New questions about Jim Morrison's death

PARIS - The official story goes like this: On the last night of Jim Morrison's life, the rocker went to a movie in Paris, listened to records, fell ill and died of heart failure in his bathtub at the age of 27.

But rumors have always swirled around the death of The Doors frontman and, 36 years later, a former Paris nightclub manager is telling a different story. In a new book, Sam Bernett says that Morrison died in a toilet stall of his club after what he believes was a heroin overdose.

He writes of his shock on finding Morrison's body: "The flamboyant singer of 'The Doors,' the beautiful California boy, had become an inert lump crumpled in the toilet of a nightclub." Bernett, whose French-language book is called "The End: Jim Morrison," says he believes two drug dealers brought Morrison's body back to his apartment.

Bernett, who was in his early 20s when Morrison died in 1971, went on to become a prominent radio personality, rock biographer and a vice president of Disneyland Paris. Though he was pestered for years by reporters investigating Morrison's death, he kept his story quiet until his wife suggested writing a book last year.

"For me it's a very bad (memory)," Bernett told The Associated Press.

Rumors have long suggested that Morrison died of an overdose and that he had fallen ill at the nightclub, but witnesses did not come forward.

Patrick Chauvel, a noted war photographer and writer, sometimes helped run the bar at the club. He recalls giving a hand to men who were carrying Morrison in a staircase there.

"I think he was already dead," said Chauvel, who considered putting the episode in a 2005 book before his publisher cautioned against it. Chauvel said he thought an ambulance would have been called if Morrison were still alive.

"I don't know," he said. "It was a long time ago, and we weren't drinking only water."

An official at the Paris prosecutor's office said it was very unlikely the case on Morrison's death would be reopened or that anybody could be prosecuted in the affair, because the statute of limitations — the time limit on legal proceedings — had run out.

Stephen Davis, the author of "Jim Morrison: Life, Death, Legend," says he would not rewrite history because of the new book. Based on his reporting, he believes Morrison did overdose at the club, but that it was shortly before his death — not the same night — and that he survived the experience.

"It just seems likely that if he died in the toilet of a nightclub, it would have come out before now," Davis said.

Morrison came to Paris in March 1971 at a troubled time in his life. At a 1969 concert in Florida, he was accused of exposing his genitals to the audience. He was convicted of indecent exposure and profanity, and the episode led to promoters canceling concerts and earned the band a stream of negative publicity.

Morrison left for Paris with his appeal pending. There, he lived in a Right Bank apartment with his girlfriend, Pamela Courson, and he wandered the streets, sightseeing and toting around a plastic bag containing his writings. In Paris, he gained so much weight as to become almost unrecognizable, and his health suffered.

He also partied. Morrison spent "practically every night" at the Rock and Roll Circus, the hip Left Bank nightclub that Bernett managed, where stars like Roman Polanski and Marianne Faithfull were regulars, Bernett said.

At around 1 a.m. on July 3, 1971, Morrison went to the club and was joined by two men — drug dealers who sold him heroin for Courson, Bernett said. At one point, Bernett noticed that Morrison had disappeared. Later, the bouncer broke down the door of a locked toilet stall, and they discovered Morrison unresponsive, Bernett said.

Bernett says he asked a doctor, a club customer, to examine the singer.

"When we found him dead, he had a little foam on his nose, and some blood too, and the doctor said, 'That must be an overdose of heroin,'" Bernett said. Bernett added that he did not see Morrison take any heroin that night but said the singer was known to sniff the drug because he was afraid of needles.

Bernett says the two drug dealers insisted Morrison was just unconscious and carried him out of the club. Though Bernett says he wanted to call the paramedics and authorities, the club's owner ordered him to keep quiet to avert a scandal.

Bernett believes the dealers brought Morrison's body home and dropped it into the bathtub, a last attempt to revive him.

Morrison's girlfriend, who died three years later of an overdose, told police an entirely different story.

Courson said the couple went to the movies and out for dinner that night, listened to records and fell asleep. According to her testimony in police records, Morrison awoke in the night feeling ill and took a hot bath. Courson said she found him dead in the tub.

Morrison was buried in Pere Lachaise cemetery, in a small ceremony without fanfare, on July 7, 1971. No autopsy was ever performed.

Sounds right to me, 27 year olds don't have heart attacks unless they have some kind of deformality of the heart ... Jimbo was careless wit da smack and now he is gone.... and I've sat at his grave many times and said why Lizard King ?... we needed more Jimbo music on earth and you didn't stay to keep us on track.... then I cry and the sky gets dark and cloudy, the wind begins to blow through the trees and there's no one there but me....

break on through

Thanks for posting. Very interesting indeed.

Acc. to other sources he had some H before he died.
This is plausible yet yet to be confirmed.
But the circumstances around his death otherwise generally
resemble those around Phil Lynott or for that
matter my friend the marathon runner & heavy drinker.
Lynott was 36 & my friend 46.
Also note Jimbo has a very tough life
with some 200-250 LSDtrips a year plus a lot of other sh*t
around the years 1966-68.

HelterSkelter Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sounds right to me, 27 year olds don't have heart
> attacks

Unless you dink 2 quarts of hard liquor, 3 grams of coke and some red yellow and blues to keep you awake a day for at least ten years. Ask the following people:

[en.wikipedia.org]

Mathijs

"new details" always surface when someone writes a book 40 years after it happens and all the particpants are dead

Donkey Girl Scout Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "new details" always surface when someone writes a
> book 40 years after it happens and all the
> particpants are dead


True in many ways, but its not a new theory. That "heroin OD in the bathroom at Rock n Roll Circus" story was much rumoured at the time of his death and is even mentioned (but dismissed by the authors) in Sugarman & Hopkins' "No One Here Gets Out Alive" biography, which must have bee published in, what 1980 or 1981?

Donkey Girl Scout Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "new details" always surface when someone writes a
> book 40 years after it happens and all the
> particpants are dead

On the money, DGS!

Gazza Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Donkey Girl Scout Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > "new details" always surface when someone writes
> a
> > book 40 years after it happens and all the
> > particpants are dead
>
>
> True in many ways, but its not a new theory. That
> "heroin OD in the bathroom at Rock n Roll Circus"
> story was much rumoured at the time of his death
> and is even mentioned (but dismissed by the
> authors) in Sugarman & Hopkins' "No One Here Gets
> Out Alive" biography, which must have bee
> published in, what 1980 or 1981?

1980 as I understand. Nevertheless, the issue is up again;
just saw a new site which one mustnt quote officially -
with very interesting never before facts and pictures,
more details on the last months. As I got it, the last
poetry releases also shines new light on it...
But I have to admit I havent completed my Morrison poetry
collection with the latest releases.
Headline here ought to be: ~ "Old mysterious questions
re-arised about --- " or slt.

Heroin overdoses are often a combination with alkohol. I think he was an alkoholic who took heroin from time to time. And the last time when he was drunk. Hardcore junkies dont mix it with alcohol. During period of drinking they dont take anything stronger then pills and coke. Ask Keith.

The only reason that I wonder about the new theory is what would the nightclub owner have to hide if Morrison died on the throne after an overdose unless he was the supplier of the herion. So what if he died at his club? Morrison was an adult who was obviously hiding his drug use, somewhat, by going into a bathroom stale. The club owner is not responsible for the overdose simply because he owned the space where Jim died! Why not make this public knowledge and if it was true, I'd have to think Doors fans and music lovers in general would ALL know about this scenario if it were factual.

All I know is that the Doors may have been the most overrated band in rock history. I'm sorry of course that Jimbo is gone, he was a very charismatic fellow, but a poet, he was not.

In Sugarman's second book, "Wonderland Avenue", he quotes Pamela Courson's confiding to Danny that H killed Jim.

I'm going to have fun and start a war by stating my opinion on Jim Morrison. And it's just my opinion, but it's incendiary and heartfelt.

Basically, good riddance. Jim Morrisson remains to this day, in my mind, the most overrated, over-revered rock star we've ever known, and the best thing he ever did for this world was to leave it so there would be more fresh air for decent, nice people to breathe, because he wasn't decent, he wasn't nice, and yes I dare declare he was nowhere near good enough an artist to excuse his faults to posterity. He was an @#$%& to everyone he ever met. He sang like a drunk college boy which is basically what he was. Calling his dreck "poetry" is an insult to legitimate poets. And his band's best material was not only written by other members of the band, it doesn't even begin to measure up to what the Stones, Beatles, Who, Kinks, Love, VAN Morrison or any contemporaries were doing. "Light My Fire" was as good as he ever got and the Mamas & the Papas were better than THAT. Morrison was a charismatic frontman, and that is ALL he ever was. Oh, and he was a drunk, a conscienceless drunk who hurt a lot of feelings, left a lot of damage in his wake and died young because he deserved it. Bring on the hate mail!

Tommy

Hate mails.... Your bizarre contribution aint worth wasting ink on.
Just two questions:

1. "Calling his dreck 'poetry' is an insult to legitimate poets."
Now, tell us what is legitimate poets?
2. Who are you to wish other fellow-men's death?

'Instant karma Gonna Get Ya'.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2007-07-12 02:52 by Baboon Bro.

My points:

1. A truly unique talent - I love lots of Doors stuff - but is everything by the Doors good? No, but nobody else's is either (including Stones and Beatles).

2. Don't use heroin.

"No Anchovies, Please"



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2007-07-12 03:02 by Elmo Lewis.

Okay, I was a little harsh. Opinions are like sphincters, everybody's got one. That's mine. But it felt good to state. That probably says ill of me. But I've had 30 years of hearing Morrison this, Morrison that, and I've listened to the records, read his poetry, read both of Sugarman's books, and I've just come to the conclusion that Morrison was a jerk. And if it takes one to know one, so be it.

Who are legitimate poets? Well, of a classical stature I'll cite Walt Whitman, Robert Frost, Shakespeare of course. Of modern times, Robert Bly I think is wonderful, and for rock poets, Patti Smith and Jim Carroll have done good work.

I don't wish any death on any living person. Morrison, I can't hurt him. I can't hurt his family anymore than he himself hurt them. Ray Manzarek, what's he gonna care? I'm one @#$%& on a message board.

To me, insulting YOU, or hurting YOUR feelings, would be worse karma than speaking ill of Jim Morrison. YOU'RE alive. Jim's hot, sexy and dead. I can't hurt him.

Tommy

He was better looking than me (not much better), but I'm a better poet.

"No Anchovies, Please"

If you believe a soul like Jimbo's can just vanish; well, then you cant hurt him. My concern is just you hurt yourself, spitting on dead people.

Why not just stop with critizising him: must he be wished dead, retro-actively.. ?

Back from the gig. I was actually excited to get back to this thread and believe me this is totally out of character. I'm not generally inclined to get up peoples' noses with some intense hateful screed, but Morrison brings it out of me.

Yes, hatred hurts the hater more than the hated, but I don't HATE Jim Morrison. I hurt myself more with the Camel Light I just smoked than anything I could say about ole' dead Jimbo. I don't think I really hate any human being, living or dead, that I can think of. But as Henry Rollins once said, there are righteous hatreds: such as hating greed, war, harming children, prejudice, etc. And I have a righteous hatred regarding Jim.

Twice in my rock and roll travels I have seen graffiti on dressing room walls of the same quote.

"The road to excess leads to the palace of wisdom."
-Jim Morrison.

Morrison didn't come up with that line. It comes from Rimbaud or Huxley or somebody Jim read, I don't know who exactly said it originally, but Jim used it in interviews often, like a mantra. He used it as an excuse basically, an excuse to get messed up. And why I'm mad at him is that kids picked up on that and went down that road themselves. I'd say in 25 years of playing gigs I've had five or six guys get me in a corner and try to "convert" me to Jim Morrison. They were always guys and they were always drunk.

The road to excess does not lead to the palace of wisdom; it leads to the cemetery, where Jim is and where Brian Jones is and where several of my friends are.

On this site we regularly discuss and celebrate the lives and achievements of three icons of debauchery: Mick, Keith and Brian. There is probably no more notorious poster child for drug abuse than Keith Richards.

However! Keith has never once advocated one iota of his own lifestyle. The only reason any of us know he was ever a heroin addict is because he kept getting caught. Mick has used drug imagery in songs but never in a way that would make anyone say "gee, heroin looks fun." or "wow, I'd like a headful of snow too!" What a person does to themselves is his or her own business. People died trying to keep up with Keith and the Stones, but I think that was more because people were in love with the Stones, craved the excitement of being in the inner circle and died trying to keep up with a man like Keith, and it's not his fault that his constitution could take more abuse than others, or that people were in love with him. Somebody had to be Keith Richards and Keith Richards got the job; it's not his fault if people die trying to be Keith Richards when they're not.

Same with other legitimate chroniclers of debauchery, from Charles Bukowski to Lou Reed. These are people who wrote about their experiences and that's valid. But I can't imagine anyone hearing "Waiting for the Man" or "Heroin" or "Street Hassle" and feeling like they got a romanticized, attractive portrayal of what it's like to be a junkie. If anything, those songs are stern warnings not to go down that road.

I don't think Jim's soul vanished. But I believe a soul freed from it's body is beyond my poor power to harm. I believe that when we die, our souls are liquid, and get poured back into an ocean of spirit. If your soul is clean and clear like pure distilled water, you instantly dissolve into the great sea of spirit and become part of everything; if your soul is black and thick with gunk and tar, you sink and take however long it takes for your soul to break down and dissolve. If Jim has dissolved into the great spiritual sea, I can't hurt him; if he's sunk down into inky black sea, I can't help him.

Two years before Morrison made the '60s scene and began proclaiming how the road to excess led to enlightenment, the Stones had already put out the perfect refutation to such nonsense. In a way the establishment at the time couldn't see, the Stones made a very moral statement. It goes like this...

"I can't get no satisfaction.
"I can't get no satisfaction.
"But I try, and I try, and I try, and I try
"I can't get no (satisfaction)."

If that's not Buddhism in a nutshell, I don't know what is. The worst thing you can do to try and be "satisfied" is TRY to be satisfied. It's when you sit still and STOP trying that life's wonders come to you. Otherwise, as Keith sang in 1988...

"The more you struggle, baby,
"It only tightens up!"

The most harmful thing I think the Stones ever did was when Jagger, in his youthful naivety, professed to being an anarchist. Well, he followed through on that political platform all the way to Altamont. Altamont WAS anarchy, and Jagger learned his lesson.

Other than that,for all their debauched image, I find the Stones and their artistic legacy to be quite moral - profane and harrowing at times, sure - but quite moral. The tunes will stand up. "Salt of the Earth" could be sung in church, as could "Heaven", "Shine a Light" and others.

So why am I criticizing Jim Morrison? Spitting on the dead? Because he deserves it, because he's been called a "poet" for too long, because he ADVOCATED a destructive lifestyle. He didn't just set a bad example like Keith maybe, or Brian, he ADVOCATED it. And even if it's just one insomniac musician on a message board saying it, someone HAS to say he was wrong then and he'll be wrong twenty years from now, and it pisses me off that kids at frat parties still think he's cool, still think he had something to say, still think the road to excess leads to the palace of wisdom.

Finally, and then I'll stop, I promise...

"There's a killer on the road
His brain is squirmin' like a toad"

I rest my case.

Tommy

Pamela phoned Patricia Keeley (?) and said she'd given Jim some H and he wouldn't wake up. This was kept quiet so Pam wouldn't go to prison for manslaughter, that's my understanding.

Morrison was a product of the times taken a few steps further. Look at Timothy Leary leading the hippies to LSD and all of those " Magic mushrooms" that supposedly lead to enlightenment.( Look at Mick in Performance and the scene with the mushrooms), Morrison was certainly a unique talent, I happen to like alot of his writings and music and The Doors were a very influential band, different from the rest of the music at that time. I can't say that anyone who says that Jim was not a talent can be taken seriously. I think everyone is entitled to an opinion but it think it's pretty hard to refute the fact that the Doors were a hot band for the 60's. Morrison Hotel, LA Woman, and even their first album are are quite good, having stood the test of time.

For me, I admire survivors, talented people wise enough to make it through to the other side (no, not Break on Through). Keith, Lou Reed, Iggy (who, onstage truly is the "shamen" that Morrison blathered on about). All great talents who could have gone the way of Jimbo, but were too damn smart.

From4TilLate:
I have spent years of my life making interpretations
of Jim Morrison's rock lyrics and poetry.

Its beyond my ability to sompare poetry and poetry.
Me, I'm a published poet; there is always those
you "must" like and others who aint "Comme il fau".
Morrison is a link in a tradition between Shakespeare,
Rimbaud, Baudelaire, and some more pens.

I dont think you have read his poetry, actually!
The rock lyrics is another thing.

The drug romantics around Jimbo is disgusting.

Jimbo as a Shaman role model is another thing;'
thats not overrated; that dimension is underrated.

Morrison aint Big cause he chose the easy way.
He is big in spite of it.

Tommy, that was well written and it's easy to understand your feelings; I'd have to agree that some who got into Morrison might have romanticized him too much and followed him down that deadly path. I happen to like Doors music, I don't much like the thought that being a " follower" of Jim caused drug addiction and death. I'm sure it did happen, however and that's a shame. The real responsibility does lie with the individual though, don't you think? It's like the bad rap heavy metal gets from time to time when a kid decides to off himself because " Iron Maiden told me too". No one told them to take Morrison's poetry to the extreme. Most of us, like myself, have read alot of his verse and appreciated alot of it but did not opt to go down the heroin addiction path.

spikey Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> For me, I admire survivors, talented people wise
> enough to make it through to the other side (no,
> not Break on Through). Keith, Lou Reed, Iggy
> (who, onstage truly is the "shamen" that Morrison
> blathered on about). All great talents who could
> have gone the way of Jimbo, but were too damn
> smart.

Sorry Spikey, it wasn't SMARTS, it was LUCK. Keith would be dead if it wasn't for LUCK, same with IGGY and BOWIE and the singer from DEPECHE MODE.... they were ALL dancing on that very thin line- some fell one way, some the other.... it's just a roll of the dice (like a lot of things in life).....

According to Spanish Tony (& more credibly reiterated by Robert Greenfield last year) Jean de Breteuil supplied the heroin that killed Morrison as he had supplied or given the Corsican connection to the Stones at Nellcote months earlier.
He returned to London & stayed at Keith's house in Cheyne Walk where he began an affair with Talitha Getty. By this time Getty was supposedly "snorting a gram a day without achieving any noticeable effect". While going tghrough withdrawal in Rome, Getty fell in love with another woman. She left her husband, flew to London and began an affair with de Breteuil. Planning to return to London in less than a week, Talitha Getty leaves for Rome. Along with Marianne Faithfull (who supposedly was also sleeping with him around this time), "de Breteuil flies to Paris where he supplies Jim Morrison of the Doors with the heroin that causes his death on July 3rd. Nine days later Getty is found unconscious in her husband's penthouse apartment... in Rome. Thirty-one years old, she dies three days later without ever regaining consciousness...it is later she revealed she died from a massive injection of heroin. A month later, de Breteuil dies of apparently the same cause."
I have heard this guy did it elsewhere too. Marianne Faithfull was even brought up as being "involved" as she was staying in Paris with him at the time it happened. Come to think of it her own book may be where I read about him being the cause... I'm at work so I can't check that now.

Yes it was in Marianne's autobiog:
"He was scared for his life; Jim Morrison had OD'd and Jean had provided the smack that killed him. Now he was a small-time heroin dealer in big trouble. Jean saw himself as the dealer to the stars. Had he lived, he might have turned into a human being, but he was so young, he didn't know."

From4tilLate Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> In Sugarman's second book, "Wonderland Avenue", he
> quotes Pamela Courson's confiding to Danny that H
> killed Jim.
>
> I'm going to have fun and start a war by stating
> my opinion on Jim Morrison. And it's just my
> opinion, but it's incendiary and heartfelt.
>
> Basically, good riddance. Jim Morrisson remains to
> this day, in my mind, the most overrated,
> over-revered rock star we've ever known, and the
> best thing he ever did for this world was to leave
> it so there would be more fresh air for decent,
> nice people to breathe, because he wasn't decent,
> he wasn't nice, and yes I dare declare he was
> nowhere near good enough an artist to excuse his
> faults to posterity. He was an @#$%& to everyone
> he ever met. He sang like a drunk college boy
> which is basically what he was. Calling his dreck
> "poetry" is an insult to legitimate poets. And
> his band's best material was not only written by
> other members of the band, it doesn't even begin
> to measure up to what the Stones, Beatles, Who,
> Kinks, Love, VAN Morrison or any contemporaries
> were doing. "Light My Fire" was as good as he
> ever got and the Mamas & the Papas were better
> than THAT. Morrison was a charismatic frontman,
> and that is ALL he ever was. Oh, and he was a
> drunk, a conscienceless drunk who hurt a lot of
> feelings, left a lot of damage in his wake and
> died young because he deserved it. Bring on the
> hate mail!
>
> Tommy


I think it's quite harsh but if that's your honest opinion, then I admire you for saying it. I agree that Morrison is EXTREMELY over rated. Haven't had the chance to read the rest of this thread yet but I will.

I wouldn't wish the man dead and I'm not glad that he died, but I have never been able to get into the Doors and I think Morrison is severely overrated. His death at a young age made him a pop culture icon, just like Janice and Jimi. Hendrix is the only one that I think deserves the legendary status that he has acquired. But that's just me.