Jerry Hopkins Interview

Author and critic Jerry Hopkins is probably better known for his New York Times bestselling biography of Jim Morrison No One Here Gets Out Alive, surely one of the most famous rock books of all time. He has also written books on Elvis Presley and a number of books on food and travel. His website is www.jerryhopkins.com.

Can you give me a brief history of your books and journalism?

The idea of writing a book was intimidating at first.  I had two degrees in journalism, three years as a reporter (daily newspapers and radio) behind me and I’d written and sold several magazine articles, so when I was asked to do an as-told-to autobiography of a colourful health food faddist in Los Angeles, I approached it as if each chapter were a separate article, strung together more or less chronologically.  Pretty soon I had what resembled a book.

Several of my later books were, in fact, collections of chapters that could stand alone - for example, Bangkok Babylon, 25 profiles of some of the most interesting expatriates I met since moving to Thailand; Thailand Confidential, 40-plus stories and essays about my new homeland; Asian Aphrodisiacs, which is a survey of what it sounds like; and Extreme Cuisine, one of the works by which I’m most pleased, a look at the foods that the picky diners back in the west think is weird and in Asia, Latin America, Africa and elsewhere is just called lunch.

The majority of the books have a story line holding them together, most obviously the histories (The Rock Story, The Hula) and the biographies of Elvis Presley, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, David Bowie, Yoko Ono and Don Ho, for which I’m best known.  The book about The Doors, No One Here Gets Out Alive, went to No. 1 on the New York Times list in 1980 and return to No. 2 in 1991 when Oliver Stone used it as a primary text for his movie about the band.

If the largest number has taken music as their focus, others have been all over the map - there have been books of humour, self-help, and trivia - so there is no real pattern to the list save, perhaps, that my selection of subjects frequently seems well off the beaten track.  Which is where I’ve spent most of my life, both determinably and contentedly.

What made you want to write about popular culture in the first place?

Hardly anyone was doing it and I thought that was a major oversight.  By the 1960s, popular culture seemed to be the only kind of culture left and even if it weren’t so visible - and influential - I thought it clearly worth chronicling.

When I started researching my first book about Elvis, he was still making those sappy movies, he hadn’t even gone to Vegas yet, and many I approached for interviews said, “What do you want to write about him for?”  A couple of years later when I began research of a biography of Jim Morrison, people said the same thing.  This shows how odd most people thought writing books about popular culture was.  When the Morrison book became such a success - selling more than two million copies, which handily put my kids through college and me through a lot of bad habits - only one other proper rock biography had been published, Hunter Davies’ book about the Beatles.  Now, how many have there been?  More than 500 about Elvis alone.  Gore Vidal said that one of the nice things about getting old is you can say, “I told you so.”

Can you give me the background story on working with Danny Sugarman on the Jim Morrison biography No One Here Gets Out Alive? How long did it take to write and how did you work with Sugarman?

It’s really an amazing story and I’m going to refer you to my website at www.jerryhopkins.com for the unabridged version, but long story short, I met Danny when he was a teenager, just a groupie hanging out at The Doors office and I was writing about the band for Rolling Stone. When I wrote the book, it was turned down by the Commissioning Editor who thought Jim’s time “had come and gone.” It was subsequently rejected by 30 additional publishers and when I told Danny (whom I’d interviewed) that I was hanging it up; he asked to try to sell it. I told him if he found a publisher, he’d get 10%. Warner Books took it, surprisingly, on what was the third submission, by itself almost without precedent. There were two manuscripts by then and when Danny said he wanted to shuffle them together, write a preface, get Michael McClure to contribute an afterword, assemble the pictures, organize the discography and obtain the Doors’ permission to use lyrics in the text, I said he was in for 30% plus 50% of the movie rights (which at the time we thought were worthless) and on top of that he was now the co-author, although in fact he wrote none of the book.  Some of my friends said I was generous. I say Danny earned every dime and he later proved with Wonderland Avenue that he was a superb writer on his own.

No One Here Gets Out Alive is one of the great rock books perhaps on par with Hammer Of Gods but both bookshave also been criticised for factual accuracy. How was the book treated by the critics? And being a critic yourself how do you handle criticism of your own books?

When my first Elvis book was published in 1971, a good friend of mine was editing the Los Angeles Times Book Review and he gave it to another friend to review.  He dumped all over it on the Review’s front page and I thanked both guys for giving me so much space and attention.  Of course I like it when critics like my books, but I really don’t care if they don’t.

As for accuracy, I researched my ass off and between Jim and Elvis alone I interviewed more than 400 people, many of whose memories may have been what memories (including mine) always are: not perfect.

You’ve written three books on Elvis. How did you tackle the sheer amount of research such a subject entails?

I assume you’re talking about Elvis: The Biography, published when he was still alive; Elvis: The Final Years, covering the last six years of his life and the first two years of craziness that followed; and Elvis In Hawaii, a picture book I thought justified by the number of important concerts and films he made here.  There actually was a second, smaller book about Elvis in the islands and in 2007, my English publisher asked me to put the first two (by then long out of print) into a single volume, update and correct everything, and add a final 10,000-word chapter explaining how Elvis came to be No. 1 five years in a row on the Forbes magazine list of biggest earning dead entertainers. 
            I don’t know how to answer your question about how I deal with all the material available.  How does anyone climb a mountain or run a marathon?  One step at a time.  The trick is enjoy it and, somehow, don’t be intimidated.  It also helps to be young.

How do you handle research in general? Has the Internet helped?

The Internet has changed everything. There are no places on earth I enjoy more than a library or a bookstore and, sadly, both are disappearing, and the Internet is the primary reason. That said, I confess I visit libraries infrequently nowadays myself.  Living in Thailand is one reason, of course (there isn’t much here even in the Thai language), but even if I lived around the corner from the Library of Congress I’d find myself depending on the Net. No matter how obscure your search, it’s there and the feedback is practically instantaneous. The Net is as important to me as my computer is. The Morrison book was a cut-and-paste job and some of the original manuscript pages were two and three feet long.  In retrospect that sounds almost funny.

Do you have an agent? Is it important for a writer to have one?

Yes, although I have found publishers on my own for many books. However, trying to get a book published today without an agent is virtually impossible; most if not all reputable houses won’t open an envelope unless it comes from an agent whose name and reputation they respect. I don’t know anything about getting published on the Net, so that may be different.

Are you a full time writer? What is your daily routine?

Yes. Occasionally over the years I’ve had to take what my daughter called a “real job” - meaning I’d pull on some trousers and shoes and leave the house rather than wrap a sarong around my waist and go into the next room - but for most of the past 50 years I’ve made my living as a full-time freelance writer.

I don’t have a daily routine and I do everything possible to keep my life form becoming “routine” in any way. I am NOT one of those write-from-nine-to-one-every-day guys. In fact, the hardest thing about writing for me is putting my ass in the chair.  Once there, though, I’m happy as a clam and much faster than one. I’m also disciplined; since moving to Thailand in 1993, for instance, I’ve kept a journal that has now passed the 4.5-million word mark. (The average book runs about 100,000 words; you do the math.) I do this for the exercise, in the same way a musician practices, but also because it’s a good way to remember stuff.  Most of it is drivel, of course, but huge chunks of several books have come from the journal, almost word for word.

I further believe in meeting deadlines and over five decades I don’t think I’ve missed too many. One thing that’s made that possible is that I’m what I call a “that’ll-do” writer. There comes a time when you have to say, “That’ll do,” send it in, and move on, because there’s more fun around the trail’s next bend and you’re never going to experience it if you don’t. 

Of your 30 books which one was the most successful in terms of sales and critical acclaim?

Because when Elvis died in 1977 my book was still the only one in existence, it actually sold in bigger numbers in one year than No One Here Gets Out Alive did over a much longer period. But it is Mr. Mojo Risin’ who earned me the biggest fame.  That book became a cult classic and it still in print - nearly 30 years after publication - and it is still paying my bar bills.

Of all the artists you have interviewed who did you most enjoyed speaking to?

Jim Morrison was the most intelligent.  Keith Moon was the funniest.  They run about equal as drinking partners, the difference being I drink a whole lot more slowly. 

And the least enjoyable interview?

Many were inarticulate or had little to say and there’s no point naming names.  I always thought it was stupid to expect any musician to have something interesting or worth quoting to say. Wasn’t it enough that they could communicate as musicians (or singers, composers, etc.)?

Who are your favourite artists?

I don’t have a Top 10, but for obvious reasons Jim Morrison and The Doors are up there. Along with Elvis. The rest of the, say, hundred are a mixed bag.  Miles Davis. Early Stones. Love. Some Hawaiian slack key guitarists you’ve never heard of. Bob Marley. Just about any Balinese gamelan band will head the list the week I hear them. Willie Nelson. Tammy Wynette. June Christy. Sinatra. Tony Bennett. Going back: Glenn Miller. Coming forward again: James Brown. Ravi Shankar (with Ali Akbar Khan). Jimmy Buffett. Ella Fitzgerald. Nat King Cole. 

What have been your favourite gigs from over the years?

Easier to name some of the all-time musical highs, about half of which were public performances. Louis Armstrong playing for my junior prom at Washington & Lee University, 1956. Joan Baez singing ‘Amazing Grace’ at the Big Sur Folk Festival, 1969. The first Elvis show I ever saw, in Vegas the same year.  Three hours of the Grateful Dead, Paris, 1972.  Manitas de Plata at the Albert Hall, same year. The unrecorded Love at Bido Lito’s in Hollywood, night after night in 1966(?). The afternoon in LA following my only interview with Jimi Hendrix when he said I could hang out in his hotel room while he jammed with the bass player who joined him after he soon dissolved the Experience, also 1969. The night Herb Ellis invited me to a private party in the San Fernando Valley to hear him jam with Chet Baker and Ray Brown, I’m guessing 1963. The Doors on any good night (when Jim was only moderately drunk), 1967-1969. The street funeral in New Orleans for Papa Celestin, also in 1969. The night Chet Atkins invited me to a Loretta Lynn recording session in Nashville, 1969. My first night (backstage!) at the ‘Grand Ole Opry’ in Nashville, 1969. (Which seems to have been an especially good year.) When I took my daughter to hear Tina Turner in Honolulu and she called Tina her first “legend” live, early 1980s. Any night I heard the Makaha Sons of Ni’ihau in Honolulu, 1980, and any sunset show when Kanoe Kaumeheiwa Miller danced (hula) with a trio of oldtimers behind her at the Halekulani Hotel (she’s still there!). When my son, who is deaf, got his second cochlear implant and told me he now understood why people liked the Beatles, because for the first time in his life he could hear high frequency sounds. “Yeah, yeah!”

Are you working on any new projects?

Always…and nowadays they’re mostly about my life in Asia.

Interview by Neil Daniels 2009