They've got The Doors covered
By Derek Paiva
Advertiser Entertainment Writer
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| When rocker Jim Morrison, above, died in 1971, his band The Doors said they would not play or tour together again. Ron Montanaro grew up fascinated by the singer's music. His group Morrison will perform a tribute concert to the Lizard King and The Doors tomorrow.
The Doors Tribute Concert 2002 Featuring Morrison 7 p.m. Saturday Waikiki Shell $10-$17.50 526-4400 Also featuring chanter Tracy Smith and a performance by the King's Guard |
Sure, Montanaro had The Doors-at-the-Hollywood-Bowl-era tight black leather pants and a blue, loose-fitting, heavy cotton dress shirt opened past his chest just so. And at 42, his body was even impressively early Morrison, wiry and compact.
But what really turned heads up from lattes, home-fries and omelettes in Bogart's yuppie-friendly environs earlier this week was Montanaro's mane. It's a jet black mop of sight-impairing bangs and weighty, uncurled locks temporarily cheating gravity by resting on his shoulders.
The visual impression didn't change all that much over the next half hour as I sat across a table from Montanaro discussing Saturday evening's Waikiki Shell Lizard King tribute concert with his part-time Doors cover band called, um, Morrison.
"It was 1971 ... the year that Jim died," explained Montanaro, of his first exposure to The Doors via his surfing coach. "I was 9 years old ... and I loved 'L.A. Woman.' It was the first eight-track I had ever purchased with my own money."
Then living in Florida, Montanaro wasn't as turned on by the thought of tuning in and dropping out to other Doors albums as he was trying to become a competitive motorcross racer or professional surfer. He actually achieved the latter in his teens, joining the Association of Surfing Professionals and entering contests that would eventually bring him here, where he has lived part time for about a decade.
Still, as a teenager and young adult, Montanaro found it difficult to escape the music of The Doors — especially after he began moonlighting in rock bands when not on his surfboard.
"Even though we were doing originals, people would tell me that my voice sounded like Jim's," Montanaro said of his somewhat Morrison-esque singing vox. When Montanaro laughed off their comparisons, friends began handing him enough Doors albums to convince him otherwise. Montanaro ended up becoming a fan, immersing himself in Doors music, literature and minutiae.
"Still, it wasn't enough for me to start thinking of doing any kind of re-creation of the band," insisted Montanaro.
The inspiration for that arrived in 1994 when Montanaro — then living in Los Angeles — was introduced to former Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek by a mutual friend. After listening to Montanaro's deep, husky vocal work on a cassette by a Florida metal band called East of Sixty, Manzarek "was kind of blown away," said Montanaro. "He just said, 'Wow, your voice is hauntingly like Jim's.' And we weren't even doing Doors songs or anything like it."
Strangely enough, Manzarek suggested that Montanaro form his own Doors tribute band. Even stranger, Montanaro liked the idea.
"At that time The Doors were saying they would never play or tour together again," said Montanaro. "And there were so many Doors fans out there who still loved the music. When (Manzarek) suggested it, it was like he was, you know, passing the torch on, so to speak. That made it OK for me."
Some form of the band — now composed of original members Montanaro and keyboardist Brent Lane; and guitarist Jeff Henrickson and drummer Norman Zalaya — has been together ever since, playing a couple of shows together every year for kicks. The band has put on Doors tribute concerts in California and Hawai'i, and came together to open for touring retro bands like Kansas, Blue Oyster Cult and Warrant.
Staged as a sort-of Beatlemania! for the peyote-and-magic-mushroom set, Morrison's Saturday concert will cover more than 30 Doors titles from the popular ("Break On Through," "Light My Fire") to the obscure ("Crawling King Snake," "Alabama Song").
"In between (Morrison) stuff, I'm always working on original stuff," said Montanaro, who, prefers channeling the Morrison mojo with more obscure Doors songs like "Not To Touch The Earth" and "Peace Frog." "This is just something we do ... to make fans of The Doors happy, and something I enjoy performing."
