which made the band late to come on stage to the packed auditorium. He was already blackout drunk mid-flight and when the band finally hit the stage, the Lizard King was slurring his words while singing. He imitated a sexual act with Robbie Krieger’s guitar.
The singer then proceeded to provoke the crowd, calling them ‘A bunch of Fucking Idiots’ and when the crowd argued back he was quoted as saying ‘What Are You Gonna Do About It’ He then invited the audience up on stage before the police put a stop to it.
While the audience was up on the stage someone poured Champagne all over Morrison and he had to take his shirt off. Reports from some of the people who were there said he put his shirt in front of his groin area and imitated some self-love.
Morrison then proceeded to entice the crowd to get naked. Reports from the roadcrew and band’s management said that they were pretty crazy already and didn’t need much direction to take their clothes off. The reports are mixed with what was said next by the singer whether it was along the lines of ‘You Came Here To See Something Else, Didn’t You?’ or ‘You Came Here To See My Cock, Didn’t You?’ The slurred speech didn’t help.
The obsession with nudity and Jim Morrison was inspired by the off-Broadway acting company called the Living Theater. They had an unorthodox way of performing shows. This was the late 1960s and the counterculture was in full swing. Part of the Woodstock generations being free also meant being free of clothes and the living theatre performed their shows this way. After the concert, as he was sobering up he was trying to get the band to go in this direction.
Throughout February 1969 when the troupe went through California, Morrison watched every show. He was obsessed with their way of performing, and joined them up on stage most nights, even though he was blackout drunk most of the time.
Then, the most controversial part of the concert happened. According to some of the crowd including a reporter for the Miami Herald, Jim Morrison exposed himself for everyone in the audience to see. Or did he? The Lizard King did unbuckle his trousers but, on what was a rare occasion, he was wearing boxer shorts. The intention was for the singer to drop the underwear as well, but the promoter ran onstage and grabbed the waistline before they dropped down too.
The rest of security then shut down the gig took the microphone away and turned off the power. Morrison then tried to fight back by pushing them off the stage resulting in him getting physically flipped over the back of another security guard and getting caught by the crowd. They then danced in circles around the frontman in a Pagan-like ritual.
The ruckus caused the stage to start to collapse and the rest of the band then ran off back to the dressing room leaving Morrison, as they did many times, to do his thing.
The Miami Herald reporter, Larry Mahoney, was not amused by the antics that went on at the auditorium. He went to Florida State University (FSU) at the same time as Morrison so was around the same age. He was quoted as saying ‘Many of the nearly twelve thousand youths said they found the bearded singer’s exhibition disgusting’ and ‘Morrison appeared to masturbate in full view of the audience, screamed obscenities, and exposed himself.’
The Doors management saw this and knew trouble was brewing. Even though they kept their eyes on Morrison the whole show, they knew all he did was take his shirt off. As did the rest of the band, they knew and whenever asked, up to the current day, that nothing downstairs was exposed.
It seemed that the truth didn’t deter Mahoney though. He started a press campaign to get the police to bring charges to arrest Jim Morrison for, at the very least indecent exposure. The reporter harassed the chief of police for Miami, the state’s district attorney, and anyone who could prosecute the singer for his alleged actions.
Mahoney’s persistence did start to have an effect, within a week of the incident (The band were on holiday in Jamaica) a lucrative tour across the major cities in the USA was cancelled by the CHMA (The Concert Halls Management Association) and insurers refused to insure them due to what happened in Miami. Then the County Sheriff issued a warrant for his arrest on the charge of indecent exposure.
It would take over 18 months for the charges to go to court, with the proceedings starting in September 1970. Morrison pled not guilty to all charges brought against him and even refused a plea deal where the band would have to play a benefit concert. He was found guilty and was ordered to serve six months in prison. Straight away the legal team appealed the conviction. The appeal wasn’t heard as the singer would be dead less than a year later.
Although the concert would end most bands if something disastrous occurred, this didn’t end The Doors. However, it would be the beginning of the end. The band would make three albums after the incident, the Soft Parade, Morrison Hotel, and LA Woman, the latter marked as one of their best, the ban on playing live in concert halls kept them from going up the next step with other bands at the time a la The Rolling Stones and The Who.
It was the first time that we saw Jim Morrison, not as the coolest guy on the planet in the leather trousers and the model-like looks, but as a bearded, tubby drunk who doesn’t know when to say when. It was one of the first times when a rock star was brought down to earth on stage.
The Beat Marches On is a music blog written by Jimmy Whitehead. Jimmy has been blogging for five years specialising in Sports (especially American Football). If you want to follow Jimmy on Twitter: @Jimmy_W1987
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The websites used for research were:
When Jim Morrison Allegedly Exposed Himself Onstage (ultimateclassicrock.com)
Jim Morrison exposes his penis at The Doors show in 1969 (faroutmagazine.co.uk)
The book Jim Morrison: Life, Death, Legend by Stephen Davis was also used for research.
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