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- . , . The Doors, ( "Calm Before The Storm") - ? Phantom's Divine Comedy Part 2 - ? !
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Albums like "Phantom's Divine Comedy Part 1" always arouse suspicion in me. They seem to be the result of some shrewd record exec's desire to cash in on some trend rather than a genuine musical expression from a serious artist or band. They may look right and may even sound right, but there is something inherently phony and slapdash about them. "Phantom's Divine Comedy Part 1" was released in 1974, perhaps a bit late to truly capitalize on the psych trend, but still making a vain attempt. What comes to mind first are the uncanny Morrison-esque vocals of Mr. Phantom (Ted Pearson) himself. You can almost hear some ambitious A&R jerkoff foaming at the mouth at the prospect of a Doors-like band performing horror themed bargain basement psychedelia via Vegas lounge jazz. Upon its release, rumors (perhaps started by the band's management) abounded about how it was indeed Morrison lending his vocal talents to "Divine Comedy Part 1," and I'm certain that Capitol Records higher-ups did little to nothing to dissuade such notions. Did it work? Well, have you ever heard of this album? Is it a bad album? Not by a long shot, my friend. Is it a great album? Well, quite frankly, no. However, it is good enough, strange enough, and rare enough to be included in the Cosmic Hearse pantheon. Phantom lays down nine songs rich in imagery crawling with spiders, wizards and demons, and even if the music is somewhat flat and unoriginal the whole affair is rather enjoyable, even if for its goofy, naive take on the psych/hard rock genre. Phantom never got around to recording "Divine Comedy part 2" (let this be a lesson to young bands, don't call something a "part 1" unless "part 2" is in the can and ready for release), so this album remains Phantom's sole contribution to the vast musical landscape of the early '70s. On the sultry "Tales from a Wizard," the album's first track, Phantom sounds most like the bloated deceased Lizard king he seeks to emulate. On "Devil's Child" Phantom opts for a more exagerrated soulful voice over a composition that sounds as if it could have been one of Joe Raposo's Sesame Street songs from the '70s. "The Calm Before the Storm" is another song that might have been culled from the Door's dumpster and "Half Life" is a creepy ballad that actually reminds me of later Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, had Nick Cave been born 15 years earlier. Smack dab in the middle of the proceedings comes the album's crown jewel, the geniusly titled, "Spiders Will Dance On Your Face While You Sleep." More of the same Halloween Super Store hard rock ensues until the albums epic closer "Welcome To Hell," a slow and slinky, melodramatic tale that encompasses all the themes explored in the album's other songs. Corny beyond belief, but still great fun. Welcome to Hell.
PHANTOM ( 1972-73, 1994) Lost Album ( Walpurgis). ( - Phantom's Divine Comedy) Phantom. , , Doors , , , ( Elektra ), - , . , , Divine Comedy, .
ANOTHER JIM MORRISON STORY [17 Feb 2008|03:30pm]
In the first two years after Jim Morrison's "death" in Paris,
many sightings of the rock star were reported. These sightings
range from the totally spurious and ridiculous to the reliable
and very hard to shake.
The LA Free Press and several wire service reports described
someone in 1973 appearing on several occasions in San Francisco.
There Morrison was involved with business and banking
transactions with the Bank of America of San Francisco. The
employee that handled the transactions, Walt Fleischer, confirmed
that someone resembling Morrison and using that name was indeed
doing business at the Bank of America. He did add that he "was
far from sure that this was the 'dead' artist" as Morrison showed
no identification. Could this be because a photo ID was already
on file at the bank, with the name James Douglas Morrison? Yes,
it is still on file.
According to authors Riordan and Prochniky, Morrison was also
seen on several occasions hanging out in "unpleasant places" in
Los Angeles and wearing Morrison's leather garb, all in black.
This was over a period of two years right after the Paris
"death". I researched this a bit further and found out that the
"unpleasant places" meant notorious gay leather bars, and the
underground gay community in Los Angeles.
There were also many rumors that Morrison was also appearing
regularly in Louisiana and had made several radio interviews.
Again, Prochniky and Riordan reveal that:
"... At an obscure radio station in the Midwest Jim
supposedly showed up in the dead of night and did a lengthy
interview that explained it all... After the interview he
vanished into the darkness again. As you might guess, no
recordings of the interview exist and no reliable source
remembers hearing the broadcast..."
An LP record called Phantom's Divine Comedy was released also
in 1974. This was rumored to be Jim Morrison singing with an
anonymous band with the names of "drummer X, bassist Y, and
keyboardist Z". The music reportedly resembled Jim Morrison's
sound quite well. All this again added and sparked the rumor
mills, and stirred public fascination.
However, in a 1992 press released from the Zeppelin group, it
is revealed that Morrison pal Iggy Pop was actually doing all the
singing and helping the "hoax" along. This added more fuel as to
how many people were actually involved in maintaining his "death
hoax". Up until the 1992 press release, the record company that
had released Phantom had refused to divulge the names on the LP,
or the singer's name -- which was indeed Iggy Pop.
Regarding all these rumors, Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek
stated: "If there was one guy that would have been capable of
staging his own death -- getting a phony death certificate and
paying off some French doctor... And putting a hundred and fifty
pound sack of sand into a coffin and splitting to some point on
this planet -- Africa, who knows where -- it is Jim Morrison who
would have been able to pull it off."
Jim Morrison's best friend Tom Baker, writing in High Times
(June, 1981) had this to say: "I was very tempted to believe the
rumors that Jim had faked his own death."
A group of fans actually went so far as to try to get
Morrison's dental records, apparently to try to get permission to
dig up his body and match the records to the remains. This was
immediately blocked both by Morrison's parents and their
attorneys -- at least for the time being.
It is known that Jim Morrison had repeatedly planted the
seeds which would lead to this sort of speculation -- that he had
somehow faked his own death and dropped out into a new identity.
At the Fillmore in San Francisco in 1967, Jim started suggesting
that he should pull a "death stunt" to bring national press
attention onto the band. This was when he came up with the "Mr.
Mojo Risin'" anagram which would be used after he "split to
Africa" and wished to secretly contact friends.
Morrison also told Danny Sugarman and Jerry Hopkins on more
than one occasion that he could see himself "radically changing
careers, reappearing as a suited and neck-tied businessman."
Jack Holzman's assistant Steve Harris even remembers Jim Morrison
asking what might happen if he were to suddenly "die"... how
might it affect business, record sales, the press, and would
people believe it? With confidant Mary Francis Werebelow Jim
"entertained long conversations about how the Disciples had
stolen the body of Christ from the crypt, jokingly calling it the
"Easter heist," etc."
In a Rolling Stone article for September 17, 1981, author
Jerry Hopkins recounts many other Morrison sightings:
"The first one I remember was a beaut... He surfaced
in San Francisco shortly after Morrison's death and began
cashing checks in Morrison's name. He was not writing bad
checks, mind you; it was his money he was spending. It was
just that he was dressed as Jim would in his 'leather
period', and that he told everyone that he was indeed the
'dead singer'.
"The telephone operator asked: 'will you accept a long
distance collect call from Jim Morrison?' It was an
interesting conversation..."
"Our conversations were unsettling. He told me to go
to Paris and dig up the corpse, but that you would need
permission from '12 Catholic Bishops' to do it... A visit
to his home was more jarring. There at the end of one room
was a Morrison 'shrine', converted with posters, flowers,
religious icons -- the works!"
Years later, I actually got the chance to visit and interview
the shrine's owner, who claimed to be Jim Morrison. He told me
matter-of-factly details about Hopkins, as well as that other
reporters had actually burglarized the shrine in an attempt to
get a scoop.
Another surreal sighting involved "Donny" of Baton Rouge,
Lousiana. He described Jim Morrison at Morrison's home in 1978.
Donny told his friend "Larry" about it, as Larry was trying to
break in to the world of rock and roll:
"I remember Larry telling me about the whole wall of
one room lined with books all across it. Every one of the
books were about Satan, or had something to do with him. He
also told me about a large chair that looked like a throne,
on which this man sat and watched over his nude children
running around... I guess that you can probably guess who
that kinky old weird man was -- Jim Morrison, The Lizard
King!"
Another person named Rhea (the Greek goddess of fertility)
claimed she was living with Jim Morrison in 1979 with their son
"Jesse Blue James". She matter-of-factly claimed that Morrison
had "evolved into a state of pure energy... And can materialize
and dematerilize at will." She and Jim were also in direct
telepathic communication and in "electromagnetic synch".
The Intelligence Connection and JM2
Rock icon Jim Morrison's father was an admiral in the United
States Navy, privy to intelligence and counterintelligence
information. His name is Steven Morrison.
During the first few years surround Jim Morrison's "death" a
number of interesting articles surfaced. These cited references
showing various intelligence interests either in Morrison's
underground activity; his "death" or that intelligence had even
masterminded Morrison's death itself! One of the more explicit
appeared in the Scandinavian magazine Dagblatte. This article
detailed French intelligence efforts to assassinate Jim Morrison
in Paris. Author Bernard Wolfe writing The Real Life Death of
Jim Morrison for Esquire (June 1972) related the story of:
"Sherry, a Pasadena girl who knew Morrison well: "...I
couldn't make sense out of the stories in the papers.
Suppose he had a heart attack exactly as they reported, is
that what he died of? My God, you might as well say that
Ernest Hemingway died of "extensive brain damage". If you
want to know the cause of Jim's death -- not just the
physiology of it -- ask what triggered his heart to stop...
And whose finger was on the trigger."
In the first few years after Morrison's "death" the owner of
B of A Communications, named James Douglas Morrison, claimed to
be operating as an intelligence agent for a number of domestic
and international groups including the CIA, NSA, Interpol,
Swedish Intelligence and others. There are also connections
between James Douglas Morrison and various occult groups with
probable intelligence connections. [Author's note: from here on
the B of A Morrison will be referred to as JM2].
The enclosed plates show several documents implicating him in
intelligence circles. JM2 also claims to be the "dead" rock star
and former singer for The Doors. The new JM2 dropped the old JM1
rock and roll identity to become a "James Bond" wearing the suit
and tie that Morrison predicted when he was with The Doors.
This author has in fact seen what appear to be stacks of
official-looking documents and letters between the CIA, various
government agencies, national news groups like CNN and NBC and
JM2, involving what looked like personal meetings, projects and
ephemera. Of special interest is that when I viewed parts of the
files, all the reports had a paper-thin metallic band affixed to
them with colored UPC bar codes. There is no way for me to
authenticate the claims of JM2, but everything looked extremely
official and very elaborate.
From about 1972 through 1992 JM2 has left a surreal trail of
paper and appearances all over the world. These include letters
to and from Louisiana Governor Edwin Edwards and CIA Director
William Colby, through the Washington, DC law firm of Colby,
Miller and Hanes.
A courtroom transcript which I have seen implicates the FBI
and CIA in several coverups regarding JM2's intelligence career.
These show that there seems to be a systematic destruction of
files relating to JM2's spy activities. An enclosed plate also
shows JM2's Swedish Intelligence ID card, obtained from the FBI
through the Freedom of Information Act. Unfortunately the only
copy I have is obscured in the facial area, but the ID numbers
are intact. Also in my possession are files concerning JM2's
rogue financial activities with the Bank of America, and news
reports regarding lawsuits by and against JM2 for bank fraud and
espionage, which he claims was done under intelligence auspices
as part of financial experiments to destabilize foreign
currencies and exchange rates.
There also appear to be hundreds if not thousands of
miscellaneous files -- both classified and declassified --
regarding one James Douglas Morrison, dated after his "death" in
1971. These also refer to "WBC", a nom de plume of JM2. These
look like real letters, documents, and court transcripts
involving intelligence circles. These involve the CIA, Danish
intelligence, and others. There is also an active passport and
banking IDs under the name James Douglas Morrison.
Is this all for real or is this an elaborate hoax? It is not
the scope of this work to determine the truth -- or lack of truth
-- or the consequences of such activities. The important thing
to note for the sake of this study is that someone or some group
are actively pursuing and setting up a mass "urban legend"
regarding James Morrison. They are painstakingly documenting it
also. Whether this is a hoax or not is not as important as the
fact that a lot of official-looking information is being
generated surrounding the myth and legendry of Jim Morrison, his
life and his supposed "death".
Just why might this be?
Multiple Morrisons
Like the "multiple Oswald" theories of Kennedy assassination
buffs, there also exist rumors and urban legends describing the
"multiple Morrison" theory.
The idea that Jim Morrison was in fact several different
people and actors, or intelligence agents has been going on for
some time. Besides the "Morrison" singing on the Phantom (now
shown to be Iggy Pop) there also exist rumors that a Louisiana
banker as well as Richard Tanguay -- a close friend of Mick
Jagger -- perpetuated the hoax. Even High Times ran and old news
story about someone claiming to be Jim Morrison (post 1971)
running for governor of Louisiana! Supposedly Richard Tanguay
(related to vaudeville legend Eva Tanguay) took the Morrison
persona on, on several occasions, and even sang with The Doors
when they toured Europe with the Rolling Stones. Is this
possible?
In fact JM2 has claimed publicly that there have been
numerous James Douglas Morrisons, and that they all knew one
another and met from time to time to work it all out. The
impersonations were part of CIA sociological experiments like
Artichoke or MK-ULTRA.
It is impossible to substantiate wild stories like this.
But the fact that there are people and groups out there making
these claims in a big way and perpetuating "urban legends" about
Jim Morrison is a curiosity in itself.
Fat_Abbot
