« Back to Top Level | Doors, The

The Doors - Dallas December 11th, 1970 (Ninja) (1970)

Track listing:
  1. Love Her Madly 10:24
  2. Backdoor Man 3:51
  3. Ship Of Fools 8:15
  4. The Changeling 4:58
  5. L.A. Woman 15:47
  6. When The Music's Over 13:20

Notes


State Fair Music Hall

Another classic Doors show and probably the very last one recorded

audience recording

NINJA REMASTER OF FREEZER'S 1ST GEN COPY

Master cassette

NINJA:
"This is what was done to it (Freezer'version):
In my opinion its cleaner clearer and louder and overall better levels as morrison was rediciously louder then the band

pitch shift > sf noise reduction ver 2


AHTAN is clear, NINJA is louder and has a bit stronger sound.


NOTES
The last occasion the Doors played live before this, was the Isle of Wight festival on August 29, 1970. Shows were at 8:00pm & 10:30 pm and tickets were sold for 3.50$, 4.50$ and 5.50$. These shows were the very lasts the band ever played together. Concert poster says:

The Doors
One Night
Only
Tonight

A decent show featuring an interesting and lenghty jam during 'Love Her Madly' which concludes into 'Back Doors Man.' L.A. Woman is beautiful as Jim and the band plays with its theme during the slower part. Despite Jim's rather tired and exhausted state, lyrical variations occur during 'Love Her Madly,' 'L.A. Woman' and 'When The Music Is Over.'
Also performing on the bill: Courtship


An excerpt taken from Stephen Davis' book on Jim Morrison p. 399-400:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Three days later (after Jim recited poetry on his birthday on the 8th of December in the studio), on Friday, December 11, the Doors went out for what turned out to be one last weekend of concerts. The Friday night shows were at the State Fair Music Hall in Dallas, Texas. In the first, the Doors played some of their new songs: "Love Her Madly" with no vocal, "The Changeling," "L.A. Woman." Jim seem tired, and became truculent as he swilled malt liquor from a can. Between shows, there were questions about wheter Jim could (or should) go on. He looked haggard, seemed exhausted, and was unusually drunk. But Jim managed to take the stage, although he sang with his back to the audience and hung onto the microphone stand to avoid keeling over.. The band hustled the show along, barely pausing between songs. "Riders On The Storm" received its first* (and last) public performance. During the finale, "Light My Fire," Jim tried to cavort around the stage, but he collapsed into Robby and both men crashed to the floor and almost fell off the stage. There was no encore.

The next night, December 12, 1970, the Doors were booked into the Warehouse, New Orleans' famed electric ballroom. Jim looked somewhat abstracted as the band began with "Soul Kitchen," but he shouted out the lyric with conviction, and the full house settled in for what they thought would be a great show. Four songs in, Jim started to come apart. He tried to tell some lame jokes, and noone laughed. When the band got going again, he forgot the lyrics. Between the songs, he was lurching around as if he was having a seizure, and the big room got quite as the music-savvy crowd intuited that something was very wrong. Then in the middle of "Light My Fire," Jim Morrison died on stage. He stopped singing and stumbled to the drum riser and sat down. He missed his cue at the end of the guitar solo, unable to stand, so the band anxiously went through another instrumental cycle. When it was time for Jim to finish the song, John Densmore disgracefully rammed his boot in the middle of Jim's back and sharply pushed him upright. Standing again, shaking with anxiety and rage, Jim burst into a tormented fury. He grabbed the mike stand and began smashing itonto the stage floor, again and again, until the wooden planks began to splinter. The kids in front looked on in shock. then the mike stand broke in two. Jim only stopped when Vince Treanor walked out from behind the amps and laid a calming hand on his shoulder. Jim put his arms around Vince for support, and stood there, staring, breathing hard, while the Doors finished the song. Then Jim dropped the microphone and staggered the stage. The show was over. And so were the Doors.

Everyone was deeply shaken by what had happened. ray Manzarek later said that he had witnessed an occult process, the evaporation of Jim's life force, the dispersal of his chi. The band had been through almost every conceivable permutation of hard rock nightmares, but the abject horror of Jim's collapse in New Orleans now jolted them into a new awareness of reality. The limo ride back to the Pontchartrain Hotel was desolate. Jim tried to make small talk, but the others were silent. When Jim got out of the car, Ray said, "Okay. It's finished."

Before they flew back to Los Angeles the following day, the Doors and their handlers agreed to suspend concert performances. Jim Morrison never appeared on stage again.