Suggested by @Louisa in tribute.
1977
A masterpiece that was rejected time and again by record labels, then went on to become one of the biggest records of all time. Over 43 million units sold, certified 14X platinum, the biggest selling album in Australian history, over 522 weeks on the UK album charts as of 2019.
Bat Out Of Hell made a superstar out of its singer and a respected and in-demand songwriter/producer of its writer and conceptualizer. Produced by Todd Rundgren and featuring members of the E Street Band, this album became a behemoth that launched a trilogy and sustained a long career.
My first impression of this album was that every song could be taking place within the world of Springsteen's Jungleland.
Long live Meat Loaf and Jim Steinman.
A real 7 degrees of separation from Bat Out Of Hell ..... But what the heck
Still listening to "Paradise By the Dashboard Light" often, still fist pumping at the triumph and tragedy of it all.
Only we could go from Meat Loaf to Cyndi Lauper without missing a beat.
Wow .....Girls just want to kick ass ....I couldn't find anything on i tunes though
I think I cracked it, you just need to be madly in love for this album to floor you. Or at least have a perfect memory of how it used to feel...
Love this one
Sorry to be the dissenting voice here, but, having listened to most of the album, it really isn't for me. The only song I managed to listen to right through was 'Two Out Of Three'. I don't really like his voice, it seemed strained somehow and certainly the whole thing felt over the top. Apologies to those who obviously hold him in high esteem.
Possibly I would have liked it if I had heard it when I was much younger, not sure it's aimed at a 67 year old!
Going over the top is the Steinman trademark, and I think Meat Loaf got trapped in expectations of that after Bat Out Of Hell. I think it only works perfectly for him in collaboration with Steinman.
There was a quote from Todd Rundgren that went something like, "If Springsteen goes over the top, Meat Loaf goes over the top by ten times that."
Confession... I listened to this album for the first time today. I've heard most, if not all of it, before, on the radio, at parties and so on, but I had never sat and listened to the whole album from start to finish before. It is OTT, it has a somewhat dated sound, but it is quite magnificent. Not something I'd listen to often, but when the mood strikes, it would be perfect.
He came here, to SA, some time ago, mid Nineties, I think. I know people who went to see him and said it was the show of a lifetime. I can see now that it would have been.
I can't ever think about him without Zappa popping into my head (Don't let your meat loaf! Ha Ha Ha) but I can see why he was so beloved.
I have listened to Bat Out of Hell after quite a long time today, and nothing's changed. It is still an outstanding record, theatrical, such an exaggeration of everything. Probably the best rock opera we will ever hear... With everything intensified to the max, it's natural that emotions also boil fast. Two minutes into Bat, I always feel like a teenager, those feelings of everything being larger than life, they overcome me completely...
I was thinking about Steinman's flawless yet overdramatic epic love songs. The ones that make you want to kill yourself gently if you are happily in love but make you want to tear your heart out with your own two hands in case things go wrong...
I believe he has infected me with the idea that music is supposed to hurt to make you heal eventually. It happened very early in my teenage years, it started with Total Eclipse when I was only 11 and went on with Meat Loaf and even with Celine Dion later. He created that perfect illusional background, a go-to place for mending a broken heart.
I was convinced that I had outgrown these songs, knowing that I had changed the station many times during the last decades if one of them popped up, thinking I didn't need to listen to this overly pathetic music anymore. My idea of a perfect love song has changed diametrically over the years. They became more subtle and not musically as violent, gentler, and more distinctive, I guess.
I did a test last night, I put I'd Do Anything for Love on driving home, and I realized that all these songs are still as harrowing, and if love hurts, maybe it's supposed to sound this way anyway....
Maybe i need to put a little work into Dead Ringer ...... I remember being disappointed with it at the time and really only love the the title track .....But I'll Kill You If You Don't Come Back came up on shuffle yesterday and it sounded really good.
But I guess my Trilogy would be Bat 1 and 2 with Bad For Good Sandwiched in there ...
Bad For Good was sort of like those Gary US Bonds albums fr me when i needed more of that River sound. It was an itch i desperately needed scratched.
I think it's only right and just that we expand the discussion to the complete trilogy.
1993
2006
And I'll qualify my inclusion of the trilogy by saying first that I consider the real Bat Out Of Hell trilogy to be...
Bat Out Of Hell, 1977
Dead Ringer 1981
Bad For Good, 1981 Jim Steinman
I'll also lead off early by saying that I fucking love the artwork on these three albums. I like the artwork on most of his records, actually.
I'm listening to Bat Out Of Hell II: Back Into Hell now and it's grown in my estimation over the years. I think my expectations were very high when it was released and my reaction to it at the time was clouded by being very familiar with seven of its eleven tracks from the original versions on Bad For Good and Original Sin. I know now that if I wasn't a Steinman fanatic who already knew most of the album, I would have been out of my mind over it. I never thought it was a bad album, just wished it had been all new songs and not two thirds older material. Also, I don't think any of Meat Loaf's versions of the Bad For Good songs, even the best of them, surpass Jim's originals. Over the years, playing it a lot just to give it a chance to be more than I deserve, I've come to love it quite a lot.
Bat III is a different sort of beast and I love/hate it, but I'll get to that when I listen to it.
Meat Loaf fucking died, man. That still sucks.
@Mario Brega please do join the album club. I don't think any of us care much whether we get to hear a 'new to us' album or an old favourite, or even an old non-favourite. It's just enjoyable exchanging views - personally I would be happy if someone suggested Revolver or Pet Sounds!!
@Mario Brega Look at the album club as a regular practice for your review writings... 🙂
Thanks, Rick for starting this. I think it's important that the tribute threads get started as soon as possible, so we can share our thoughts and emotions while they are still acute.
I've been sick the last few days, with severe headaches, so I couldn't listen to anything...
This is something we are all familiar with, but I plan to listen to the album as soon as I feel good enough. Maybe it will sound different now that he's gone. Even more epic and grandiose, perhaps.
I also don't think he's ever had a backup singer in The Neverland Express that I haven't fallen in love with.
Including Rory Dodd, and he's a boy.
A warning to my friends: be careful with your typing when doing a google search for Meat Loaf videos.
I don't want to tell you some of what comes up for Meat Load.
I posted this on the thread announcing Meat's death, but I gotta put it here, too. I just find him so humble and uncertain introducing it, not faking it when he says he is "one nervous individual," and then he dips into some great well of passion and fairly nails it.
On Friday evening I went to the supermarket and in the car park I overheard through my earphones some lad sitting in his car, window rolled down, blasting "For Crying Out Loud".
I keep thinking about this.