Floating Through The Water, With Flowing Moss Beneath And A Majestic Waterfall In The Background 😌

Wonderful & magic winter ❤️

By 1966, Guy Webster had established himself as a go-to guy for every record company in Hollywood, so it was hardly a surprise that fall when Jac Holzman of Elektra Records hired him to create the cover for the debut album by a new group Holzman had signed. What was a surprise, at least for Guy, was that when the band showed up at his studio for the shoot, the lead singer greeted him like an old friend. It turned out they had met years before when Guy was taking a philosophy class at UCLA. It was Jim Morrison, much thinner and with much longer hair than when Guy had last seen him in the classroom. The group, of course, was the Doors, and the album cover, dominated by Morrison’s handsome face, would earn Guy his second Grammy nomination.

1966,11.  Beverly Hills, CA. © Guy Webster

Amy and Ozzy by Ross Halfin

1967.05.26. Crescenta Valley High School, La Crescenta, CA.  Photos by Linda Neff (Backstage) / Unidentified (KRLA Beat) 

I received an Aztec wall


of vision


& dissolved my room in


sweet derision


Closed my eyes, prepared to god


A gentle wind inform’d me so


And bathed my skin in ether glow

10/24/1966 The Doors give their first performance in New York. Billie Winters— a friend of Jim Morrison and Ondine club owner Brad Pierce, is hosting this concert for The Doors. Apparently, this performance is the first audition in residence in Ondine. After the first performance, Brad Pierce hired The Doors to perform throughout November. The Doors stay at the Henry Hudson Hotel during their stay in New York. The owner of the club, Brad Pierce, takes The Doors shopping during this period in search of new stage clothes. The Doors record their first album in Elektra Studio during the day and perform at night. During this period, Hit Parader editor and photographer Don Paulsen interviewed The Doors for the first official interview. On November 24, The Doors take a day off, they were invited to Paul Rothschild's house for Thanksgiving dinner.

📷1966.11 The Doors on the stage of the Ondine nightclub. Photo by Don Paulsen

The Doors shot an early morning photo session with Bobby Klein atop a billboard on the Sunset Strip in Hollywood, California. Photo Credit: Bobby Klein © January 1967.

The first Doors album – simply titled The Doors – took just five days to make. Yet it took five months for Elektra to finally release it.  Jim and Ray had pushed at that point for the album to be released immediately, in time for Christmas. But Jac, the wise old label head, knew better and talked them into allowing Elektra to hold back its release until the new year. Jim threw a tantrum and again needed to be talked down.Jac painted Jim a picture of the kind of campaign Elektra would build around the album when it was finally released in January 1967: “I said: ‘We’ll have more time to prepare for you and I’ll release no other album that month, which means you’ve got Elektra working a hundred per cent on your album for the first month. And by the way, I have this idea about putting a billboard up on Sunset Strip…’ Well, that caught Jim. He loved that idea. He said: ‘Where’d you come up with that?’”

Jim and Thor (Ray's brother's doberman) hunt abalone with Ray, Dorothy and Ray's mother. At that time, Jim was living in Ray and Dorothy's house, where he was given the master bedroom. Photo courtesy of Ray Manzarek, 1965.

In May 1967, "Elektra Records" organized a lunch in Los Angeles for The Doors.  

Jim Morrison, Jule 28th-30th, 1967, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, CA. 📷 Paul Ferrara