Bal Fantastique

There are Doors concerts known and there are Doors concerts unknown and in between are the fans. I have been lucky enough to stumble across one such unknown performance by the Doors.

Bal Fantastique was the name of a ball that had a surrealistic theme, which seems very apt for a Doors gig, and was held at the Presidio in Santa Barbara on Saturday the 19^th of February, 1966. This is the Doors pre-Light My Fire fame and even pre-Whisky a go go era. In fact, this performance pre-dates the accepted timeline of when the Doors debuted at the London Fog, on the famed Sunset Strip.

Most accounts have the Doors starting at the Fog in early March or late February 1966. Whereas this performance is on the 19^th  of February, and the articles, which are printed mid-February, state that the Doors are a band that play at the London Fog. That means they must have been already playing there for it to be mentioned. (Edging it closer to Ray’s birthday.)

It is also interesting to note that the Doors who are often touted as an intelligent band, apart from those who incorrectly insist Jim Morrison was a full time clown, were already being advertised as “a group of university graduates”. I guess there wasn’t much else to say about them at that point in time. Even the London Fog had them billed as “The Doors: band from Venice”! Sometimes it’s difficult to remember there was a time when they were relatively or completely unknown. Especially when they still receive a lot of air play and Jim’s face can be seen on many T-shirts, all over the world.

However, at this point in time, the Doors were yet to break through and were taking gigs where they could and were still finding their feet. It is often written that at the Fog, Jim was too shy to face the audience and would face the band instead, just as he did in rehearsals. So it’s possible the audience at Bal Fantastique might not have seen too much of his face.

The setlist(s) remains unknown for now, but we can assume it would have been similar to that of the 2016 official release of the Doors at the London Fog. With perhaps one or two more songs from their 1965 demo and their first two albums.

Their instrumentation would have been similar to that recording as well, including Jim playing the harmonica. Ray would not have had his piano bass at this point in time.

It’s not quite certain when the Doors started playing that night but 9pm seems to be when the festivities were to begin. There is also uncertainty over how many sets they performed that night. They were sharing duties outside in the courtyard (on opposite sides) with a jazz band called the Red Coats. Later in the evening, both bands alternated performing inside.

There were also other performances by the Men in Blue and Tico Robbins and his band, but these seemingly took place away from The Doors and the Red Coats.

Bal Fantastique was sponsored by the Art Affiliates of UCSB (University of California, Santa Barbara) and the guests included the mayor of Santa Barbara and other distinguished guests, students and the public. There were colourful, surrealistic art installations and the party-goers were dressed accordingly.

Santa Barbara seemed to be enjoying quite the celebration of surrealism in early ’66, with a surrealistic film night also scheduled for early March. I wonder if film buffs Ray and Jim attended the screenings? There was also a surrealist art exhibition held, not long after the ball, once again sponsored by the Art Affiliates of UCSB.

I don’t know too much more at the moment but hopefully the door will open a bit further, so we can see more of what’s inside. Ok, I’ll stop with the Doors wordplay now, before you tell me to shut it! (oops!) Please keep checking back with me as I will be providing updates with anything further I find.

Images sourced from Google Street View and Newspapers.com