This spring, Doors co-founder Ray Manzarek passed away due to complications from bile duct cancer. Now, the surviving members of the group are reconciling and planning a tribute concert for the late keyboardist.
The only living members of the original band are guitarist Robby Krieger and drummer John Densmore. "We're going to do at least one show for Ray and have a big send-off," Krieger told Rolling Stone. "That's either the start or the end of it, I don't know."
This gig will follow prior Doors reunion gigs that have seen the surviving band members performing with various replacements singers in lieu of the late Jim Morrison, who died in 1971.
This reunion is particularly significant since Krieger and Densmore have publicly feuded over the past decade, most notably waging a legal battle over the use of the band name. Densmore's new book, The Doors Unhinged, chronicles these disputes. This being said, the band recently set aside their differences in order to record genre-crossing collaborations with Skrillex and Tech N9ne. (The latter team-up, "Strange 2013," is due out on July 30 as part of Tech N9ne's Something Else album.)
It's not clear exactly when the tribute show will take place, but Krieger said, "We should probably wait until John's book dies down. He's the one that got me in the Doors. What am I going to do? I can't hate him forever. I just wish he had wanted to play with Ray and I back before all this started. That's when things went bad. We're talking about it."
Krieger further noted that he and Manzarek had worked on some new material with the Cult's Ian Astbury that has yet to see the light of day. "Maybe something will come of that at some point," he said. "It was some pretty good stuff, actually. We couldn't call it the Doors. We didn't know what to call it, and we kind of gave up on it."
The only living members of the original band are guitarist Robby Krieger and drummer John Densmore. "We're going to do at least one show for Ray and have a big send-off," Krieger told Rolling Stone. "That's either the start or the end of it, I don't know."
This gig will follow prior Doors reunion gigs that have seen the surviving band members performing with various replacements singers in lieu of the late Jim Morrison, who died in 1971.
This reunion is particularly significant since Krieger and Densmore have publicly feuded over the past decade, most notably waging a legal battle over the use of the band name. Densmore's new book, The Doors Unhinged, chronicles these disputes. This being said, the band recently set aside their differences in order to record genre-crossing collaborations with Skrillex and Tech N9ne. (The latter team-up, "Strange 2013," is due out on July 30 as part of Tech N9ne's Something Else album.)
It's not clear exactly when the tribute show will take place, but Krieger said, "We should probably wait until John's book dies down. He's the one that got me in the Doors. What am I going to do? I can't hate him forever. I just wish he had wanted to play with Ray and I back before all this started. That's when things went bad. We're talking about it."
Krieger further noted that he and Manzarek had worked on some new material with the Cult's Ian Astbury that has yet to see the light of day. "Maybe something will come of that at some point," he said. "It was some pretty good stuff, actually. We couldn't call it the Doors. We didn't know what to call it, and we kind of gave up on it."
