THAT DAY

This concert marks the turning point in the career of the Doors: there was a before and after Miami.

This catastrophic concert will forever mark the history of the Doors but also of Rock. The fault of Jim Morrison, but not only.

The pre-concert:

Three factors explain, in my view, this disaster:

1 - Jim, the previous 5 days, has not missed a performance of the Living Theater which incites young people to revolution by provoking chaos and pushing back the rules of morality and the law: Jim therefore arrives in Miami overwhelmed by this experience,

2 - Jim had a fight with Pam at the LA airport before boarding for Miami:

He sends her home, and gets so drunk at the airport bar that he misses his flight.

He finally catches a flight that stops in New Orleans where Jim will start drinking again to the point, again, of missing the NO-Miami connection: no big deal, he goes back to the bar while waiting for the next flight.

Jim will eventually arrive in Miami dead drunk. According to those close to him: drunk as rarely seen!

3 - The producers of the show, Ken and Jim Collier have tubed the Doors:

The show must take place in a former seaplane hangar converted into a performance hall.

The Dinner Key Auditorium has a seating capacity of 7,000 with a theoretical maximum payout of $42,000 of which $25,000 is agreed to be donated to The Doors.

The promoters remove the seats at the end of the afternoon, sell 5,000 additional tickets, earning $75,000 instead of the $42,000, without, of course, modifying the initial cachet of the Doors.

The Doors Manager, Bill Siddons, discovering the facts shortly before the show is furious, threatens to cancel the concert and even asks Vince Treanor, equipment manager to be ready to dismantle the equipment.

But the Collier brothers are cunning and make Siddons realize the riot that this cancellation would cause, for which the Doors would, in the end, be inevitably made responsible.

Shortly before he goes on stage, more than an hour late, Jim will be warned of this scam by Siddons. Jim, in addition to being drunk, becomes furious!

The concert :

You will find in link the recording of 56 minutes of the concert of Miami which is worth all the speeches. The first few minutes set the tone. Listen out of curiosity, music lovers: forget...

In addition to being completely unable to sing, Morrison does not want to sing: he wants to create chaos, to reproduce on the stage of Miami what he saw the previous days at the theater.

Throughout the concert he will therefore encourage the public to revolt, calling him a slave, asking him how much longer he was going to let himself be walked on, inviting him to go on stage, to undress, ....

Did he take out his penis as he was later accused? At first no,

Simulated fellatio on Krieger, his guitarist? He knelt in front, that's for sure...

The after concert:

The concert will end in the most total chaos, Jim finishing ejected in the public by one of the promoters (black belt of karate).

The next day with a hangover, the Doors went to rest for a few days in Jamaica where they learned that a complaint from a spectator (from the family of a member of the sheriff's office...) had been filed with the county sheriff's office. of Dad.

4 counts are brought against Jim Morrison:

- Lewd and lewd behavior (crime)
- Indecent exposure (misdemeanor)
- Public profanity (misdemeanor)
- Public drunkenness (misdemeanor)

Jim Morrison then faces a maximum sentence of 13 years in prison if he is found guilty of these 4 counts....

The trial will be held from August to October 1970 and Jim will finally be sentenced to 6 months in prison and a $500 fine, found guilty only of the last two counts.

He will appeal and then leave the country for France ... The rest we know.

Epilogue:

In 2010, nearly 40 years after the concert in Miami, the singer of the Doors will receive a posthumous pardon from the State of Florida, at the instigation of its governor.

Conclusions and personal remarks:

Did Jim, in Miami, cause the fall of the Doors?

Personally, I don't believe it: he changed its trajectory, he redirected it by destroying, in one "glorious evening", the image of the rock star in leather (Miami is moreover the last concert where he will wear leather pants, and the first where he will appear bearded).

The 1969 tour is certainly canceled, ie 24 dates.

Financially it will cost "The Doors Company" nearly half a million dollars in legal proceedings (not counting the loss of earnings from the cancellation of the tour)

But maybe without the Miami disaster there would have been no musical return to the roots, to the blues and rock of Morrison Hotel and LA Woman....