Coming to you from the studios at the Illinois Rock and Roll Museum on Route 66, it's the Rock and Roll Chicago Podcast. Hey everybody, it's Ray the Roadie. And this is Hollywood Mike.

Hello, Hollywood Mike. On a fine, wonderful afternoon. Well, it's kind of evening already.

I guess it is. It is after six. I mean, the sun is, you know, the sun is out now.

The sun is out. I finished work. I did a whole thing.

I got here. The sun is out. This is great.

It's beautiful. It's a wonderful time. But it feels like winter.

Um, yeah, a little bit. It's a little chilly. Yeah.

Even though this is going to be coming out in July, we're recording this and it's freezing cold. Well, you know, it can be cold in July. It can.

It can. You can have Christmas in July. That's true.

When hell freezes over. Yeah. Yeah.

Is anything exciting? Not really. No. It's been just kind of a mellow kind of week.

How about you? Pretty much the same. Yeah. Yeah.

Pretty much the same. Just looking forward to tonight's podcast. Yeah.

Do we have one? We do. Who's that? That's the Lizard Kings. How you guys doing? Who let that cricket in here? There's a cricket in the studio.

Yeah. We got to change that though, because it's just a bunch of dudes screaming. It's what? It's just a bunch of dudes.

It is. It is. You know, you hear that? Yeah.

You're right. There's no chicks in there. Yeah.

We need to get some women's voices. Yeah. We got to get a new one.

So tell us about who you are and what do you do in the band? Um, we're the Lizard Kings. I'm Al Logan. I sing and I play the keys.

And I am Bruce. Sorry. I am Bruce Dorada, guitar, the Robbie of the band, if you will.

Yep. And apparently I'm the new John Dunsmore. My name is Grant Nieberthal.

There you go. Right. Right.

Nice to meet you guys. And you're missing one. Yes.

And who's that? Dan Huber. He's, uh, why is it? He's indisposed for some reason. There you go.

He's in the bathroom. Oh, we can wait. Yeah.

Getting musician together is like trying to herd cats. Yeah. You're right.

Yeah. You're right. So is y'all my, is y'all my guests? Yes.

Lizard Kings. Yes. A Doors tribute band.

Exactly. I guessed it. I guessed it immediately.

You did. That's what they were going to be. Yeah.

You should go on a game show. And there's, you know, maybe, yeah. And there, you know, there isn't a lot of Doors tribute bands around in Chicago.

I mean, I think you guys might be the only one I've ever heard of. There's, well, there's a couple others. And, um, Grant, we, we, we met Grant through, uh, he's from another cover band locally.

Okay. Uh, we were, we were. Not a Doors, but not a Doors tribute band.

Another Doors tribute band. Actually it is. So you're like two time in these guys.

Well, I got to love me two times. Yeah. We need that.

Yeah. It's an American prayer and, um, it's the shows are sparse, but, uh, we're taking a hiatus right now because our lead singer's parents are ill. So, um, I kinda, I do the local booking.

We have a national agent and, um, I'm just basically standing the band down right now. So Rick can focus on family. Cause we're about that.

Gotcha. Okay. So when we do refire back up, we'll probably only be doing maybe one show, two shows at the most every other month kind of thing.

Right. Right. Try not to burn out because he's right.

There are a couple of, uh, other tributes out there and, um. Yeah. And I, I call us more of a, of a cover band.

We don't, we don't like try to look like them or I don't, I'm not like Desmond used to say, I'm not a Jimitator. I don't dress up like him. I don't fall on the floor and try to roll around.

You're still alive. I'm still alive. Right.

You know, and then you, you, when you see us, you see, oh, we're not a tribute. Cause, um, I'm singing and playing the keyboards. Right.

So as opposed to just having just a front man singer. Yeah. It's, it's truly different with, with different kinds of setups.

I mean, you see tribute bands and cover bands and there's a fine line between it. And when a tribute does it, they got all the right gear, all the clothes, all, all the, all the, everything. Right.

That would be us. These guys, they're phenomenal, you know? And, uh, I'm going to let them tell you the story. If we have an insert for it.

I didn't want to go to the tribute route. Cause then that would mean no, no live bass player. And, uh, the doors had a lot of great bass players in studio, not live.

They never performed live with a bass player. I don't think. Right.

Um, but, uh, in the studios, they had a lot of great bass player musicians coming in and, and sitting in and laying down those tracks. And so I really wanted to have a bass player playing live with us. And it lets, it allows us to play more songs that, that you wouldn't be able to do on the bass keyboard.

But come on, man. I mean, Geddy Lee can play keys and work the bass pedals and sing at the same time. What's wrong with you? For a while, there was, when we didn't have a bass player for a year, I did the bass keys and say bass keys.

So you played bass guitar? No, I played bass with my left hand. Gotcha. Just, just the way the doors it.

Yeah. Yeah. Believe it or not.

The, um, the only formal music lessons I ever took were organ lessons. My mother wanted me, she had dreams. She wanted me to play in the church choir and that didn't take, that didn't take, but I still have, I think it's, I think it's from 1964.

They bought it secondhand. It's a 1964 Wurlitzer spinet organ. It's got the wooden pedals on it and the whole bit.

It sounds absolutely amazing. It's, it's got Wurlitzer's, um, version of a Leslie. So they can't really call it a Leslie and it doesn't spin all the way.

It doesn't completely, it doesn't go 360. It just kind of oscillates back and forth a little bit like this. It's got the, it's got the vibrato pedal and stuff on the volume pedal and everything.

But I've learned math third, third grade kid learned with the organ teacher smacking me on the knuckles with the ruler. You know, if I hit the wrong note, don't look at your feet. And I literally learned how to play that way.

That's how you learn being smacked on the knuckles. Yeah. Can we say oscillate? Oscillate? Can we say that? Yeah.

You just can't say oscillate. Okay. Although, you know, we should probably coin that though.

Oscillate. Oscillate. Oh, oscillate.

Oscillate. Yeah. That'll be on some website by next week.

Yeah. For your burning hemorrhoids, use oscillate. That's a new band name.

Yeah, there you go. Or an album, new album coming out. So what is your keyboard setup? I mean, I'm imagining that you kind of want to sound a little authentic, right? Yeah, I went with a Korg N5.

It's an older model, but it was back when Korg, what they did later on is take a keyboard, all those special things that it does. And then instead of having it just in one keyboard, they went and divided it up into two, three, three keyboards. So you'd have to buy all three of them.

But the Korg N5 has a lot of features. I can split the keyboard, has a lot of different organ sounds. I can get a Hammond sound.

I can get the Doors 60 psychedelic sound. I can get a road sound out of it. Right.

I was going to say, you got to have the road sound too. And I get a thunder sound. So when we play Riders on the Storm, it sounds like it starts raining.

Nice. Wow. Okay.

So, I mean, yes, you're a cover band, but you're trying to be authentic to a point. You want to make the music sound right. Oh, absolutely.

Absolutely. You're not like completely reorchestrating Doors music, you know. No, we try to capture the live shows.

So we do, we try to do the live versions of the shows. And Al's kind of underselling himself. I mean, basically he's doing Ray and Jim at the same time.

Sure. Right. So, but the thing with, as I think you mentioned before, the bass lines are so intricate that having that bass player allows him to do kind of more of the right hand stuff and still sing.

But yeah, that's what we try to do. We try to capture more of the live feel. Right.

Right. Yeah, absolutely. So how did the whole thing come about? You guys said there's a story.

Well, I started the band right out of high school. And high school, I already had a vision for the band. I was going to have a band.

We were going to call it the Lizard Kings. And that was my vision. Well, what happened was I went out and I started seeing a lot of local bands and seeing who was good.

And I saw a lot of good tribute bands, a good Santana band. And I saw a really good Santana band. They really inspired me.

I was like, oh, that's what I want to do. But with more like psychedelic music. And then I put a band together.

I ran into Bruce, I don't know where, at a club or no. You answered it. Craigslist.

Because you never know what you're going to get. Craigslist. Yeah, I play guitar.

You know, and the first incarnation, it wasn't before I met Bruce. The first incarnation of version of the Lizard Kings I had. It was all like all for one.

We all decided together, just like the Doors. The Doors all decided, hey, you know, we either we decide everything unanimously or we don't do it. But then that just led to a lot of fights.

And then after a while, I was like, you know what? This is now a dictatorship. Yeah, somebody has to be in charge. Exactly.

Somebody needs to make the final call. And actually, after that, everything started running smoothly. Yeah.

So this has been a long time dream of yours. You said in high school, you came up with the name Lizard Kings. So the biggest problem is just finding the right guys.

So the guys are with the talent and the dedication and they can get along. You get the talent, you get the dedication. Now you have to have four guys to get along.

Yeah. And that doesn't always happen. Yeah, absolutely not.

And especially, you know, when you're in a band playing music as unique as the Doors, because let's face it, it is unique. It really is. A lot of musicians.

There's a distinct sound. A lot of musicians don't want to tackle it. That's the main problem.

Yeah, that is correct. Yeah. They hear that and they go, oh, you know what? That's going to take too long for me to get that.

Never mind. I mean, I get that at open jams all the time. There's always the harmonica player that wants to play, I mean, Roadhouse Blues or something like that.

And you've got guys that are like, no, we don't want to play that. That's too bluesy. Too bluesy.

What does that mean, first of all? That song rocks too hard. Let's not play it. Yeah, that kicks too much ass.

We can't do that. But you know what? It's the age-old story about the guitar players that say things like, yeah, I would never play blues or something like that. It's primitive music.

It's too easy. Well, OK. Well, then let's see you do it.

Right, right. Exactly. You know, let's do it.

Sometimes these guys are so technically skilled that they can't just hold down a simple one, four, five. And those are the guys that don't want to play Roadhouse Blues. So that's a blues song.

But what I found, I played it with just about every band I've ever been in. Right. It's all about that shuffle feel and finding the right drummer and bass player that can play that shuffle.

I got to say, I mean, of all the bands I've played this with, this band does it correctly. So yeah, it might be simple from a music theory standpoint. But to get that shuffle feel, that groove, it's not always that easy.

That's the intangible. There's little nuances here and there that you got to tweak the song so they can give it that feel. The common mistake whenever bands try to play this, bass player tries to play the E on the low E string.

That right away just changes the feel of the song. And you got to tell them, hey, play the E on the A string. And it just gives it a whole different vibe.

Right, right. I have to apologize. We're going to take a pause here for just a second.

Why don't we take a pause and give them time to set up their instruments and everything. For some reason, my daughter and my wife are blowing up my phone. OK, well, we will be right back.

You're listening to the Rock and Roll Chicago podcast. Hey, everybody, it's Ray the Roadie. And this is Hollywood Mike of the Rock and Roll Chicago podcast.

If you've been joining our weekly program, we have great news for you. Just tune in to Road to Rock radio on Mondays at 7 p.m. Central Time, and you can hear a rebroadcast of one of our past episodes. Then again on Thursdays at 7 p.m., you can hear our most current episode brought to you by the Illinois Rock and Roll Museum on Route 66.

So go to Road2Rock.org, scroll down and click on radio station. That'll bring you to the Road to Rock radio, a station committed entirely to the great music from Illinois, from Chicago blues born on Maxwell Street to today's rock and roll and everything in between. 24-7, all music with its roots in Illinois.

All right. And we're back after the break. We got it all set up here in the studio.

We got some instruments. We have a really cool tambourine here. Real cool tambourine.

Check the tambourine. You know, from now on, you know what we have to do? We have to start looking for the band that has an electric tambourine because we found a band that has a glockenspiel. Yeah, I've been looking for a glockenspiel band for a long time.

And we found the glockenspiel band. So now we've got to find an electric tambourine. All right, sounds good.

All right, everybody, we got the Lizard Kings. Take it away, fellas. So What are they doing in the hyacinth house What are they doing in the hyacinth house There is a lion This day I need a brand new friend who doesn't bother me I need a brand new friend who doesn't trouble me I need somebody who doesn't need me.

I think the bathroom's clear. I think that somebody's near. I feel like somebody's following me.

Why did you throw that deck of cards away? Why did you throw that deck of cards away? It was in my luck I slipped away. And I'll say it again. I need a brand new friend.

And I'll say it again. I need a brand new friend. One more time.

And I'll say it again. I need a brand new friend. The end.

Very nice. Love that. Love that, man.

It's got that trippy sound, man. It does. It does.

And I didn't miss the keyboard. It took us hours to learn it. We took that from one of their later discovered recordings off the box set.

I don't think they were signed with Electric yet. And I picked that because I knew I wouldn't have the keyboard here. So I was like, oh, they did it without the keyboards.

And it'd be something cool for us. Yeah, no, it's pretty good. Definitely.

How many albums did The Doors record? While Jim was alive, they did six albums in five years. Six albums in five years. Wow.

Yeah, to do two albums in a year is like it's in a hurdle now. I mean, it would have been kind of hard to do albums after he died. And yet they did.

They put three more albums after he died. Posthumously, yeah. And the irony of the whole thing is In American Prayer was the last album, and Jim was dead already.

And that's how we came up with our name for our tribute. It was just weird. Yeah.

Huh. Interesting. So yeah, they just had all that material left over and just kept releasing material posthumously, I guess.

Yeah, while he was in seclusion in Paris, he went into the studio one day and just recorded himself talking poetry, hours and hours of poetry. And it was enough there for them to piece together some songs. Wow.

Wow, that's awesome. It's beautiful. The poetry on its own, even without the music, is beautiful.

I don't think I've ever heard any of that stuff. That makes me want to go and find it. So it's like, is it a bunch of spoken word stuff? It's a lot of spoken words.

Some of it, medleys he heard in his head, he would sing them, and the guys would put music to it. But even the spoken word stuff, they put music to it, and it just fits really well. Wow.

Yeah. So a lot of stuff, he would just sing the words and the melody to the song, and he had a recording of himself doing it, mainly because he wanted to remember it. And then they found it, and the guys just played it and played along to it, and bam, we've got a new song.

Well, he was pretty musical. I think we've talked about this before. Jim, when he recited his poem, wasn't it more in a meter that allowed the musicians to be able to attach music to it? He wasn't just kind of randomly rattling off these lyrics.

I think he did it in a way with a certain amount of meter to it. Yeah, kind of like the lyrics and the music came to him at the same time. Right, right, right.

Well, even early on, a lot of the songs where he was just speaking, like you said, there's like a meter to his voice. He's not just talking. There is actually something there.

Right, right, right, because a lot of his vocals, I mean, he wasn't known as a fantastic vocalist. He was a front man. He was a performer, and a lot of the music, the melody is very, when he sings it, it's very monotone.

It just has very slight inflections. Either he's very low and monotone or he's screaming. Or he's screaming.

Right, right. Yeah, he's kind of like Dave Grohl in that respect. Now I heard that there was one song that they recorded that they put him in a bathroom, I remember hearing about.

It was L.A. Woman, and actually the song that we just played is off that same album. And it's weird because one of the lyrics is, I see the bathroom is clear. I think that someone is near.

And then he died after that. Before that, yeah, before they could take that album on tour, he already had passed. He had passed.

Wow. Yeah, because they said the acoustics, he was in there singing, and somebody heard it and said, stay in there. Yeah, yeah, yeah, go over there.

You don't have any of your own. No, no, no. Stay over there.

And really, everybody sounds great in the bathroom. Oh, heck, man, you ought to get me in the shower every morning. So what kind of venues are you guys playing? This, to me, sounds more like a theater type of a thing than just like your average sports bar or something.

Well, definitely small bars, small clubs do work in our favor, especially if we get it nice and dark with the right lighting. It really reproduces a really good vibe. Even to the point where, like, people come up to us who have never even heard the music and are experiencing it for the first time and they actually love it.

And that's the great part about this band is that if they had never existed in the 60s and came out today as they were, they would still be a hit. They totally would. I've always thought that.

I thought, you know, there's several bands that I always kind of felt were ahead of their time. Doors were definitely one of them because now if you listen to the music, go to Spotify or Pandora and stuff and listen to those guys that are – I'm trying to think of an example of a station. There's a station I was listening to.

I think it might be called New Mud. It could be blues. It could be country.

They all kind of fit that Chris Stapleton, Lucas Nelson kind of genre. The Alabama Shakes would fit into that. It's like got kind of a vintage sound, sounds like they're using vintage instruments.

Everything sounds like it's recorded like in someone's bathroom. And usually the front person in those bands are just fantastic lyricists, and that is hot right now today. Number one stations on all of those streaming services right now.

The Doors would be like the number one band. I totally believe that. I'd see them on a tour with like the Black Crows and the Alabama Shakes.

That'd be the kind of thing. Another revelation that's been happening is that people are liking their – not their greatest hits, but their B-side stuff. The B-sides are becoming popular.

Everybody already knows the greatest hits, but now the B-songs are coming out, they're popping out, and people are liking those songs too. They're having more success now than they did back then. I think some of the earlier stuff as well was like they were experimental before experimental became a thing.

Because some of their songs were – especially some of their live recordings, they were like epic songs, these 15-minute long songs when Jim just decided to start doing his grunting and his dancing around and flopping around on the floor and stuff like that. And the band's like, what do we do now? They're like, I don't know. Just keep playing.

Keep freaking playing. Well, the other cool side of that band was is that these were guys that came from like three different genres of music too. So you had Manzarek who was – well, if you look at the era back where the Doors came out of in the 60s, I'm going to say early 60s when they kind of formed and then they were kind of pushing it toward the end in the 70s.

Densmore, I can say because I had to do his history and stuff like that, learned a lot of his drumming from Max Roach who was a big band drummer, jazz cat. So that's kind of like where he fit in with his style against Manzarek. And so between Robby's experience doing whatever he was doing back then, which I never really followed what Robby did much of unless you did.

Flamenco and jazz. Flamenco and jazz. So, I mean, that just was kind of the genre that was around there.

And then you had the British invasion around that time too. And I don't know. It just seemed like everybody kind of grabbed on that boat and went that way.

But, yeah, that's kind of like how all that came together. I mean, you had three different guys, great artistry. And I was watching the Doors movie one day.

And they had to see him when they're walking on the beach and he's just going, I think it was Manzarek said, Hey, Jim, we got to put a band together. And Jim's like, Yeah, man. Sure.

Okay. No problem, man. Look at that pigeon over there.

No, that's a seagull eating a pigeon. Right, man. Got it.

And that's kind of how they put the band together right there on the beach. And then they all agreed to it, like you'd say. And, of course, Ray Manzarek, the pride of us outside of Chicago, went to St. Rita High School.

We used to rehearse right across the street. Well, I live on the block. Actually, I'm two blocks away from where Manzarek learned to play the piano from the very first time over on Cermak Avenue and Marshall Boulevard.

There's an old building that used to be a community center. That was the first place where he learned to play the piano because they offered piano lessons. And we got to be just a rehearsal spot for a while.

One summer, it was just right across the street from that. It was very inspiring. Wow.

Very cool. I'm picturing that Family Guy episode where they put together a band and Peter Griffin decides he's going to be the Jim Morrison. By the end of the Family Guy episode, he's wearing a dashiki and a whole band.

Yeah, I got this. I got this real good over here. That's great.

I'm sorry. I'm also a man of many voices. That's good.

Can you do Rich Little? Well, Nancy, no. No, no, no, no. That sounded like Ronald Reagan trying to do Rich Little.

Well, that was one of Rich Little's biggest impressions. Yeah, well, I'm dead. Dad and Carson.

Yeah, well, that is whacked out stuff. I'll tell you why. The Blizzard Kings are at a roundtable right now.

Nobody believed that. That's crazy. Isn't that right, Ed? Yes, sir.

Big Ash. All right. A man of many talents over here.

Yeah, that's right. Can he do that and play a Fender set of bass pedals at the same time? Yeah. That's what I want to know.

So you said you're playing smaller clubs and things like that. Are we talking full nights by yourself? Do you usually have an opening act with you? How do you guys do that? Well, we usually try to do the night by ourselves because we have a lot of music. We usually play two hours to three hours, sometimes nonstop.

Because the venue will say, hey, you can take a break. And we're like, you know what? We're feeling it. Let's just keep going.

And we've done like three-hour sets until we come off the stage all just burned out and sweating and feeling great. Right, right. But yeah, no, we play a smaller end.

But we do a regular performance over at Montrose Beach over at a place called The Dock. It's right on the beach. That's probably where our favorite place to play at.

On a really nice day, you're right on the beach. Sun's hitting the eye on the stage. You can hear the music for a long, long, long, far away all the way down the street.

And that's probably our favorite place to play at right now, Montrose. And we're just waiting for the weather to get warmer so we can get out there. We have to play Riders last.

Because every time we play Riders, we invoke the rain gods. And we get rained on every time. So we always do it last.

It feels like it. Lo and behold, every time we do it, the clouds start rolling in. And we get to play like when the sun's still up.

We play through the sunset and then like an hour or two at nighttime. And it's just beautiful. So yeah, just come on out.

Just look up the dock at Montrose and you'll find us there. Yeah, man. So I'm assuming, or maybe I shouldn't make this assumption, because there are some cover or tribute bands that don't focus on the hits.

I mean, are you focusing on the hits? Are you putting emphasis on the B-sides? How are you making your set list up? Well, if we were just playing an hour set, yeah, we would just focus mainly with the hits and then sprinkle a couple of B-sides. But when you're playing two, three hours, you got to do the B-stuff, you know, just to cover the whole night. Like I said, they're only around for five years, six albums.

It's about 80 songs. I think 80 songs total. Well, that's plenty.

Yeah. Because you need about, what, 32 songs to do a full night by yourself? So I think you've got enough. And when you're playing and rocking, they go by fast.

Right, right, right, right. Now, unless you do some of the live cuts where, you know, one song lasts like half the set or whatever. But yeah.

We do. Like, for example, like Break On Through, it's a very short song studio-wise. But when they're live renditions, like a lot longer, it's an eight-minute song.

Oh, yeah. And we tend to do that version more. And we've done album theme nights, too.

Yeah, we also do the entire album. Oh, nice. That would be pretty cool to see.

Yeah, from start to finish. Yeah, yeah. We've done the first album.

We've done Waiting for the Sun. We've done Morrison Hotel. We've done L.A. Woman, which is my favorite album.

The only one left for us to do is Soft Parade. Okay. Oh, nice.

And that's probably going to be for this year in October. Well, we don't know what venue yet, but we usually have a venue we pick for Halloween. Halloweens are like our biggest night.

We usually rock out somewhere. Yeah, yeah. How does that, you know, focusing on one album as opposed to a mixed set list, how does that make you approach the music differently? Depends on the album.

Like, we did, what's the second album? Strange Days. From a guitar standpoint, there's five different tunings on it. Wow.

So, you know, I have to bring a couple guitars to the gig and make sure I got a good tuner. And there's a lot of different sounds on some of those albums, you know. But then there's also kind of a theme to the album.

So, as opposed to, let's say, we talked earlier, like maybe we're doing Roadhouse. It's more of a shuffle, bluesy kind of thing. And then we might do, what's the Stronger Than Dirt song? I just forgot it.

Touch Me. Touch Me, which is the South Parade album, which is more orchestral. Oh, yeah.

That whole album is a little different. It is. So, we have to pivot more, I think, when we move from album to album as opposed to sticking with one album.

Without a doubt, they're a band that, which each album just, by the time you hear their first album, and then you listen to their second album, it sounds like two different bands. It doesn't even sound like the same band on those two albums. It sounds like a different singer.

It sounds like different musicians. It's like their evolution was just massive in a short amount of time. Yeah, yeah.

Definitely South Parade. I think that was definitely probably their most poppy, if that's a word, or commercial album or something like that. Touch Me was one of their bigger hits.

The big hits were Light My Fire and Touch Me. Right. Well, I think once Sgt. Pepper's came out, everybody was trying to jump on the orchestra.

They did Sgt. Pepper? Yeah, yeah. Whoa, I thought that was The Beatles. Damn.

I learned something new tonight. You did. There you go.

When I heard Touch Me, for some reason, that reminds me of like, it was almost like a throwback because it reminded me of something that the Yardbirds post Eric Clapton would have done. It kind of has that kind of a sound to it to me. And I was like, wow, it sounds completely different.

Yeah. So how many other, you said there's at least one other. How many other Doors tribute bands are in Chicago? I could probably answer that because I did the R&D for An American Prayer.

Just to shake hands with, because number one, we all agreed as a band that we weren't going to be competitive because you know what? I'm a family guy. We're family guys. And at the end of the day, when we sit down as a group and we talk about things, we talk about other Doors tributes.

And we speak highly of them because at the end of the day, the Lizard Kings versus us, for instance, we both bring a great show. It's just a different version of it. So the only other band I can think of up top my head is a band called The Ultimate Doors.

Okay. And I've heard great things about them, though I haven't been able to find much on them. And maybe I just haven't chipped on the right algorithm or whatever.

But I do know that there are some in Europe. Okay. But as far as the United States, gosh, I wish I could remember the name of the bands the drummer was in, but they were huge in the 80s and they were packing places in LA around the block.

I mean, it was like they were the Doors kind of thing. Wow. Okay.

And they did. I know what you're talking about. Yeah.

You're talking about Moonlight Drive. Moonlight Drive. And there was another one that spun off of that afterwards.

After the movie came out in the 80s, it was a resurgence for the Doors. Yeah. And there was this huge band called Moonlight Drive.

The guy looked like him, dressed like him. He was getting messed up like him. Wow.

Get on the mic and he started asking people for drugs. Hey, anybody have any cocaine? Just come out here. Yeah.

They meet me in the back. It's like nobody got a guy in the alley waiting for you. Wow.

And of course, I think he died. Yeah. And then, actually- I mean, he really committed to the role.

Yeah. Right. Absolutely.

Stuck to his guns. It's really dangerous with this band too, because you get sucked into that, you know? And you have to watch yourself and hold yourself back, make sure that you don't get sucked into that role. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. No, I can see that.

I mean, you're literally kind of playing a character in a way, even though you're not dressing like them and you're not looking like them, but I mean, you're kind of playing a character in a way. Oh, for sure. It's intoxicating.

Yeah. It's alluring. Yeah.

Is there any of the other bands, do they replicate them, you know, to the T, like no bass player? Well, there's your fine line of a tribute versus a cover band. Right. I mean, so this guy, these guys acting as a cover band, you know, they got an electric bass player, he just plays one keyboard kind of thing and it's not necessarily a box or anything of that.

And there's no points against that, as long as you're pulling it off and making the sound. Right. Right.

And, you know, I, I actually heard the Lizard Kings online, seen some of the videos even before we had our conversation to kind of work together. And I was like, damn, damn, you know, I mean, cause you got a great, you're got a great voice, you know, I'm just going to say it, you know, there, I said it, you know, and you got a man. Welcome to Man Crush.

Howdy boy. That's not the one I was looking for. No.

I can't see that far. I'm freaking out. It's the other band.

I was going to do the creepy, but on the, but on the fine line of that, what, what we do as a tribute is, I mean, we've got all the gear. I actually had a drum kit that was built to replicate Densmore's kit without going to Ludwig because, you know, to buy him a mod orange Ludwig used in any conditions starts at around $3,200 just because it's a Ludwig. And I, I just had a friend of mine who I met at the Chicago drum show who was backing me for a product I was doing for PBS on a production as a co-producer.

And he built me a phenomenal blue snare drum. And then when I got involved in American prairie, he rang my, rang my belly. He's like, dude, he goes, I want to build your doors kit.

I'm like, okay, well, you know, not to put any spotlight on what I do, but I, I build drums too. You know? So what I did was I jumped on my cab machine, gave him all the drawings and we reverse engineered a Ludwig kit in mod orange wrapped in mahogany, maple and tiger maple. And, um, you know, I told the guys, I said, well, you know, I'm going to be working doors music with England.

I had to bring my American prayer kit, you know, America. So, um, but you know, it's a great sounding kit and, um, you know, it, it fits the part. So, you know, we got that going for us and, you know, I wear bell bottoms, you know, where all the mod clothing and stuff like that, Rick, he comes out in his leathers and things like that.

Yeah. So it's, I, I, I, I, I really fought against the leather pants. I'll tell you, man, I didn't want to do it.

I don't know if I want to see you in another pants, so damn hot. I've worn leather pants before and it's just disgusting. And I've seen them.

I agree. Those are the assless chaps. You saw the assless chaps.

Those had, those had ventilation. Those had been, he's not kidding. I, I, I, my, my band, we, we played the Rocky Horror Picture Show live and, and I, I didn't dress in drag.

I was drag adjacent. I dressed up like a biker, you know, with the makeup and the whole thing. But I wore, I wore a gold Speedo with leather chaps.

So did you walk him into a party too? Yeah, I did. I did. Yeah.

It was actually a good show. I, I, I did actually, I, I was technically the Frank converter. That's awesome.

But those are ventilated though. I've worn leather pants where I go home and it's literally, my wife's pulling on the bottom of the pants, trying to get them off as I'm sprinkling powder out. Just get out the Westin oil and call it a night.

We're going to get two birds with one stone right now, baby, right now, baby, let's go. We're going to do this. So, so then, you know, give us your, give us your 32nd elevator speech.

What differentiates your band from another, say doors cover band? What do we want? But there's, there's two doors cover bands playing on the same street, a block away from each other. Why should I go see you guys? Because what we do is we take the best performance that they had. For example, I would go look, I'd listen to their, their concert that they did at the New York felt forum.

They did two nights, four shows. And I listened to every song, every concert, and I picked the best version that they did on those nights. And if you, you listen to those concerts in, in order, you see Jim and first night on a Friday, he's really into it.

By the last show on Saturday, he's drunk, he's just yelling and he's just giving it a different vibe. And so I like to listen to all the different versions and put together a collage of like, just, you know, I have the, I have the advantage that I am a musician, so I can cherry pick, you know, the, the good parts musically and vocally. Right, right.

Good. Excellent. Well, I think they need to put their money where their mouth is and play us another song.

I think they do. So we'll let them get their stuff together and we'll be right back. Sounds good.

You're listening to the rock and roll Chicago podcast. Hi, I'm Rick Anthony. I'd like to thank my radio brothers, Ray, the roadie and Hollywood Mike, for allowing me to tell you about my podcast, the someone you should know podcast.

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Join me in the crime cave. We got the lizard Kings one more time here. Let's do it.

Well, show me the way to the next whiskey bar. Oh, don't ask why. Oh, don't ask why.

Show me the way to the next whiskey bar. Oh, don't ask why. Oh, don't ask why.

Oh, if we don't find the next whiskey bar, I tell you we must die. I tell you we must die. I tell you, I tell you, I tell you we must die.

Oh, moon over the bar. We now must say goodbye. We've lost our good old mama and musk and whiskey.

Oh, you know why? Oh, moon over the bar. We now must say goodbye. We've lost our good old mama and musk and whiskey.

Oh, you know why? Yeah. Yeah. Well, show me the way to the next little girl.

Oh, don't ask why. Oh, don't ask why. Show me the way to the next little girl.

Oh, don't ask why. Oh, don't ask why. Oh, if we don't find the next little girl, I tell you we must die.

I tell you we must die. I tell you, I tell you, I tell you we must die. Oh, moon over the bar.

We now must say goodbye. We've lost our good old mama and musk and whiskey. Oh, you know why? Yeah.

All right. All right. That song works absolutely perfectly.

You know, like stripped down and acoustic. That's really cool. It's got that minstrel, minstrel, minstrel, minstrel.

Minstrel. Minstrel. Well, it's not a, that was not a Doors song, actually.

It's from like a 1920s German opera. That's, yeah, that's exactly what I was getting at. It just goes to show that people always steal other people's stuff.

They translated it. They transposed it. And, yeah, they came up with that.

And that was Manzira because he was the big, you know, transposer guy. Yeah, I think the story was like he kept playing the song a lot, and eventually Jim was listening to it, and he put lyrics to it, and it became a. It has kind of like that gypsy rhythm. For sure.

Yeah. It's definitely a drinking song when we're at a bar and we want to get everybody drunk. That's what a club one is like because we get everybody drinking.

Well, that's good. Well, I mean, that's, that's what your job is, you know. It's part of selling alcohol, right? That's your job.

People think your job is to play music and entertain people. No, it's to sell beer. Yeah, sell beer.

Everybody have a good time. Yeah, that's right. That's right.

So where are you guys playing next? Okay. End of June. Where are you guys playing? Yeah, July.

July. Yeah. It's already July.

So, yeah. Well, it is July. Oh, man.

Yeah, it's July. Where are you guys playing? Man, we just missed our big show in Arkansas. Arkansas.

Yeah, I heard that was a great show. Yeah. No kidding.

Backwoods, Mount Blueberry. Yeah, Blueberry Mountains, Backwoods, Music Fest. It's a really big show.

But July, we should be at Montrose Beach and our new place that we just got into, the Montrose Saloon, unaffiliated between the two businesses. But we're usually been more on the south and west sides, and we're working that way up north of Chicago. We went to Fitzgerald's last night.

Yeah. Oh, we have one in, oh, Fitzgerald's. We're in Fitzgerald's in August.

Yeah. Yeah, we got, I think, August 5th, I want to say. That'll be a good show.

We're at Fitzgerald's in Berwyn. Fitzgerald's is good. Yeah.

Yeah. No kidding. Yeah.

So if you want to find out where we're playing at, you can find us on Facebook, the Lizard Kings, the Chicago Lizard Kings. We're on Instagram as well, the Lizard Kings official. And yeah, you're going to find us somewhere in the city of Chicago.

How many gigs a year you do? We usually fluctuate between 20 on the slow and then like 50 on the high end. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah. Sometimes we're like twice a month. Sometimes it's like every weekend.

Right. Sometimes the fall just won't stop raining. That's great.

That's a good thing. Yeah. It is a good thing.

It's a great thing to have, a problem to have. You know, I have to say, you know, we, we interview a lot of cover bands. I have to, I guess I have to make the distinction because we interview a lot of tribute bands because you guys kind of walk that line of cover and tribute bands.

And after a while you're like, okay, I don't need to hear the next, you know, the Bon Jovi, you know, you know, tribute band and stuff like that. This is the first time we've had a Doors band or talked to a Doors tribute or, you know, cover band. Really enjoyed our conversation.

Number one, cause I love the Doors. So it was really cool to have you guys in here and be able to talk about the Doors a little because it's very rare that I find somebody that I guess wants to sit down and talk about the Doors. Well, you're never going to find a cover band out there that plays anything.

I have never heard anybody play anything by the Doors. Yeah. Ever.

Never. Never. Never.

I mean, the half-hearted attempts at Roadhouse Blues. Right. Right.

You know, I actually, I actually heard a band play. Was it Peace Frog? Oh, what a great song. I heard a band.

I heard a band attempt Peace Frog before, but that's, that's about it. That was the other band in LA. Peace Frog.

Peace Frog. That makes total sense. I don't know if they're still around.

Oh, no. Like I said, I talked to the drummer and he's got, he had a stroke, unfortunately, and he lives in Indianapolis, but he actually started following an American prayer. And of course he came right at me going, you're not playing it right.

Oh, boy. You know, but he is a nice guy. And, you know, as hard as he came at me, I'm not that guy.

So I literally found out what he said about me through the guys. They, cause they were saying, Hey man, there's some guy like ringing our bell about you, man. What's going on? I have no idea.

So. A lot of band drama everywhere. You know, and it's funny because I, and I love the guy when I say this and I know I won't get in trouble for saying this, even if he happens to come across his ears, but he's not doing anything now.

And sometimes people who sit on the sidelines might get a bit jaded, you know, it's just, it just says who we are as humans. That's our clock. It does happen.

But I did reach back out to him and said, Hey, listen, uh, my name's Grant. And he went like rogue silent on the phone and he's like, what's up? And I'm like, Hey, first of all, I want to tell you something. I love you.

I said, and I respect you. And I said, but you're wrong about me. And I'm not going to sit here and have a contest going back and forth about what you think I am versus who you were.

I go, look, we're both drummers and I respect you as a drummer and I respect you for, for the bands you played in. You know? I said, but, you know, be a nice human. Did you ever see the movie? Best friends since then.

Yeah. Yeah. Did you ever see the movie Rockstar? Oh yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. For me, it's more like that.

Like you see the other, when they, when they, when the two different cover bands ran into each other, it's like, Oh, you're not wearing the right leather jacket. Oh, you're not wearing the right pants. Like it gets, sometimes it gets like that.

It definitely can. And the closer you get to LA, the more and more it is like that. And, and, and believe me, I've, you know, played in a lot of bands and I've, I've opened up for big name cover bands or not cover bands, but a tribute bands.

And when you get the guys that think they're actually the people that they're imitating on stage, those are the worst. Let me see your nails real quick. Just checking.

If you weren't Joey, I'd, I get it, but no. Alrighty guys. Well, thanks a lot for coming out.

This has been a lot of fun. Thanks for having us. Really interesting.

Thanks a lot. Yeah. Appreciate it.

Awesome. Wow. Who would imagine the lizard King doors cover band? I get it.

Yeah, you did. Yeah. It's really gross.

It's disgusting. You get spittle going down your chin too. You know, but Hey, I, I enjoyed talking to them.

Yeah. I guess it, I guess it all depends on who they're, who they're covering. That's exactly what they're paying tribute to.

I mean, it's very unique and they had a lot of knowledge of the doors, which was really Well, that's a good thing. If you're going to be a tribute pan, you better know a lot about the band, you know, and they've done some research and they know their stuff, man. They sound good.

Yeah, they do. They sound like they're pretty seasoned musicians as well from the people that they know. Exactly.

So, all righty then, as usual, thanks for listening to the rock and roll Chicago podcast every week. We'll be back next Tuesday with another exciting new episode. See you then.

Hey, it's Ray and Mike, and we got some great information for you. Yeah, we just wanted to remind you about the fundraiser for the Illinois Rock and Roll Museum on Route 66, which is taking place on October 27th at the Renaissance Center in downtown Joliet. You'll be able to get tickets at Cadillac Groove shows.

If you see Mike or myself somewhere, we'll have tickets. You can get them at a museum. They're only $5.

Also at cadillacgroove.com, you will be able to purchase them online as well. Very good. They're going to cost you $5 a ticket.

There's going to be a $10 cover charge to get in the day of the event and for your $10, we will give you two more additional tickets as well as some Cadillac Groove swag. And the lucky grand prize winner will win the band Cadillac Groove. And winner must be present to win, so remember that.

And Cadillac Groove will play for whatever event it is that you would like for us to play for. You know, conditions do apply. That's true.

We do have to say that. So get out there and get your tickets right away. The Rock and Roll Chicago Podcast is edited by Paul Martin.

Theme song courtesy of MNR Rush. The Rock and Roll Chicago Podcast does not own the rights to any of the music heard on the show. The music is used to promote the guests that are featured.