 |
| Left to right: Ray Manzarek, Ian Astbury and Robby Krieger |
http://alibi.com/alibi/current/music_section.html#ears
Spotlight
Interview with Robby Krieger of the Doors
By Rachel Heisler
|
It may have looked like the end when in 1971, poet/musician/philosopher and lead singer of the Doors Jim Morrison was announced dead in a bathtub in Paris. But only time can tell about these things, and 30 years later, the Doors (minus Morrison and drummer John Densmore) are on the road again with "The Doors 21st Century Tour," with Ian Astbury of the Cult picking up the coveted role of lead singer. And while no one is claiming that these performances will be exactly as they were 30 years ago, they will definitely be worth hearing.
Who are the musicians
playing on this tour?
This is just me and Ray (Manzarek) and Ian Astbury and the two guys
from my band, the bassist and drummer. Angelo Barbera is the bass player
and Ty Dennis is the drummer.
So John Densmore didn't want
to be a part of this?
No, he sure didn't. I wish he would've.
But he was asked?
Oh yeah, in fact he still may change his mind pretty soon.
So how's the tour going so far?
It's really great. It started in LA. They had this Harley Davidson 100th
Anniversary, and they wanted somebody to headline and that was really when we
got the idea to do it. We said, "Hey--why don't we get the Doors back together."
And Harley Davidson, they love the Doors those bikers. (Laughs.)
How did you find Ian?
Ian has been trying to get together with us for years. He's good
friends with our manager, Danny Sugerman. And Danny's been telling us for
years, "Hey you've gotta see this guy, he's really great, he could sing with you
guys." And we go "No, we don't want somebody copying Jim." Blah, blah, blah, the
same old arguments. And finally we ended up doing this VH1 special,
"Storytellers," and we had six or seven different singers that came and sang and
each sang one song, and Ian was one of those, and he was great.
Ian sounds and looks quite a bit
like Jim. Was that an intentional thing for the tour?
Well, I wouldn't call it an accident. But no, he's not trying to do an
impersonation, he just wants to get into the right frame of mind. And some
shows he doesn't wear leather pants or anything like that, but other ones he has
the sun glasses and the leather pants. It all depends, I don't know what it
depends on ... but it's up to him. And his voice is really great. He
has his own voice, but he can still hit a lot of the notes that Jim hit, so it's
pretty good.
What is same or different
about touring now compared to back in the day?
Well, it's not all that much different, really. We have
cell phones and stuff so we don't get lost as easily. (Laughs) The
audiences are different. In those days they were a lot more naive.
They didn't know what to make of the Doors. A lot of times we'd finish the set
and there would be silence, and they'd just go "Huh? What the hell?
And then 10 minutes later they would destroy the place. (Laughs.)
Today the audience kind of knows what to expect and it's harder to get an
audience off. They've seen so many groups and so many acts, it's
tough to get any response out of them. But they've been great.
We've had standing ovations and double encores on every show. It's
just like clockwork.
Do you find it's your fans
from back then and plus a bunch of new, young kids?
Yeah, a lot of young kids, it's kind of disconcerting to see.
At one show the whole front row was these 50-year-old guys with beards, it was
crazy.
It seems like there was a good
connection between the original band members. Is there still a connection with
you and Ray?
Oh yeah, definitely.
Is it the same as it was
before?
Yeah, it's very much the same. It's kind of amazing.
We haven't played for so long. We get together every couple of years or
something and do something, but it's always there. That
communication is there. I didn't realize how rare that was until I
had played with so many different configurations of bands. And it's
really not that automatic.
What's the best part of the
tour so far?
Probably the LA show. That was the first time people
rushed the stage. (Laughs.) My manager Tom told the
security guys "Listen, if anybody rushes the stage don't throw them off the
stage. If they're cool, just let them stay up there."
And they did. And all of a sudden there was one girl, then there was
two girls and then there was 10 people and all the sudden there was like a
hundred people on the stage, and it was getting kind of crazy. Some
guys grabbed me and put me up on top of their hands, it was like crowd surfing
all the way across the stage. (Laughs.)
That's a new thing, isn't
it?
Yeah, that never happened in the old days. That's pretty
wild.
Did you release a
compilation or a new CD for this tour?
Not yet, but we have plans.
Is it going to be live?
Yeah, some of it. We've been recording all the shows.
And we're working on some new stuff, too.
Are there new songs on the
set list?
Yeah. There will be a couple.
Were they written by you and Ray
or the whole group?
So far it's been me and Ray. But we are going to start doing some
with the whole group. And we got some words by Jim Carroll, and
we're going to be getting words from Michael McClure, some of the poets.
We want to keep the tradition going of Doors music and poetry.
What songs will definitely
be on the set list?
Well, obviously "Light my Fire." The only one we don't
do that people might think we do is "The End" because even though it's a great
song to do in person, it was kind of (about) Jim's personal devils, so we kind
of respect that. I don't know, we'll probably do it someday, but not
right now.
The Doors will perform at the
Journal Pavilion on Sunday, July 27, at 7:30 p.m. Tickets cost $25-$63 and are
available through Ticketmaster by calling (505) 883-7800.
return to Ida's L. A. Woman Confidential home page
for more Doors news and reviews