Meat Loaf: The Very Best Of Meat Loaf (1998)

It would have been a few weeks before Christmas in 1998 when I was heading toward the music store, which had closed down while I was waiting for an import of Meat Loaf's "Bad Attitude" from the US, and opened up as another Sanity. I can remember walking in, having absolutely no idea there was any new release from Meat Loaf at all, looking under his name and being hit with the cover art of this album. Holy cow!

A blazing sky in the background, with a fiery image of the motorcyclist from the "Bat out of Hell" covers, and then the ruins of an enormous bridge overlooking a post-apocalyptic city and a screaming, maniacal bat, it was astonishing.

I turned the cover over so I could see what the track list was on the other side, and immediately I noticed three new titles: "Home by Now/No Matter What", "Is Nothing Sacred" and "A Kiss is a Terrible Thing to Waste", along with a remix version of "Life is a Lemon and I Want my Money Back". I knew what I wanted for Christmas that year!!!

When the day finally came, I looked inside the lyrics for the album and saw "Written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Jim Steinman" on two of the songs, and "Lyrics by Don Black" on another. I knew who the Lloyd Webber guy was! I had seen him on TV, having no idea he was the same person who was behind "Jesus Christ Superstar", "Evita" and "The Phantom of the Opera", all musicals I and many other people around that time (and even now) couldn't help but be aware of. And now he was collaborating with Jim. Well, wow.

The album began playing, and immediately my ears were greeted with a blast of church organ and a choir in the vein of Verdi's "Messa da Requiem" (which Jim had sampled on both "Original Sin" and "Bat out of Hell II", and probably here as well.) It was remarkable! What I didn't realize was that Jim was back in the driver's seat as the producer, on both this song "Home by Now/No Matter What" and "A Kiss..." It would be the last time this would ever happen on a Meat Loaf album. Yes, this is true. Jim was not in the studio producing "Braver Than We Are" and was credited as a creative consultant rather than a producer.

By the time "A Kiss..." had finished, it was like a hundred voices were screaming out for more... more... more...!!!! My God, you can't leave it here. You have to give us a full album, like yesterday. This is too amazing to be over now. There's an orchestra, for heaven's sake, for the first time since "Bat out of Hell", and now you've opened the floodgates... bring on "Bat out of Hell III: The Final at Bat". Bring it on now! Or something! An EP! I don't know! Unfortunately that moment would never really come for me, and in hindsight this is still, cover and all, the closest I get to a "Bat III" the way I imagined.

Let's look at the history. At this point, Meat hadn't made an album in three years since 1995's "Welcome to the Neighborhood", which he had successfully toured all around the world. He had released an impeccable live album in 1996 called "Live Around the World" which is essential listening for all Meat and Jim fans, also marking the last time they performed together onstage. Meat had also been making more films, and had even appeared in "Spice World" as the guy driving the tour bus. Meanwhile, as I would discover when I surfed the internet for the first time in 1999, Jim was working in musical theatre again.

There had been a workshop of Jim's "Neverland" musical about five or so months before "Bat out of Hell" was released, and a full production of "The Confidence Man" which had been performed at Queens College in New York, but in 1996 Jim joined forces with Andrew Lloyd Webber on his latest musical "Whistle down the Wind", Andrew's first musical since "Jesus Christ Superstar" to premiere on American soil. The London revamp would yield the Boyzone hit single "No Matter What" which topped the charts in eighteen countries worldwide, not to mention of course the two selections that are on this album. In 1997, Jim had worked with librettist Michael Kunze and director Roman Polanski on a musical version of Roman's "Tanz der Vampire", one of the biggest musicals to have emerged from continental Europe. There had also been an announcement that Jim would be writing songs for "Batman: The Musical". And what of "Bat III"?

It seemed like both the guys had moved on at this point. They'd put it behind them, but had they really? Anyway, they could have done if they'd wanted since they'd both given us so much already, as exemplified brilliantly with "The Very Best of Meat Loaf." Bearing in mind that we've heard most of this before, let's have a look at the songs.

CD 1:

"Home by Now/No Matter What"---holy crap! This is flipping awesome! It's also a nice counterpoint to the Boyzone version. I really think everyone needs to hear both.

"Life is a Lemon and I Want my Money Back (Remix)"---I hear mixed opinions of this remix, but I love it. It made me wonder what a whole "Bat II" remixed would have sounded like, and I do wonder about that sometimes.

"You Took the Words Right out of my Mouth" and "Two out of Three Ain't Bad"---apparently all the "Bat" songs have been remastered for this release, and apparently they've never sounded better before or since. In that case, it's a pity. The full album should be done, even better again. And this is the third greatest selling rock album of all time?

"Modern Girl"---one of only four songs from the 80s albums to be included here, with nothing from "Blind Before I Stop" at all, but I guess the length of the Steinman songs would have played a part in this as well. They needed two discs to fit what they could.

"Rock and Roll Dreams Come Through"---sounding as great as ever here.

"Is Nothing Sacred"---this was the song which contained lyrics by Don Black that had originally been recorded by Celine Dion but cut from "Let's Talk About Love" at the last minute, for reasons I'm not really sure why. Here, it's given to Meat, and later in a duet version with Patti Russo, and it just soars. For some reason though, it's not produced by Jim.

"Paradise by the Dashboard Light" and "Heaven Can Wait"---it's "Paradise", what can I say? I also have to point out the wind effects leading into "Heaven Can Wait". That's really cool, and something I wouldn't have been expecting at all.

CD 2:

"I'd do Anything for Love (But I Won't do That)"---what a way to open the second disc! And not one single edit! This is the entire nearly 12 minute song here!!

"A Kiss is a Terrible Thing to Waste"---the one and only time both Meat and Bonnie Tyler appear on the same song together. Treasure that! Meanwhile you've got Batman (Jim Steinman) versus Superman (Andrew Lloyd Webber) on this song which blows the roof off the whole joint! Bloody hell!!! It feels like "The Phantom of the Opera" meets "Bat out of Hell". This orchestra is going off like the aliens in "The War of the Worlds". Heat rays are flying everywhere! It's just nuts! I never wanted it to end.

"I'd Lie for You (And That's the Truth)" and "Not a Dry Eye in the House"---with "A Kiss" ended, we take another look at two of the singles from "Welcome to the Neighborhood". Their placement here seems just right, and again not one single edit between them.

"Nocturnal Pleasure" and "Dead Ringer for Love"---from memory, I think these songs are sounding good as well, in terms of whether or not they've been remastered. It's really cool that we get the "Nocturnal Pleasure" speech too, and not just the song.

"Midnight at the Lost and Found"---this song had been part of the live set for years, so even though it hadn't been a big single, you can see why it was included here. I think it's probably the one Meat liked the most from that album. Again, there is nothing from "Blind". I probably would have chosen... actually, I have no idea. I can't answer that.

"Objects in the Rear View Mirror May Appear Closer Than They Are"---all I have to say here is that I love that "Bat out of Hell" is the next song. To me, "Objects" is connected to "Paradise" and "Bat out of Hell", so hearing the Bat Overture after this is really cool.

"Bat out of Hell"---and the day is done and the sun goes down and the moonlight's shining through... so we come to the end of "The Very Best of..." set with Meat hitting the three high C's, and the last studio release until 2003.

The following year Meat would publish both his autobiography "To Hell and Back", and embark on the "Storytellers" tour, an offshoot of his VH-1 special of the same name, which was originally to feature both Meat and Jim, only Jim was ill in London where he had been working on "Whistle down the Wind". Meat would also perform at the Night of the Proms in 2001. And what next? Time alone would tell.

Thank you for reading,

Ryan.