The Doors "AN AMERICAN PRAYER" Elektra/Asylum records Produced and Engineered by John Haeny Produced and Directed by John Densmore, Robby Krieger, Ray Manzarek with Frank Lisciandro. Released on vinyl 1978 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- TRACKS and LYRICS * AWAKE GHOST SONG * AWAKE * DAWN'S HIGHWAY * NEWBORN AWAKENING * TO COME OF AGE * BLACK POLISHED CHROME (Latino Chrome.) * ANGELS AND SAILORS * STONED IMMACULATE * THE MOVIE * CURSES, INVOCATION * AMERICAN NIGHT * THE WORLD ON FIRE * LAMENT * THE HTCHHIKER * AN AMERICAN PRAYER/ HOUR FOR MAGIC/ FREEDOM EXISTS/ A FEAST OF FRIENDS ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Awake Ghost Song Is everybody in? Is everybody in? Is everybody in? The ceremony is about to begin. WAKE UP! You can't remember where it was had this dream stopped? AWAKE Shake dreams from your hair My pretty child, my sweet one. Choose the day and choose the sign of your day The day's divinity First thing you see. A vast radiant beach in a cool jeweled moon Couples naked race down by it's quiet side And we laugh like soft, mad children Smug in the wooly cotton brains of infancy The music and voices are all around us. Choose they croon the Ancient Ones The time has come again Choose now, they croon Beneath the moon Beside an ancient lake Enter again the sweet forest Enter the hot dream Come with us Everything is broken up and dances. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- DAWN'S HIGHWAY Indians scattered on dawn's highway bleeding Ghosts crowd the young child's fragile eggshell mind. Me and my -ah- mother and father - and a grandmother and a grandfather - were driving through the desert, at dawn, and a truck load of Indian workers had either hit another car, or just - I don't know what happened - but there were Indians scattered all over the highway, bleeding to death. So the car pulls up and stops. That was the first time I tasted fear. I musta' been about four - like a child is like a flower, his head is just floating in the breeze, man. The reaction I get now thinking about it, looking back - is that the souls of the ghosts of those dead Indians...maybe one or two of 'em...were just running around freaking out, and just leaped into my soul. And they're still in there. Indians scattered on dawn's highway bleeding Ghosts crowd the young child's fragile eggshell mind. Blood in the streets in the town of New Haven Blood stains the roofs and the palm trees of Venice Blood in my love in the terrible summer Bloody red sun of Phantastic L.A. Blood screams her brain as they chop off her fingers Blood will be born in the birth if a nation Blood is the rose of mysterious union Blood on the rise, it's following me. Indian, Indian what did you die for? Indian says, nothing at all. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- NEWBORN AWAKENING gently they stir, gently rise The dead are newborn awakening With ravaged limbs and wet souls Gently they sigh in rapt funeral amazement Who called these dead to dance? Was it the young woman learning to play the ghost song on her baby grand? Was it the wilderness children? Was it the ghost god himself, stuttering, cheering, chatting blindly? I called you up to anoint the earth I called you to announce sadness falling like burned skin I called you to wish you well To glory in self like a new monster And now I call you to pray ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- TO COME OF AGE A military station in the desert. Can we resolve the past Lurking jaws, joints of time? The Base To come of age in a dry place Holes and caves. My friend drove and hour each day from the mountains The bus gives you a hard-on with books in your lap Someone shot the bird in the afternoon dance show They gave out free records to the best couple Spades dance best, from the hip. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- BLACK POLISHED CHROME (Latino Chrome.) The music was new black polished chrome And came over the summer like liquid night. The DJ's took pills to stay awake and play for seven days They went to the studio And someone knew him Someone knew the TV showman He came to our homeroom party and played records And when he left in the hot noon sun and walked to his car We saw the chooks had written F-U-C-K on his windshield He wiped it off with a rag and smiling cooly drove away He's rich. Got a big car. My gang will get you Scenes of rape in the arroyo Seduction in cars, abandoned buildings Fights at the food stand The dust the shoes Open shirts and raised collars Bright sculptured hair. Hey man, you want girls, pills, grass? C'mon... I show you good time. This place has everything. C'mon... I show you. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ANGELS AND SAILORS Angels and sailors rich girls backyard fences tents Dreams watching each other narrowly soft luxuriant cars Girls in garages, stripped out to get liquor and clothes half gallons of wine and six-packs of beer Jumped, humped, born to suffer made to undress in the wilderness. I will never treat you mean Never start no kind of scene I'll tell you every place and person that I've been. Always a playground instructor, never a killer Always a bridesmaid on the verge of fame or over He manouvered two girls into his hotel room One a friend, the other, the young one, a newer stranger Vaguely Mexican or Puerto Rican Poor boys thighs and buttock scarred by a father's belt She's trying to rie Story of her boyfriend, of teenage stoned death games Handsome lad, dead in a car Confusion No connections Come 'ere I love you Peace on earth Will you die for me? Eat me This way The end I'll always be true Never go out, sneaking out on you, babe If you'll only show me Far Arden again. I'm surprised you could get it up He whips her lightly, sardonically, with belt Haven't I been through enough? she asks Now dressed and leaving The Spanish girl begins to bleed She says her period It's Catholic heaven I have an ancient Indian crucifix around my neck My chest is hard and brown Lying on stained, wretched sheets with a bleeding virgin We could plan a murder Or start a religion. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- STONED IMMACULATE I'll tell you this... No eternal reward will forgive us now For wasting the dawn. Back in those days everything was simpler and more confused One summer night, going to the pier I ran into two young girls The blonde one was called Freedom The dark one, Enterprise We talked and they told me this story Now listen to this... I'll tell you about Texas radio and the big beat Soft driven, slow and mad Like some new language Reaching your head with the cold, sudden fury of a divine messenger Let me tell you about heartache and the loss of god Wandering, wandering in hopless night Out here in the perimeter there are no stars Out here we is stoned Immaculate. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE MOVIE The movie will begin in five moments The mindless voice announced All those unseated will await the next show. We filed slowly, languidly into the hall The auditorium was vast and silent As we seated and were darkened, the voice continued. The program for this evening is not new You've seen this entertainment through and through You've seen your birth your life and death you might recall all of the rest Did you have a good world when you died? Enough to base a movie on?. I'm getting out of here Where are you going? To the other side of morning Please don't chase the clouds, pagodas Her cunt gripped him like a warm, friendly hand. It's alright, all your friends are here When can I meet them? After you've eaten I'm not hungry Uh, we meant beaten Silver stream, silvery scream Oooooh, impossible concentration. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- CURSES, INVOCATION Curses, Invocations Weird bate-headed mongrels I keep expecting one of you to rise Large buxom obese queen Garden hogs and cunt veterans Quaint cabbage saints Shit hoarders and individualists Drag strip officials Tight lipped losers and Lustful fuck salesman My militant dandies All strange orders of monsters Hot on the tail of the woodvine We welcome you to our procession Here come the Comedians look at them smile Watch them dance an Indian mile Look at them gesture How aplomb So to gesture everyone Words dissemble Words be quick Words resemble walking sticks Plant them they will grow Watch them waver so I'll always be a word man Better then a bird man ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- AMERICAN NIGHT All hail the American night! What was that? I don't know Sounds like guns...thunder. (Roadhouse Blues) ...Alright! Alright! Alright! Hey, listen! Listen! Listen, man! listen, man! I don't know how many you people believe in astrology... Yeah, that's right...that's right, baby, I...I am a Sagittarius The most philosophical of all the signs But anyway, I don't believe in it I think it's a bunch of bullshit, myself But I tell you this, man, I tell you this I don't know what's gonna happen, man, but I wanna have my kicks before the whole shithouse goes up in flames Alright! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE WORLD ON FIRE The World on Fire...Taxi from Africa...The Grand Hotel... He was drunk a big party last night back going back in all directions sleeping these insane hours I'll never wake up in a good mood again I'm sick of these stinky boots ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- LAMENT Lament for my cock Sore and crucified I seek to know you Aquiring soulful wisdom You can open walls of mystery Stripshow How to aquire death in the morning show TV death which the child absorbs Deathwell mystery which makes me write Slow train, the death of my cock gives life Forgive the poor old people who gave us entry Taught us god in the child's praye in the night Guitar player Ancient wise satyr Sing your ode to my cock Caress it's lament Stiffen and guide us, we frozen Lost cells The knowledge of cancer To speak to the heart And give the great gift Words Power Trance this stable friend and the beast of his zoo Wild haired chicks Women flowering in their summit Monsters of skin Each color connects to create the boat which rocks the race Could any hell be more horrible than now and real? I pressed her thigh and death smiled death, old friend death and my cock are the world I can forgive my injuries in the name of Wisdom Luxury Romance Sentence upon sentence Words are the healing lament For the death of my cock's spirit Has no meaning in the soft fire Words got me the wound and will get me well I you believe it All join now and lament the death of my cock A tounge of knowledge in the feathered night Boys get crazy in the head and suffer I sacrifice my cock on the alter of silence ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE HTCHHIKER Thoughts in time and out of season The Hitchhiker Stood by the side of the road And leveled his thumb In the calm calculus of reason Hi. How you doin'? I just got back into town L.A. I was out on the desert for awhile "Riders on the storm" Yeah. In the middle of it "Riders on the storm" Right... "Into this world we're born" Hey, listen, man, I really got a problem "Into this world we're thrown" When I was out on the desert, ya know "Like a dog without a bone An actor out on loan" I don't know how to tell you "Riders on the storm" but, ah, I killed somebody "There's a killer on the road" No... "His brain is squirming like a toad" It's no big deal, ya know I don't think anybody will find out about it, but... " take a long holiday" just, ah... "Let your children play" this guy gave me a ride, and ah... "If you give this man a ride" started giving me a lot of trouble "Sweet family will die" and I just couldn't take it, ya know "Killer on the road" And I wasted him Yeah ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- AN AMERICAN PRAYER/ HOUR FOR MAGIC/ FREEDOM EXISTS/ A FEAST OF FRIENDS Do you know the warm progress under the stars? Do you know we exist? Have you forgotten the keys to the kingdom Have you been borne yet & are you alive? Let's reinvent the gods, all teh myths of the ages Celebrate symbols from deep elder forests [Have you forgotten the lessons of the ancient war] We need great golden copulations The fathers are cackling in trees of the forest Our mother is dead in the sea Do you know we are being led to slaughters by placid admirals & that fat slow generals are getting obscene on young blood Do you know we are ruled by T.V. The moon is dry blood beast Guerrilla bands are rolling numbers in the next block of green vine amassing for warfare on innocent herdsman who are just dying O great creator of being grant us one more hour to perform our art & perfect our lives The moths & atheists are doubly divine & dying We live, we die & death not ends it Journey we more into the Nightmare Cling to life Our passion'd flower Cling to Cunts & cocks of despair We got our final vision by clap Columbus groin got filled w/green death (I touched her thigh & death smiled) We have assembled inside this ancient & insane theatre To propagate our lust for life & flee the swarming wisdom of the streets The barns are stormed The windows kept & only one of all the rest To dance & save us W/the divine mockery of words Music inflames temperament (When the true King's murderers are allowed to roam free a 1000 Magicians arise in the land) Where are the feasts we are promised Where is the wine The New Wine (dying on the vine) resident mockery give us an hour for magic We of the purple glove We of the starling flight & velvet hour We of arabic pleasures's breed We of sundome & the night Give us a creed To believe A nightr of lust Give us trust in The Night Give of color hundred hues a rich mandala for me & for you & for your silky pillowed house a head, wisdom & a bed Troubled decree Resident mockery has claimed thee We used to believe in the good old days We still receive In little ways The things of Kindness & unsporting brow Forget & allow Did you know freedom exists in school books Did you know madmen are running our prisons w/in a jail, w/in a gaol w/in a white free protestant maelstrom We're perched headlong on the edge of boredom We're reaching for death on the end of a candle We're trying for something that's already found us Wow, I'm sick of doubt Live in the light of certain south Cruel bindings The sevants have the power dog-men & their mean women pulling poor blankets over our sailors I'm sick of dour faces Starong at me from the T.V. Tower, I want roses in my garden bower; dig? Royal babies, rubies must now replace aborted Strangers in the mud These mutants, blood-meal for the plant that's plowed they are waiting to take us into the severed garden Do you know how pale & wanton thrillful comes death on a stranger hour unannounced, unplanned for like a scaring over-friendly guest you've brought to bed Death makes angels of us all & gives us wings where we had shoulders smooth as raven's claws No more money, no more fancy dress This other kingdom seems by far the best until its other jaw reveals incest & loose obedience to a vegetable law I will not go Prefer a feast of friends To the Giant family ----------------------------------------------------------------------------