Sunday, November 16, 2008

42. Meatloaf - Bat Out of Hell

Ok, I'll be honest with you here. I bought the album. It was 1977. Elvis had just died. I was momentarily blinded by heartache. No, I was trying to revolt against the constant crush of Eddie Money songs being played on 99X. I was trying to drown out the disco craze. I was looking for an alternative to my friends' constant playing of Billy Joel's The Stranger. My local department store where I bought my records didn't have Elvis Costello's My Aim is True. I was suckered in by Meatloaf's amazing turn as Eddie in Rocky Horror.

I could come up with a million more excuse, you know. But the fact is, I liked Bat out of Hell when it first came out. Don't look at me like that. Like you didn't lay in the dark with the headphones on and just wait for the part...


Then I'm dying at the bottom of a pit in the blazing sun
Torn and twisted at the foot of a burning bike
And I think somebody somewhere must be tolling a bell
And the last thing I see is my heart
Still beating
Still beating


That was beautiful, man. Genius. See..he was telling a story. But set to music. It works on two levels! And you had to sing it just like Meatloaf, as if you were on a high school stage in the midst of some overwrought musical about love and loss and umm...motorcycle accidents.

Ok, that one hasn't really stood up to the test of time. What about...

On a hot summer night, would you offer your throat to the wolf with the red roses?
Will he offer me his mouth?
Yes


I'm sitting here wondering how I ever thought that was good. Maybe when you're drunk on Boones Farm wine at a party in someone's basement that's decorated to look like some kind of art deco cave and that Canadian kid you have a crush on is mouthing the words to you...well, that's hot when you're 15 and stoned on fermented strawberries. Now...now it just makes me cringe.

Favorite song: No. I'll just let you read about my now infamous hatred Paradise by the Dashboard Light
Meatloaf recipes

4 comments:

Timmer said...

We'll never agree on this. It's simply one of the best rock albums ever produced. Again, you've got the E-Street band as the studio musicians (I know, not a plus for you.) and then you've got Todd Rundgren producing. That's the icing on the cake to Steinman's lyrics and Meat's pipes.

It's the album I want to put on when I want to remember 1977 again. I was 16. Star Wars had come out the summer before. And come ON, you never made out to this album? Seriously?

Sometimes Michele I swear you live on a different planet. I do not understand the hate for something as pure FUN as Bat Out of Hell. It's like not liking The Ramones because they can't play guitar very well.

...but I suppose if I'd ever watched drunk relative perform Paradise, I'd probably have my brain warped too. And no...I'm afraid it is a Long Island thing, I've never seen that done anywhere else...outside a cast party when gay men have had too much to drink, but that's another story entirely.

Solonor Rasreth said...

Pile o' crap.

It didn't stop me from ripping my heart out to "Two Out of Three Ain't Bad" when I was jilted by some girl as a sophomore in high school, but it's still overproduced garbage. And I always hated "Paradise".

However, my dear spouse convinced me to get over myself and listed to it as something fun and funny instead of taking it so seriously, and I was almost able to enjoy it. Once.

Unknown said...

Might be the single most enjoyable self-indulgent, overwrought, excessively ludicrous, roll-your-eyes album ever. Laughable and great, great fun. And Meat Loaf has got real chops.

michele said...

Theodore, you're right; it is enjoyable in that way. I can get down with any of the songs in a goofy kind of way. But I just can't do Paradise.