I was always under the assumption that Michael Lee Aday, better known as Meat Loaf the man, was behind the music and lyrics for this album. Wrong. These songs were all composed by a guy named Jim Steinman. His name is displayed prominently at the top of newer releases of Bat Out Of Hell so there’s no confusion as to who is the true maestro. Never heard of Jim Steinman? Well, you may notice some of the other hits he’s written and produced:
Yes, he wrote “Total Eclipse of the Heart,” one of the greatest jukebox masterpieces of all-time. You can’t go wrong putting this on late at night, preferably after 1 a.m. when everyone is good and sauced. Once the climax kicks in you’ll be locked arm-in-arm with people you just met, screaming “I need you now tonight…I FUCKIN’ NEED YOU MORE THAN EVER!” It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it.
Ok, so still a decent song. I mean, if you were a 15-year-old, heartbroken girl in 1983 this was a decent song. Maybe Jim Steinman is really a teenage girl controlling a mechanized adult male android. I don’t have enough proof, yet, so let’s see if we can find a concrete answer in some of his other work.
Oh God…..Jim Steinman is the Anti-Christ. Very clever, Jim–making us fall in love with your “Meat Loaf”. Then, when we least expected it, BAM! You unleashed your Hell Banshee upon us.
Son of a bitch, now I can’t turn off this song. It has me in its wicked grasp….I’ll never escape Celine’s brain-stabbing vocals. DAMN YOU JIM STEINMAN!!!
The story of Elvis’ earliest music inklings is pretty quaint – just a small town teenager looking to make a record as a present for his mammy one hot summer day in 1953. What if he had decided to just buy her a Hallmark card instead and hadn’t strolled into Sun Records? Who would people be impersonating? Johnny Cash? God rest your soul, Mr. Cash, but it’s not as much fun dressing up in a black suit as it is a gold fringe and sequin onesie for Halloween.
"Hello, I'm not Johnny Cash."
It’s funny to think that the legend of the King of Rock of Roll was born in a little rink-a-dink R & B studio in Memphis. Most of the music stars you see today were run through child slavery media bootcamps like Disney or Nickelodeon and the like. But Elvis was just a hillbilly from Tupelo, Mississippi who was too dumb to know that he wasn’t supposed to be the most influential American musician of all time. Then again, Jesus was birthed in a manger full of goats, pigs and bed bugs so I guess the greats have to start somewhere.
Check out this excerpt on the King’s beginnings from the record sleeve:
Though Sam C. Phillips had been producing local R & B hit records since 1950,he used to boast to his competitors that, if he could find a young white singer who could sound and feel like a negro, he would make a billion dollars.
In 1954 Phillips discovered such a singer but, the most that he ever made was $35,000 when he sold both Elvis Presley’s recording contract and the tapes that constitute this album to RCA-Victor.
In Terms of commerciality, these 16 sides may not have been the most successful rock ‘n’ roll records ever releases but, beyond any doubt, they proved to be the most innovative. Other artists may lay claim to having cut the first bona fide rock single (Jackie Brenston’s Rocket 88 Chess 1458), but truly, this is where it all began.
Phillips’ ultimate ambition may have been to become a millionaire, but when Elvis Presley parked his Ford Pick-up truck outside the memphis Recording Service at 706, Union Avenue one hot summer’s afternoon in 1953, his only desire was to own the snazziest car in town. Within two short years, Presley was to take delivery of the first, of what was to quickly become, a fleet of Cadillacs. The events that let up to Prsley being signed to the Sun label may have all the basic cornball ingredients of a low-budget rock ‘n’ roll B-movie, but these are the facts as we know them.
Sun Records wa a local label which used to either sell or lease independently produced R & B masters to major companies at a very small profit. To boost its economy, the Memphis Recording Service was a lucrative subsidiary which specialised in recording weddings, club meetings, and anyone who wanted to preserve their amateur talent on wax.
Running the Memphis recording Service was Marion Keisker who, had quite recently abdicated her position as Miss Radio of Memphis, in order to collect the four dollar Service charged to cut a double-sided 10-inch acetate. Business was always brisk, and so when Elvis Presley – who was still employed as a $42 a week truck driver for the Crown Electric Company – stopped by one Saturday afternoon he was obliged to join the queue of local starstruck hilljacks and precocious pubescents waiting their moment of glory in the studio.
The songs on this album were lost in the storage at MCA for over 20 years. You can find a pretty cool story about how these tracks were saved from the bowels of eternity here.
