Peace Frog

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"Peace Frog" is a 1970 song by The Doors which appears their album, Morrison Hotel. It was released on vinyl February 1970 by Elektra/Asylum Records and produced by Paul Rothchild. The song blends into the next track on the album, "Blue Sunday," seamlessly, so radio stations often play the two songs consecutively.

"Peace Frog" was originally called "Abortion Stories;" guitarist Robby Krieger gave the song its more tame title, "Peace Frog." The bloody images (There's blood in the streets, it's up to my ankles/There's blood on the streets, it's up to my knee, etc.) originated, like several songs of The Doors, from the poetry of Jim Morrison. Other such songs that are based on or have lines from Morrison's poetry include "Not to Touch the Earth" on the album Waiting for the Sun and "The WASP (Texas Radio and the Big Beat)" on L.A. Woman.

The line "Indians scattered on dawn's highway bleeding/Ghosts crowd the young child's fragile eggshell mind" originates from his poem, "Ghost Song," that describes an event that occurred when he was young. As Morrison described it in An American Prayer:


   
“
Me and my — 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 floating in the breeze, man.

   
”

The opening scene of Oliver Stone's movie, The Doors, portrays this memory of Morrison's.

In 2004, the song was prominently featured in "Busey and the Beast," an episode of the HBO television series Entourage. The episode originally aired on August 22, 2004. It also appears on the soundtrack of the video game Tony Hawk's American Wasteland, which was released in 2005 for the GameCube, PlayStation 2, Xbox, and Xbox 360 consoles, as well as the PC. It is on the movie The Waterboy as well, and was put on the soundtrack. The song was also recently featured on the hit show My Name Is Earl in episode 14 entitled "Monkeys In Space" where, in a montage, Earl (Jason Lee) is trying to buy some donuts from a Dinky Donuts but finds his old ex girl friend with one leg (whom he stole a car from) works there.

"Blood in the streets in the town of New Haven" was Morrison's reference to the police in the town of New Haven, Connecticut. He had been arrested there while on stage for taunting them.

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