At the beginning Jim rehearsed with Rick and The Ravens (who did three singles in 1965), which consisted of the three Manzarek brothers and three other musicians. Short after only Jim, Ray and his brothers were left and together with John Densmore, who was in Ray’s meditation class, they did a 6-song demo tape. They took the songs to every record company they knew but were always rejected.
In October Jim and Ray saw a picture of Billy James, Columbia Records’ talent manager for California, and decided that he was hip enough to understand their music. Two days later they virtually had a contract with Columbia, but Ray’s brother decided to leave and Robby Krieger, also in Ray’s meditation class, joined. In the next weeks they rehearsed five days a week, working for an occasional gig on weekends. Jim was still very shy at that time, and Ray sung most of the songs.
Because nothing happened with Columbia, Billy James got no attention of the producers, the band auditioned for several clubs and finally came to the London Fog were they played for lousy $5 each on week-nights and $10 each at Fridays and Saturdays.
By February 1966 they had about twenty-five own songs in their repertoire. As the weeks passed, Jim became more self-confident and the band grew closer.
In May the owner of the London Fog fired the band, but in their last night Ronnie Haran, talent booker for the legendary Whiskey a Go Go, asked them to play the next Monday night, for union scale, $499.50 for the band.
The Doors played at the Whiskey two months, from mid-May on and were fired at least once a week by it’s owner Elmer Valentine. Jim went really crazy at that time, every day on acid and sometimes making everyone, including the go-go dancers mesmerizing. The Doors were fired when Jim sung “Mother… I want to FFFUUUCKKK YOOOO!” during the epic song The End. No band member knew about these lines and owner fired the foul-mouthed son of a bitch.
When Jac Holzman, co-founder and president of Elektra Music (Love was their first highly successful band), said “This group doesn’t have it”. The second time he saw them he liked Ray’s organ play and after the fourth visit in the Whiskey he gave them a contract. The conditions were: Three years or six albums (what ever takes longer), $2,500 advance against future royalties of 5% of the record’s wholesale price. Paul Rothchild became their producer and they’ve learned a lot from him during the first years, enough to do L.A. Woman nearly on their own.
Because describing the following five years I’ll only mention the most important moments, like the concert at the Hollywood Bowl on July 5th, 1968, which was filmed in color with many cameras and can be purchased on video. Or in the same year the European tour where the kids took music seriously and discussed it and didn’t know the super-star Jim Morrison. And of course there was the concert in Miami.