On January 12, 1993 The Doors were inducted into the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame. The induction ceremony is a two step process the actual award ceremony where the group is given an introduction by a contemporary artist influenced by the band and the group then comes onstage and accepts the honor, and the second part, which has always seemed a little strange to me, the band is asked to perform some of the songs that made them famous.
Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder inducted The Doors, giving about a three minute speech (see video to the left of this article) in which he details how the members of The Doors avoided the draft, and the story of Jim Morrison’s mysterious ‘Z’ classification. Then The Doors themselves came out, Ray Manzarek, Robby Krieger, John Densmore and representing Jim Morrison and the Morrison family, Jim’s sister Anne was with them. Manzarek, seemingly enjoying the moment talked the longest, and maybe with a stage manager rushing him said he was going to take his time and enjoy this because he was only going to do this once in his life, and he ended by reading part of Jim Morrison’s An American Prayer. Robby Krieger took the moment to thank his parents, and tell the story of how they borrowed The Doors $300 so the band could buy some keyboards, and Robby said he didn’t think they had paid his parents back. John Densmore also took the moment to thank his family, and Anne Cherney, Jim’s sister, thanked the audience in her family’s name for honoring Jim.
During the performance part of the show, Vedder sang lead vocals on three songs with The Doors, Roadhouse Blues, Light My Fire, and Break on Through. During the solo of Roadhouse Blues Robby seemed to add a bit of phrasing from a Beatles song, this isn’t unusual, in the past Robby has said that in the instrumental of Light My Fire he used phrasings from John Coltrane’s My Favorite Things, and The Beatles Eleanor Rigby. During Break on Through Vedder inserted a bit of Jim’s “Dead Cat” rap into the song.
In a recent interview with Classic Rock Society Robby remembered that once Eddie Vedder agreed to do the Hall of Fame induction he decided to drive down to L.A. from Seattle, but when the time for the rehearsal came about Vedder was a no show, the same for the second rehearsal. Naturally, they were wondering what had happened to Vedder, and it turned out that he had decided to drive through one of the Northwests heavier rainstorms, and that his rehearsal was listening to CD’s of The Doors albums on the drive down. You can also hear Robby’s thoughts on the Rock Hall of Fame in another part of the interview the Classic Rock Society.
Also in Doors history on January 12, 1968 Strange Days is certified as a gold album.
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