MOJO MAGAZINE

 January 2003 issue - page 135

"A SERPENT'S TALE"

Celebrations as rare Jimbo epic is found

A legendary, long-lost studio version of Jim Morrison's epic poetry performance and concert favourite, Celebration Of The Lizard, hitherto unreleased even on bootleg, has been discovered and is set for official release.  It's uncertain whether the 17-minute recording is the definitive studio version;  Jerry Hopkins' No One Here Gets Out Alive refers to a 25-minute take that all the surviving Doors members have long maintained has been lost.

The source of the tape is also a mystery, although it's widely known that Doors producer Bruce Botnik has been in contact with online tape traders in a bid to replenish the band's official vault.

The find, one of a bunch of tapes that has recently come to light, has temporarily halted releases on the band's Bright Midnight rarities imprint.   Instead, the best of the new material, including Celebration Of The Lizard, will replace the original rarities disc in a new-fangled edition of the box set of studio albums first issued in 2000.

For those who balk at the prospect of having to buy the entire set again in order to obtain the newly discovered material, Elektra maintain that an expanded version of the rarities disc will be released as a stand-alone CD later next year.

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