FRANCE:"DOORS' FANS PAY THEIR RESPECTS AT PERE LACHAISE CEMETARY ON THE 30TH ANNIVERSARY OF JIM MORRISON'S DEATH

Record ID: 391704

  • Title: FRANCE:"DOORS' FANS PAY THEIR RESPECTS AT PERE LACHAISE CEMETARY ON THE 30TH ANNIVERSARY OF JIM MORRISON'S DEATH
  • Date: 3rd July 2001
  • Summary: PARIS, FRANCE (3 JULY 2001) (REUTERS) WIDE OF ENTRANCE TO THE PERE LACHAISE CEMETERY WIDE OF MORRISON FANS AROUND GRAVE SCU SIGN DIRECTING PEOPLE TO JIM MORRISON'S GRAVE VARIOUS, FANS AROUND JIM MORRISON'S GRAVE (3 SHOTS) SLV FANS TAKING PICTURES OF THE GRAVE SCU/ PAN UP MORRISON'S PICTURES, FLOWERS AND CANDLES ON THE GRAVE /TOMBSTONE SCU JIM MORRISONS PICTURE ON GRAVE S
  • Embargoed: 18th July 2001 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: PARIS, FRANCE
  • Country: France
  • Topics: Entertainment,General,People
  • Reuters ID: LVAEKVM253H992BUQ1ULRFI3FR0K
  • Story Text: Hundreds of rock fans paid tribute to Jim Morrison, one of the most enduring icons of the 1960s, thirty years after his death.
    Paying tribute at one of rock's most enduring shrines, hundreds of fans pressed around the Paris grave of The Doors cult singer Jim Morrison on Tuesday (July 3), 30 years after drug and drink excess claimed his life.
    On alert for trouble that has marred previous anniversaries, French security guards hovered as a mix of ageing hippies, teenage fans and bemused-looking tourists took photos and laid wreaths at his modest plot in Pere Lachaise cemetery.
    But with alcohol and music now banned -- and not a whiff of the marijuana that shaped the American's own peace and love generation -- the mood was more that of an ordinary family funeral than a late 1960s happening.
    Morrison was the archetypal 1960s rock star whose tousled good looks and raucous stage show combined with the The Doors hard-edged mix of electronic blues and West Coast psychedelic sound to give them a string of international hits.
    While tracks like Light My Fire were hymns to sexual abandon, Unknown Soldier was an unmistakeable anti-war protest song and other pieces delved into Morrison's eclectic interest in everything from Greek tragedy to ecology.
    Tiring of his drugs and groupie-drenched milieu and increasingly trailed by narcotics officials, he left the United States in early 1971 to settle in France to concentrate on writing poetry and becoming a true artist. He'd come here to Paris to stop being a rock star. To become an artist again, to become the poet, Door keyboardist Ray Manzarek told Reuters Television in an interview.
    But a few months later Morrison was found dead in the bath of his Paris flat, apparently having succumbed to a lethal mix of alcohol, medication, drugs and asthma. The French coroners pronouncement of death by natural causes and his hurried burial have sparked cover-up theories ever since.
    Manzarek said the actual cause of Morrison's death is not relevant. What Jim Morrison died of is excess. He carried it too far. He never knew how far you could take things before the limit could be reached, and unfortunately he physically reached the limit, he told Reuters.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2014. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
Register