Break on Through The Life and Death of Jim Morrison
By: James Riordan and Jerry Prochnicky
This is a long, and in some sections boring, read. Where it didn’t drag it was marvelous. Sadly, it was just too long. Too much pontificating in so many places caused me to doze off on occasion. It’s really too bad because their subject was anything but snooze-worthy.
My copy of this charming book was about 500 bloody pages long. The authors might have had a masterpiece on their hands had they had the ability to rein themselves in a wee bit. 400 pages would have been just fine and removed the snoozy parts.
Once that gets done we have one hell of a book. I think the idea here is that because Jim Morrison was larger than life the fine gents who wrote this thought the biography should be as epic as the man’s life. Well, they were wrong-ish. Sort of wrong.
This could have been, maybe not epic, but certainly better than the average biography. As it sits it’s still a good biography. It has depth and the writing is fine, for the most part anyway. It’s just those rambling, meaning nonsense that was a clear attempt to appear as epic as Morrison. But it was just boring.
Sadly, that seems to be my biggest takeaway from “Break on Through”. Often a book will leave me with a general impression when I think about it. The impression of this book is that it was boring. But it really wasn’t except when it was, which was much too often.
When this biography of Mr. Morrison wasn’t boring it was fun. When they were concentrating on Morrison the man things were fine but too often they wandered and strayed far from home.
This is a balanced look at Morrisons' life, for the most part at least. The authors do seem rather fanboy-ish but for the most part, it’s an objective look at the man.
I just wish they had done less pontificating that way they would produce an excellent book. There are about 100 pages too many for my liking. I get that folks often think that a book the size of a Tolstoy novel has to be epic but that’s just not the case. In many cases, less is more.
Big fans of The Doors will have already read this. If you are not a huge fan but just sort of has a passing fancy then pass on this. I wanted to love this and tell everyone to read it. Sadly, not. Only huge fans of The Doors will love this, the rest of you should look elsewhere. I really hate saying that but it will be said again.
Oftentimes in biographies, you read a little history of the places folk come from. It’s always cool to read a little something about the history of say . . . Jamaica when reading about the life of Bob Marley.
“Break on Through” goes one step further with a comparison of Morrison to Alexander the Great. Not only did Morrison bear a resemblance to the Macedonian warrior but he thought there were similarities in their lives. Sure there might be a physical resemblance in their faces but that’s likely all.
Are there indeed similarities between the 2 men? Who knows, I’m sure Jim just made some of it up to suit himself. How could a modern-day rocker have anything in common with an ancient marauder? I’m sure Morrison took enough acid to make up whatever he felt necessary at the time.
In the early days of The Doors, there were gigs where Morrison would stand with his back to the audience and the vocals would be handled by keyboard player extraordinaire Ray Manzarek. Morrison had stage fright and couldn’t sing in front of people in the beginning.
That image is a curious juxtaposition with the man who would be arrested for exposing himself a few years later. Did he actually expose himself or did he just fake it? None of the other Doors seems to know. Manzarek claimed he just kept his head down while playing and saw nothing while guitar player Robby Krieger didn’t actually see the deed either.
There is a fun story about the 60s rock phenom Janis Joplin. According to the book, Janis loved the physical company of men and she liked drinking. When she met Jim Morrison she wished to engage in both activities with the man but Jim was not as charming a drunk as Janis so there was nothing between them. But it’s a fun story and who doesn’t want a quick story about the Mercedes Benz riding, Southern Comfort drinking songstress?
Again, some lonely intern was sent to collect pictures for inclusion. Most are publicity-type pictures and of the others, I don’t think there is anything new or exciting. Someone should start paying these poor interns.
While the authors have done a good job with the information in the book there is just far too much nonsense to recommend anyone but the most ardent fans read this. As I mentioned earlier, this is really a shame because there is a truly good book here. If only they weren’t so hyped up on the idea of creating an epic biography.
Had someone taken a pair of scissors to the manuscript and lopped off about 100 pages “Break on Through” could have been a masterpiece read by many more folks. Instead, we all have to wallow in the mire of boring stuff stuck between all the stuff that is so good.
Hardcore, diehard fans of The Doors will love the book once they clear away all the dull bits.
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