No Way Man!

In the time that I've moved from NYC, the city has seen many changes, economically, culturally and otherwise. In '01, the nationwide real estate boom hadn't quite begun but in NYC the market always seemed robust. A gradual upward trend in real estate put the pressure on many small business owners who were increasingly finding it difficult to pay the rising rents that their landlords were pushing on them. Many of these small businesses were nightclub owners and music venues. So many of them are gone from the NYC music scene today including Tramps. This 1000 person-sized venue located around 17th or 18th street on the west side was not as famous as the other venues that have gone under in the last few years (CBGB, The Bottom Line and others) but it did bring in music fans with challenging and talented bands and artists. One of these bookings looked back nostalgically to the baby-boomer hippie era of the 1960's and professed to be a half-assed Doors reunion. Half-assed because, of course, Jim Morrison had been dead nearly 30 years at the time and (according to the bill) not even all of the 3 surviving Doors members would be performing with Ray Manzarek having pussied out for some out-dated notion of artistic integrity and it "not being what Jim would've wanted". Nevertheless, guitarist Robby Krieger and drummer John Densmore were scheduled to appear with, I believe, Robby Krieger's son on bass, another keyboardist and with vocal duties shared by all.

Years earlier I had actually seen Ray Manzarek perform with beat poet Michael McClure at 15 Minutes in Washington, DC. This gig with the other two surviving Doors members would allow me to say that I've seen all of the 3 surviving Doors members perform live. The only negative would be that before the Krieger/Densmore group took the stage I had to endure some kind of fake Allman Brothers reunion group with Dicky Betts and sons. Not being a fan of the Allman Brothers this set would be a little painful. And painful it was. It seemed like this damned group would never get off the stage. Maybe they were stalling because of some logistical issue or problem with the Doors-related group. I wasn't sure.

Finally, Betts and Co. wrapped up their languorous set and the stage went dark. With some darkambient cum hippy rock theme as their entrance the Doors-related group took the stage to rousing applause. Krieger - looking frazzled and stoned as usual took his place just off-center stage (still a little uncomfortable front-and-center without Jim around?) and addressed the crowd. With hair looking like he had just stuck a fork in an electrical socket, Krieger introduced the band, his son on bass, i-don't-remember-who on keys, a backup guitarist and then - a drummer. But not Densmore. Whafuck? Where was the guy? I was attending this gig with a friend of mine from Arkadia. An older aging hippie himself by the name of Henry Blaukopf. Henry laughed ironically and said to me, "What is this - Densmore's first gig in nearly 30 years and he can't show up? This is bullshit."

Indeed it was bullshit. But I remained steadfast. Densmore would take the stage at some point. There's just simply no way they could bill the show as Krieger and Densmore and not have both of them up there for most of the set. But I've been wrong before and it looks like I was going to be wrong again. Song after song was played by what was now just the Robby Krieger band without Densmore. They did Light My Fire - which was of course penned by Krieger - a couple other random Doors tunes and then the set was over. As the crowd was applauding waiting for an encore (apparently not caring that Densmore wasn't present) I turned to Henry and said "I'm just going to leave. I have better things to do with my time." I had simply lost my patience and had reached the end of the line.
"OK. I'll see you on Monday", Henry responded.
I left very disappointed and frustrated. How could this happen? Where was the guy? Trapped in some paranoid-delusional acid flashback? Maybe the ghost of Jim Morrison told him to say in the green room and stop disgracing his memory. Whatever it was it was bullshit and I thought about asking for my money back.

Back at work on Monday, Henry approached me and said that Densmore had showed up after I left. Like maybe he and I had bad blood that I didn't know about and Densmore was just waiting for me to quit the place so that he could take the stage. I acted exasperated when Henry told me but part of me believes that Henry just made up the part about Densmore actually showing up so as not to make him seem silly for staying through an encore of the Robby Krieger Band.