Chat out of Hell

Episode 3.2 - Total Eclipse of the Heart | Peel Out

• Emma Crossland & Sam Wilkinson • Season 3 • Episode 2

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Massive hair, massive covers and massive driving test errors, it's Chat out of Hell!

We finally get to the pinaccle of Jim's 80s output in Total Eclipse of the Heart, while Peel Out takes us to its exact middle. This time, we solve the big questions like:

- Who came up with all that nonsense in the Total Eclipse video?

- What if Bonnie Tyler ran a husky farm?

- What time does Meat Loaf's mum call him in for his tea?

PLUS an email to swell Sam's ego by proxy, some truly horrifying early lyrics from the Dream Engine (Dream Engine...Dreams...Engines...) and all the usual sundry nonsense.

Keep your comments, reviews and arguments flying in to chatoutofhell@gmail.com, find us on Facebook or Instagram by searching Chat out of Hell and don't forget to use the hashtag #dearA1saucepleasesendsomeofyourA1saucetosamfromthereallygoodpodcastchatoutofhell or the much shorter one #pleasegiveemmaamichaelbaybudget

Chat out of Hell is a is a review podcast: all music extracts are used for review/illustrative purposes. To hear the songs in full please buy them from your local record shop or streaming platform. Don't do a piracy.

Music extracts on this episode:
Total Eclipse of the Heart by Bonnie Tyler from the album Faster than the Speed of Night (1983)
Total Eclipse of the Heart by Nicki French (1994)
Si Demain...(Turn Around) by Kareen Anton and Bonnie Tyler from the album Simply Believe (2003)
Peel Out by Meat Loaf from the album Dead Ringer (1981)


Send us a text

Sam:

What is this?

Emma:

This is Chat Out of Hell, the only fortnightly podcast dedicated to dissecting the works of Meat Loaf and Jim Steinman in more detail than should ever be necessary.

Sam:

Who is Meat Loaf?

Emma:

Meat Loaf is a musician who played his own superfan in a film about himself. Who's Jim Steinman?

Sam:

Jim Steinman is a record producer who described Bonnie Tyler as a"Welsh dairymaid with a lusty body."

Emma:

Good grief.

Sam:

They were different times, Emma.

Emma:

Who are we?

Sam:

We are Emma Crossand and Sam Wilkinson, generic evil business owners cursed to be visited by the ghost of operatic rock music past without ever getting to the bit where the ghosts of operatic rock music present and operatic rock music future rock up and make us change our ways. It's

Emma:

We are recording this close to Christmas. Yeah, this is

Sam:

episode, isn't it? Welcome to Chat Out of Hell! Bow, now, now, now. That gets more tuneless

Emma:

every time, doesn't It It really does. Yeah, yeah. How are you?

Sam:

I'm I'm alright as well.Good. Does it ever feel weird to you that We go to each other's houses and we have half an hour, 45 minutes of small talk before we start

Emma:

And then we do more

Sam:

And then we pretend that we've only just walked into the room and just, Oh, it's you! How are you?

Emma:

Yeah. Yeah. It is weird. Also, if I ever really told you how I was, I think that would be, socially unacceptable for a podcast. Absolutely.

Sam:

And for a friendship.

Emma:

I'm fine. Everything's fine.

Sam:

a man from the Victorian ages, Emma.

Emma:

It's okay, I'm not going to emote at you, it's fine. You're safe. Bantz over?

Sam:

I guess

Emma:

so. Yeah, probably.

Sam:

So this is Chat Out of Hell and this is a podcast where two comedians, what is us, talk about the songs of Meat Loaf and Jim Steinman, what is some musicians from the past. Every episode we both bring a Meat Loaf or Jim Steinman song to dissect on our rock and roll lab table drop some facts about it, listen to it, have a lovely time, audience has a great time, do the emails, go home.

Emma:

Rock and

Sam:

Sounds good,

Emma:

doesn't it? Yeah, yeah. It sounds great when you lay it out like

Sam:

It is, yeah, That's how I do agendas for meetings at work as well. Right lads, we're gonna do rock and roll, then we're gonna do this, then it's mailbag. There's always a mailbag

Emma:

Mailbag! Do you get fan mail at

Sam:

yeah, yeah, I Hey Sam, long time listener, first time emailer. Can you please get that spreadsheet back to me by Tuesday? know you keep ignoring my emails. Anyway. that's what we're going to do. So this episode I have brought Bonnie Tyler's incredible hit, Total Eclipse of the Heart, which was written by Mr Jim Steinman

Emma:

I have brought another song written by Mr. Jim Steinman. And it is the first track from Meat Loaf's second album, dead Ringer. And that track is called Peel

Sam:

Out Peel Out. So listeners, go away, find those on YouTube, Spotify, wherever you get your music from. Wait for a busker to play it in the town centre. Eventually they'll get there,

Emma:

I think it might take quite a long time for them to get round to peel out.

Sam:

Yeah, maybe. I reckon you'll get a lot of Total Eclipse of the Heart buskers. Ambitious, but possible. But we're gonna listen to Total Eclipse of the Heart now. If you've never seen the video for this, do yourselves a favour, find that on YouTube. Otherwise, we've all heard the song before, right? Everyone knows it. everybody knows this masterpiece We'll see you all after this very short clip.

Emma:

What was that

Sam:

listeners, Emma had never seen that video before. I assumed that everyone had seen it loads because I thought everyone was me.

Emma:

So this Bonnie Tyler thing, obviously since we've started doing Chat Out of Hell, you've been digging more and more into the various works of Jim Steinman, and you've rather fallen for our lovely Bonnie. Were you a fan beforehand, or is this a new thing?

Sam:

We need a new jingle for this. I don't know how it's gonna work. It's not a Meat Loaf Memories, it's a Bonnie Tyler

Emma:

Memories

Sam:

This is song that's always been with me and I have lots of lovely memories of it from being a student and singing karaoke and

Emma:

It's a

Sam:

It's a great karaoke song and there are a couple of friends that it always makes me think of

Emma:

of So

Sam:

get to see very much anymore. So it's, it's really nice. That's

Emma:

a really nice Bonnie Tyler memory.

Sam:

It is, thank you.

Emma:

welcome. No, like, weird awkward teenage stuff to do with it then? It's not a classic memory then? is it?

Sam:

not classic me both memories, no. It is a banger of a

Emma:

It is a banger I love it. And I'm sure that there have been times in my life when I've thought, this song's about

Sam:

Yeah.

Emma:

Probably quite drunk a bad night out in in my university days. Doing a bit of air clutching while singing and

Sam:

have some killer lyrics in It really does. Every now and then I get a little bit nervous that the best of all the years have gone

Emma:

I mean,

Sam:

God! Ow! Ow! Oh,

Emma:

that one, punches

Sam:

Yeah, but it's a lovely song. let's start with the theme of the song. What do you think that song is about,

Emma:

Oh my God. The video is

Sam:

is mad. It is mad. We'll come back to the video. Yeah. talk to me about themes.

Emma:

Once upon a time I was falling in love, now I'm only falling apart. It feels like a song about heartbreak.

Sam:

Wrong! It's about vampires.

Emma:

I should have known. I should have known. How is it about vampires?

Sam:

looks so disappointed, listeners.

Emma:

are bits of that song that touch my aching soul and now it's about fucking

Sam:

vampires. Jim was kicking it around for a musical based on Nosferatu, but didn't happen. It did end up going into Dance of the Vampires later. So the sort of vampire y bits to it is loving in the dark. Giving off sparks like vampires do. Have

Emma:

you noticed that a lot of Jim's songs involve giving off sparks? Which is a theme that we need to bring into

Sam:

I was about to mention that. because this is one of the earliest cases of Jim recycling the shit out of things. Here's your Total Eclipse facts. This was the lead single from Bonnie's fifth album, Faster Than The Speed Of Night, which is her first collab with Jim Steinman. The single is four minutes thirty, the album version seven minutes and two. It's duet with the lovely Rory Dodd. Wonderful Rory. This song stopped another Steinman work from getting to number one. Did it? Yeah, Making Love Out of Nothing at All by Air Supply got to number two. Jim Steinman doesn't like air supply so I think he's quite happy with the outcome here. As I've mentioned I think before, he called them"two boring idiots from Australia". American songwriter called this song"a gloriously over the top evocation of romantic torment" and"a garment rending, chest beating, emotionally exhausting ballad". right. Yeah? You were about to say that, weren't you? That's

Emma:

pretty much what was on the tip of my Tongue?

Sam:

Tongue? You can say it however you like, I just never knew you were a Tongue guy. Tongue? Tongue. Oh no, you're from that part of the world that's right on the border and you're not sure. Shit, sorry.

Emma:

Tung.

Sam:

Tongue. Tongue.

Emma:

Tung. Now I'm just really aware of my own tongue. Tongue. Tongue.

Sam:

Edit point. I'll cut all this out.

Emma:

Um,

Sam:

So like everything Jim did after 1981, this was recycled from various other things he'd already done. The melody came from the soundtrack to the film A Small Circle of Friends, which Jim totally soundtracked. I've not watched it, but it's a sort of indie some people are in love and now they're in love with somebody else and then something else. Film. So I'm chucking that in for Film

Emma:

Yeah, is that going on film club Bonnie

Sam:

Tyler makes bank singing this every time a solar eclipse happens and good on her.

Emma:

I'm pretty sure that in recent years I heard that she was singing it on a cruise during a

Sam:

right, yes, there are clips of her on a cruise ship, sailing through a solar eclipse. It's one of these massive ships, with thousands and thousands of people all watching her, and she's on a stage at the front. Her band are fucking awful.

Emma:

When I went on a cruise, which was a weird holiday I was sat in one of the bars drinking cocktails because we'd got a drinks package. So we thought we'd make the most of it by being drunk for, I'd say about 90 percent of our waking hours. There was like a, pianist playing lounge music, And then all of a sudden I heard the lounge version of Radiohead's Creep

Sam:

ha ha ha ha! ha!

Emma:

which was a really

Sam:

Oh my god, that sounds

Emma:

yeah, yeah, that was, quite

Sam:

awesome Da da ding, da ding, da ding. That's a reverse John Lewis ad, isn't

Emma:

they? Yeah. I very much enjoyed that

Sam:

line giving off spark, that comes on the song Bad For Good, from the album, Bad For Good. See also Invocation and Formation of the Tribe, from The Dream Engine. Dreams Dreams can come true. Look at me, babe. I'm looking at engines. Thank

Emma:

Thank you!

Sam:

So that song was later rejigged into a song called Skull of a Country for Meat Loaf. So we're not going to listen to the whole thing here, but it is the, very much the proto Total Eclipse of the Heart. The lyrics are much weirder though. Emma, I'd like you to give me some turnarounds and I'll give you the lyric in Don't have to sing it, just give me a Rory Dodd turnaround.

Emma:

Turnaround.

Sam:

It's a black day dawning,

Emma:

Turn around.

Sam:

there's a corpse in mourning,

Emma:

Turn around.

Sam:

To your tin can graveyard,

Emma:

Turn around.

Sam:

To your tin foil saviour,

Emma:

there more?

Sam:

around, bright eyes, turn around, bright eyes. And then There's another verse. Go.

Emma:

Turn around.

Sam:

There are napalm babies screaming.

Emma:

Turn around.

Sam:

There are rivers steaming.

Emma:

Turn around.

Sam:

Give us all that you have now.

Emma:

around.

Sam:

And stop feeling bad now. Fucking hell, Jim. Crikey.

Emma:

mean, Wow. You've dug up some absolute gold. It's, that is incredible.

Sam:

So listeners, if you all need a hug, please do podcast and go find a loved one. Thanks for listening.

Emma:

I'm just going to cuddle the cat

Sam:

the cat The album version has two verses that were missing, and I think they're quite nice and touching. Yeah. So if you can give me some turnarounds, I'll bring us up again. Every now and then I know you'll never be the boy you always wanted to be.

Emma:

Turn around.

Sam:

Every now and then I know you'll always be the only boy who wanted me the way that I am.

Emma:

Turn around.

Sam:

Every now and then I know there's no one in the universe as magical and wondrous as you.

Emma:

Turn

Sam:

Every now and then I know there's nothing any better, there's nothing that I just wouldn't Jim has turned it around there. I

Emma:

I prefer the bit about the Napalm baby. Napalm Babies is the title of my new band.

Sam:

Oh God. Yeah, your ukulele folk band. My ukulele

Emma:

funk band, Napalm Babies.

Sam:

Oh, lovely. nice. That's nice. Emma.

Emma:

Yeah. hey Sam, how did Jim and Bonnie come to work together?

Sam:

Oh, what a great prompt. Thanks, Emma. She first hits fame in 1978 with a song called It's a Heartache.. That does alright, it gets to like number four ish in the UK, slightly worse in the US. But then disappears again. She's just meh. In 1981 she switched management record companies and she asked Jim to produce her. Because she had seen the Meat Loaf performance on the Old Grey Whistle Test. And she was a massive mega fan of Meat Loaf.

Emma:

The old gray whistle test did a lot of good for

Sam:

didn't it? It did, yeah. It absolutely made both their careers. She says,"I didn't expect Jim to say yes to producing me, I only asked him because I'm a huge fan of his records, especially his solo album".

Emma:

Aww.

Sam:

Yeah. bless her. Nobody is especially a fan of his solo album. Especially when at the time the only records we're talking about are Bat Out of Hell and the

Emma:

Sun.

Sam:

album. Bonnie Fact, she represented the UK in Eurovision in 2013,

Emma:

Did she? unaware of

Sam:

She landed somewhere mid table and then sat in the green room getting

Emma:

ha ha!

Sam:

Good on But what does Jim think about Bonnie?

Emma:

ha! ha ha this is going to go well.

Sam:

"I always thought she had a great voice", he says."She reminds me of Creedence Clearwater Revival's John Fogarty, probably my favourite male rock'n'roll singer." Is that a compliment?

Emma:

Hard to say.

Sam:

Not only Jim, but a lot of people compare Bonnie to a female Rod Stewart.

Emma:

I can see that with the gravelly

Sam:

Yeah, but it's also quite an unkind comparison. This is interview with Smash Rock Anthems for ITV."I think she had the perfect voice for Total Eclipse. It sounded so sensual but so ravaged. It sounded heroic that she could sing at all." Does that sound familiar to you?

Emma:

It rings a bell.

Sam:

Back when we were talking about Meat Loaf's last album, Jim's press piece said,"Meat Loaf is absolutely heroic in his ravaged voice."

Emma:

Not only does Jim recycle music and lyrics and themes, he also recycles press releases.

Sam:

Just comments on people he knows.

Emma:

Amazing.

Sam:

"Her voice sounds like Rod Stewart in the middle of an orgasm."

Emma:

What? Yes.

Sam:

Somehow he meant that in a good way., they get on very well. Jim produced two albums for Bonnie. He wrote, I think, four or five songs for her one of which was Ravishing, which I've already brought to the table and

Emma:

you made me

Sam:

It's amazing, Emma. I just think you are still under the Hulk Hogan shadow. This was produced at the power station in New York, where Jim did a lot of his work in the early 80s. He worked with a couple of engineers called Neil Dorfsmann and John Janssen. Neil recalls that Steinman wasn't very experienced at the time. He says he's grateful that John Janssen was there to talk Jim down from an idea like,"We need more cannons in the bridge."'Jim, we can't have any more cannons, Dorfsmann recounts, adding that they were created on the synth.'Just like Todd Rundgren and the motorcycle.

Emma:

Did Jim want to wheel actual cannons in?

Sam:

cannons? I believe so. Rory Dodd gave a very technical and detailed explanation about how they did the background vocals. Complicated and difficult is the gist that I got from it, but then he says,"It was 2am when we finished recording a 10 hour session during the backgrounds. I thought we were done when Jim piped in,'Hey Icy!" We all recall that Rory Dodd is called Icy. Do you want to sing the duet parts now?' I wanna go home, Jim. But I acquiesced". Because Icy's such a nice guy.

Emma:

is a nice guy. Also

Sam:

We're often quite disparaging about Jim. And he makes it very easy to be so. but people do have nice things to say about him long days of recordings that could have gone on for five to seven days. But Jim was very supportive of the team. He was constantly ordering giant piles of food for everyone. And people have said this about him in other points as well. He was a very generous man to his friends. You'd go to a restaurant with Jim, he would order the whole menu and just have whatever, it's fine. Sometimes I think we're a bit too down on Jim because he says incredibly stupid and cruel things about his friends. But he seems to be genuinely liked by people in the industry as shall we talk about the music video now? Yes.

Emma:

Yes.

Sam:

The video for this song features Bonnie Tyler in a sort of dreamscape in a big

Emma:

it is a very sort of classic Jim

Sam:

video. Yeah, there's lots of blowy curtains. Bonnie has massive hair blowing in the wind everywhere. There's candles streaming in the wind and then

Emma:

got a bit of a gothic

Sam:

it's got a very gothic vibe to it and then we get to a lot of teenage boys who are alternately doing ballet or backflips or fencing or just around being shirtless or taking the bright eyes thing incredibly literally because they all suddenly have glowing eyes. There's a choir of younger teenage boys who sing Turn Around Bright Eyes and then one of them flies towards

Emma:

Yeah, that's quite is that being a vampire?

Sam:

I guess that's part of the being a vampire, yeah, it's the Lost Boys thing. then we cut to the coda scene where it's day and it's outside of what is clearly a boarding school. And Bonnie, I think is being introduced as a new teacher to the boys.

Emma:

She's looking very smart

Sam:

very smart in her black tie and suit, and she's shaking hands with the boys, which is, that never happened when I met a new

Emma:

teacher in high school.

Sam:

They never paraded, yes. But as she shakes hands with one of the boys, he has bright eyes and sings, turn around bright eyes, which she finds a bit shocking. And then it happens again, and the boys all push past her and go into school. Typical boys. It's

Emma:

I assume that as she was then their new teacher, that they systematically tried to work out her weak points and destroyed her

Sam:

Undermined her from within.

Emma:

Yeah,

Sam:

Yeah,

Emma:

I enjoyed it when the boys were ballet ninjas.

Sam:

Yes, they were ninjas. Here's a quote for you. So this video is directed by our old pal Russell Mulcahy, who directed The Shadow.

Emma:

The Shadow.

Sam:

The Shadow. with Alec Baldwin. Alec so here's Russell's remembrances."Jim is fabulously, fabulously crazy. We would banter ideas over a bottle of red wine. I'd say, let's set it in a school and have ninjas in one And he'd say, let's have a choir boy with glowing eyeballs.

Emma:

God,

Sam:

We shot it in an old abandoned insane asylum in London. We had one sequence, which was Steinman's idea, where a shirtless young boy is holding a dove and he throws it at the camera in slow motion. Bonnie came around the corner and screamed in her Welsh accent, YOU'RE NOTHING BUT A FUCKING Prevert

Emma:

Prevert?

Sam:

then she stormed off. There was nothing perverse intended, the imagery was meant to be pure. Maybe slightly erotic and gothic and creepy, but pure. Anyway, the video went to number one and a year later, Bonnie's people rang up and asked if I would direct her new video."And I told them to fuck off, because I was insulted about being called a fucking pervert. And I was a little mad because pervert wasn't pronounced correctly". Yep. absolutely Bonnie says"it's a fantastic video, I don't like the way I look in it with all that curly hair, I look like a bloody poodle". Emma, would you like a quiz?

Emma:

Always.

Sam:

Bonnie Tyler is actually a stage name. So which of these was the name she was born under? Is it A. Sannie Carlson? Is it B. Gaynor Hopkins? Or is it C, Nicki French?

Emma:

I'm going to go with Gaynor.

Sam:

was Gaynor Hopkins, yeah. There we go. Do you recognise either of those two other names? Sannie Carlson is the real name of Whigfield, singer of the

Emma:

the electric

Sam:

smash Saturday Night.

Emma:

okay, well done.

Sam:

Nicki French

Emma:

Yeah. Sang this

Sam:

this

Emma:

this feels very 90s.

Music:

Every get a little bit lonely and you never come around, turn around. Every now and then I get a little bit tired of listening to the sound of my tears,

Sam:

Do you not remember that one from your raving days? Sam

Emma:

just handed out the glow sticks. ha ha ha!

Sam:

you remember that? No. That was 1994, and as I was researching this one, found it and I played it and I had a massive like, fuck I do remember this! I mean I was eight years old at the time, but I remember this being on the radio. the

Emma:

Oh my god. Yeah.

Sam:

That went to number five in the UK, number two in the US.

Emma:

Crikey.

Sam:

There's a couple of other interesting covers that I'd like to share with you. now. Okay. We'll go back to Bonnie Tyler first. She's re recorded this a lot of times. As her voice has matured, it sounds a little bit better every time. But in 2003, she re recorded it as a bilingual duet with a French singer, Karine Anton, under the name of Si Demain. The song is alright, but the video is so diametrically opposite to the video you've just seen that I have to share it with you.

Emma:

Okie

Sam:

dokie.

Music:

Tu sais que quelquefois j'ai peur de toi. Tu sais que quelquefois j'ai peur de moi. J'ai tant besoin de toi.

Emma:

That video was that about two women that run away together to go and raise

Sam:

huskies Yes it was! Much as the Nikki French version was so 90s, this was the most early 2000s video you could get.

Emma:

I like the Husky Puppies,

Sam:

was good, it was, it was one of those, I don't know the name of the genre. An un rom com where Kareen Anton is in a not an abusive relationship she just doesn't like her partner very much and she leaves him and she moves Bonnie Tyler in a cabin in the snow

Emma:

where they Aww.

Sam:

I He's lovely!

Emma:

that is the dream, isn't it? Yeah.

Sam:

That went to number one in Belgium, France and Poland.

Emma:

Did it?

Sam:

Loads of covers, most of which I will skip over. Westlife did one. Their version is boring. But Jim produced one of the remixes. Which the label didn't want, but that remix has found its way to the internet. Most of it is still shit, but the first 40 seconds are absolutely killer. so So check this out.

Emma:

heh, heh. God. Nothing they can do after that intro is going to

Sam:

No, no.

Emma:

It's just, they are

Sam:

Yeah, yeah, that was real bat two Jim production

Emma:

It does remind me of A Kiss is a Terrible Thing to Waste, which I know is also Around that

Sam:

Yeah, broadly. when Bonnie asked to work with him, Jim actually gives her a test. He invites her over and he plays her a couple of records. And if she didn't like these records, they're not going to work together. It was a Credence record and I can't remember what the other one was, but they end up covering them on that first album. But I can't picture. What he did with West Life.

Emma:

Was that a stage where yeah, I'll just

Sam:

it. Whatever. Yeah, I

Emma:

Just give me the money

Sam:

now actually.

Emma:

need to like, I

Sam:

to like, I need to pay my choir

Emma:

I need to pay my choir and my restaurant bills are getting ridiculous.

Sam:

That is almost it for covers. I've got one more to briefly play for you. In 2019, in the Canto Uma Para Mim segment on Brazilian television programme Alerta Amazonas, this song was performed by contestant Priscila Munhoz, who did not know how to speak English, and instead substituted her own gibberish lyrics. She was eliminated from the programme, but this video went viral as a

Emma:

Lots of N's in there. Yeah.

Sam:

I just love it because that is how English sounds to people who don't speak English. Yeah. And it's, it's interesting hearing that because

Emma:

interesting.

Sam:

So yeah, she went totally viral and there's several clips of her, singing her cover on like big prime time Brazilian shows., Bonnie Tyler video, over a billion views on YouTube. And that is over 37 pence in YouTube ad revenue. But Emma, what do the people of the internet think? I'd love to know. Johnzed85, My aunt Jeanette used to babysit me and play this over and over again on the record player. She danced very drunkenly with a glass of cheap wine in her hand. She'd always throw the glass at my little brother and scream. Her hair caught fire in the summer of 89. They say she fell asleep while smoking. I can still smell her hairspray. She used too much of that stuff. Very flammable.

Emma:

Some people tell the internet things that should only be spoken to a

Sam:

Yeah, like confessing to setting fire to their aunt's hair. Because that's definitely what

Emma:

Yeah, that's,

Sam:

that's, that's, Yeah thanks, Johnz85. Yeah. Is time to rate this song. For those new to our podcast, we always rate our songs on our patented copyrighted trademarks. organic, homegrown Jim Steinman Meat Loaf song rating scales. Today we're using our Jim Steinman scale, so we go from Jim Steinman at the top, Jim Fineman in the middle, all the way down to Jim Declineman at the bottom. I don't think there's any discussion It's

Emma:

absolutely a Jim Declineman.

Sam:

And that was chat out of hell, thank you for listening.

Emma:

the over forever. I'm kidding, of course it's Jim Steinman.

Sam:

Of course it's Jim Steinman! There we go, total eclipse of the heart. Emma, what was your song?

Emma:

We do have another Jim Steinman song, but it's perhaps not as well known, despite being a single, we're gonna have a listen to Peel Out, which is the first track from the Dead Ringer I'd recommend that you go and find the video on YouTube, just so that you can go, What? Like Sam's about to.

Sam:

Brilliant. I've not watched it yet.

Emma:

Enjoy. That was Peel Out. Sam, any thoughts?

Sam:

This song does rock more than I thought it would.

Emma:

Okay.

Sam:

It is a bit weedy still. Yeah. And I think some of that is to blame on the mix. I would quite enjoy hearing it, I think,

Emma:

Mm.

Sam:

The mix feels a bit flat compared to some of the other work that they do. The song is alright. it's not either of their best work. It's the story of how Meat Loaf failed his driving

Emma:

It does seem to be, yes. He wants to go on all

Sam:

colours. All the colours, red and the green. There is one pair of lines, which, when I was listening to it yesterday, I picked up on as absolute classic Steinman. Go on. My body's the car and my soul's the ignition. Your love will be the key and we'll jockey for position. Yeah,

Emma:

It's stunning, isn't it? Stunningly stupid.

Sam:

The rest of it is quite generic y 80s rock song.

Emma:

Yeah, it's the first track from Dead Ringer, which is the album that we know that Jim didn't really want to write. He's not really involved in it beyond writing the songs, so he doesn't get involved in the production.

Sam:

okay. That explains it..

Emma:

There is a line in here that is recycled elsewhere. Tire tracks and broken hearts. That's all we're leaving behind. Which is used in A Kiss is a Terrible Thing to Waste as I mentioned earlier So that links all of these

Sam:

these songs together. Look at Bonus points for Crossland! Thank

Emma:

you This is the first track and It feels like it's trying to imitate the first track on Bat Out of Hell. Yeah. With the motorbike noises that do sound more like a motorbike than previous attempt. And I suspect, I don't know, because there's so little written about this album. cares about it. Jim gives zero fucks about And Meat Loaf, in his own biography, barely touches on it. It mostly talks about various litigious bits and pieces instead.

Sam:

I do find it funny that slates Jim's solo album for trying to imitate Bat Out of Hell too much. And then we just get the imitation

Emma:

imitation of there's an article written by whoever it is that writes for Crowd Full of Pockets. I don't know if you've come across this site before

Sam:

not off the top of my head.

Emma:

Most of what Jim did and has done are reworkings of The Dream Engine, as we've talked about before.

Sam:

Sorry, do you mean?

Emma:

The Dream Engine. Engine. And engines. Dreams.

Sam:

Dream Dream, Oh, I thought I wouldn't find one then

Emma:

yeah, so most of what he'd written was for said set piece. I'm frightened of saying the words in case I set you off again. and he kept trying to perfect this, but, the stuff Bad for Good was intended with that in mind as well. Dead Ringer, he had to come to completely fresh. Yeah. Because it was just like please write Meat Loaf something for his follow up album now that you've just used up all of the songs that you'd got planned for him. This is a quote from Crowd Full of Pockets"On Dead Ringer, we're not getting another set of songs written with the Dream Engine in mind, but rather a conscious recreation of the album that resulted from it last time. It's sort of a copy of a copy situation, and that's how it feels" I've listened to the whole album many times cause I discovered this when I was 12, I think?

Sam:

Meat Loaf Memories? So I

Emma:

At the age of 12, I was desperate to find more music but I didn't have any money. So buying my own stuff and, discovering things is hard. This is pre internet. Yes. So finding stuff is largely based on the taste of your parents or siblings in your case. I have none. And so I would go through my parents record collection looking for things that I thought might be exciting and interesting. I found this on vinyl in my mum's stash of records and gave it a listen. Because of course I loved Bat Out of Hell 2, but didn't have anything else to really work with. So this is quite early big music for me. I was really excited to find another Meat Loaf album in the house. And I listened to it, and I was really surprised by a number of things. But the thing that took me back more than anything was his voice. Because you listen to Meat Loaf's voice on this album, and it doesn't sound like him at any other time. Obviously it's partly to do with the productionn, but this is like after he's recovered from losing his voice, And he's not there yet. The vocal's strained, and I think he struggles through the songs on this album. Yeah. Because he's just not at his vocal best. It just, it sounded really odd to me. I thought that maybe this had come before Bat Out of Hell, before I knew the difference. because in a way it sounds like a younger,

Sam:

less It does polished It does, doesn't it? You're right. If you had heard those two albums. You would assume that

Emma:

Dead

Sam:

Dead Ringer was the prototype to what would become Bat out of Hell.

Emma:

I could find hardly anything on Jim's own website about it, apart from a few articles praising the album, because, of course, those are the only articles that he kept You

Sam:

keep your bad reviews?

Emma:

Locked in my head forever.

Sam:

Yeah, but not on your website, surely.

Emma:

website, Sam?

Sam:

I maintain your website, Emma, and it's very out of date.

Emma:

Yeah, we really should put the gigs on there, shouldn't we? Sounds Magazine, 1981 gives it five stars out of five. Yeah. Yeah. Which seems bold. There's been a few interesting things that I've found as a result of looking into this. We'll talk about the video first, I think.

Sam:

Yeah, that's weird, isn't it? it's Meat Loaf in the way the Nowhere Fast video is, which is done a bit on the cheap. Quite weird.

Emma:

video begins with city scenes while a motorbike revs.

Sam:

revs. fame.

Emma:

Yeah. Yeah.

Sam:

it's like early 80s New york. It's

Emma:

early eighties. This, this whole vibe, I'll come to that in a minute. So Meat Loaf gets out of a truck and runs into a house. And then you cut to the band who are playing on stage. And what I've put here, one man has lovely silky looking blonde hair. I wonder what conditioner he uses. We cut between some dancing old guy and some weirdly dressed girls jigging along to the music. The girls don't feature again. That's their bit. Then suddenly Meat Loaf appears looking wide eyed and open mouthed at the door. Next, some people in army surplus combat gear are in an office. We don't see them again either. They presumably are awaiting their time as rock and roll

Sam:

Yes.

Emma:

Meat Loaf runs downstairs, into a crowd that he can't get through, so he hides in a different room, and all of this is intercut with shots of the band playing, and this is just the intro. Meat Loaf starts singing aggressively into the face of a man. He has a short, sensible haircut, compared to Meat Loaf's long hair. I assume this means he is not just a man, but THE

Sam:

man. And

Emma:

meat Loaf intends to stick it to him, it grabs him by the lapels and sings into his face. Ooh, intimidating. The next line of the song is sung directly to the camera. And Meat Loaf is angry. The old bloke from earlier is shown in the background. He's actually playing a banjo along to the song. Meat Loaf sings aggressively into his face now.

Sam:

Yeah, that old bloke weird.

Emma:

a weird, weird thing.

Sam:

I guess he's dressed like one of the fancy doorman that you get in New York. Yeah. He's in the kind of pseudo military

Emma:

But with his

Sam:

banjo? But with a banjo as well.

Emma:

He runs outside now, still singing angrily, and he jumps into the back of a red Ford pickup. And sits awkwardly on it. That must have hurt. You can't sit comfortably like

Sam:

yeah, he's like astride the

Emma:

tailgate of the pickup. Yes. The pickup drives away with him still sitting there. The camera switches positions so it's in the pickup looking at him still sat awkwardly. With an

Sam:

an awful blue screen

Emma:

behind him. It's not blue screen. What? Apparently, and I haven't seen it for real, but there are photographs of that shoot taking place where it is a real

Sam:

So just really low quality film?

Emma:

Just really low quality film. Camera switches position, we see the road disappearing behind Meat Loaf as he continues to sing. This shot is uncomfortably long. And Meat Loaf does his best to ham up the action, but I'm still relieved when we cut back to the band. This is bad GCSE drama stuff. We keep cutting back to him still sitting on the back of the truck while he sings about traffic lights. And because this is a very literal video, when he sings about traffic lights, we see the traffic lights. Finally, he climbs properly into the back of the truck and I can stop worrying that he's going to fall off into the road in a grisly accident that will delay responsible road users for hours. The truck stops and Meat gets off and runs into the building. He runs straight onto the stage with all the other musicians. Silly Meat Loaf, he's late for his own gig. He looks angry and confused. I'm angry and confused by this point, too. Now he joins the band for the second half of the song. After a while We cut to a motorbike gang, because of course we do. They're riding down the road. We're shown that Meat Loaf is in the gang. What the fuck? The police try to block the motorbike gang, but one of them, presumably Meat Loaf, jumps over the cop car.

Sam:

That was so Blues Brothers,

Emma:

Yes, Yes, it was. That was also the bit where you looked up and said, I'm sorry, have I like

Sam:

stopped your attention

Emma:

during this? because suddenly it changes direction. So during the instrumental, Meat Loaf stalks the stage looking furious, like the angry animal that Jim Steinman wanted him to be. But he's wearing a brown waistcoat which rather takes the edge off the look. Cut back to Meat Loaf and his biker gang, still tearing up the road, and then for some reason an aerial shot of some trucks on a road. Then a sequence of Meat Loaf and other bikers on bikes in the dark. so up to this point. All of the video has looked like a slightly overcast afternoon then suddenly we're in the dark and it looks slightly damp as well. They take off into the night on their bikes and then it's another daytime shot of them racing off, because continuity doesn't exist in this world. And then we're looking at the wheels of a truck for a bit. Then a few other vehicles on the road before finishing with the bikes driving towards us in the darkness again. So what the fuck? What?

Sam:

Don't look at me! What? What? I think when it goes from overcast daytime to night time What happened there is Meat Loaf's mum called him in for his tea and they had to come back and finish the video afterwards.

Emma:

Yep. So while, while digging around, I was surprised that I found a video and this was only uploaded in 2020 by something that seems to be a bit of a project of rejigging some of the Dead Ringer stuff, and there's all sorts there. The project will be released as a big folder on some sort of Google drive or something. Will include a remastered album. movie.

Sam:

Hello, what?

Emma:

Yeah this is my submission for Film Club. Do you remember at the beginning of today's show where I talked about Meat Loaf playing his own superfan in a film about him

Sam:

do remember that. That is

Emma:

is this

Sam:

mackerel.

Emma:

Dead ringer the movie is on YouTube waiting for

Sam:

us So it's on YouTube, so that presumably means it sank at the time.

Emma:

don't think it ever was released there's been the odd screening, but I don't think it was ever released properly but I think we will have a screening.

Sam:

Oh, that's exciting got four more episodes in this series, Emma. Nobody had better mention any more films, because we are locked in.

Emma:

Do you want to hear what the people of the internet have to say?

Sam:

Only if you say it more

Emma:

Do you want to hear what the people of the internet have to say? Most of the comments beneath the video were just Oh, Meat Loaf was amazing. Oh, I miss him. R. I. P. All of that sort of thing. the only thing that piqued my interest from at break fluid last name, 2, 400. ha

Sam:

ha!

Emma:

I passed my driving test the other day, and yesterday I went out for a drive by myself for the very first time. Wasn't sure what song I wanted to listen to for the very first drive, but I ended up settling on Peel Out, which I'm very, very happy with. Brilliant tune. And I just wanna know, when you passed your test, what was the first song you played?

Sam:

Okay, I'll tell you the first thing that came on the radio. which is slightly different. So I, I passed my test relatively late. I was thirty, thirty one? Okay. Might have just been thirty, Either way though, driving my first car home it was the last day of Leeds Festival, traffic was not moving, all the roads were closed. I was completely overwhelmed. And I'd been driving in silence, because that's what I always did on lessons. Yeah. And I put the radio on. And it was Radio 4, 4, it was you! Yeah, so for listeners from the US, it's like NPR but twice as much. but that relaxed me. But then the first music I listened to was The Pipettes first album. Oh, nice? Yeah,

Emma:

I quite liked the

Sam:

Yeah. What about you?

Emma:

I passed my driving test when I was 20. So I've been driving for 20 years I can't believe they'd let me have a car. Me too. I passed on my dad's

Sam:

nice. So do you have to get each other cards every year then? We have to

Emma:

get each other cars every so yeah I think I played, cause I was a bit I played a track called Hope from REM's Up

Sam:

My God!

Emma:

Yeah, I know.

Sam:

Listeners! Can you beat that? What

Emma:

was

Sam:

first song that you listened to in your first car, driving on your own? Do let us know, chatoutofhellatgmail. com Double points if it was Meat Loaf, but don't pretend it was Meat Loaf if it wasn't, because we'll

Emma:

I have nothing else

Sam:

Okay, shall we rate this then? Yes. It's another Jim Steinman song, so that's back to our Jim Steinman rating scale. Jim Steinman at the top, Jim Declineman at the bottom. Jim Fineman in the middle. It's Jim Fineman,

Emma:

It It is a Jim Fineman.

Sam:

discussion there.

Emma:

it's not bad enough to be a declineman.

Sam:

it's a fun generic 80s rock song.

Emma:

be having it on the playlist in the car.

Sam:

After the pipettes and whatever it was by R. E. M. Jim Fineman. Jim isn't it? Yeah. Call it. So that was Chat Out Of Hell, Series 3, Episode

Emma:

Gosh.

Sam:

Listeners, did you agree with us on those songs? Do you have extra song facts to share? Would you like to ask us to review a different Meat Loaf or Jim Steinman song? Drop us an email, chatoutofhellatgmail. com,

Emma:

Speaking of emails, do we have any?

Sam:

We certainly do. Emma, which one would you like first? Mailbag Submission or Jim Steinman's Sexy Voice?

Emma:

I would like Jim Steinman's sexy voice, please and thank you.

Sam:

This is from Claire Muncaster.

Emma:

Hi Claire.

Sam:

Hi Claire. It's a very short one. Glad to hear, chat out of hell is back. I think Jim Steinman had a really sexy voice. Great impression of him by Sam. Can't wait for your song, Claire. Kiss kiss. Thanks Claire. By inference, I have a sexy voice, Emma. That's what I'm taking away there.

Emma:

I am disappointed that my voice hasn't been declared sexy. It has in the past, when I worked doing telesales for a company once.

Sam:

Do you have a sexy voice? Drop us an email gmail. com. Emma, who told you about your sexy voice?

Emma:

Some really pervy guys I spoke to on the phone. Did

Sam:

you make any sales?

Emma:

Yes. If you've got it, use it. Sorry. If you've got it, use it.

Sam:

Hi. Would you like to buy some double glazing? I'm Jim Steinman. Thanks Claire, it's lovely to know you're listening. Mailbag submission.

Emma:

please.

Sam:

This is from Stephanie, Love your show. I'm a longtime Meat fan and had the good fortune to see him in concert 13 times over the years. Awesome. I regret not seeing

Emma:

I saw him three

Sam:

I also appreciated that Meat never took himself too seriously, even calling one of his late career tours the Guilty Pleasure Tour. always kinda in on the joke and was truly a legend. Listening to your wry take on his songs has been a joy hearing them for the first time. I hope you guys are enjoying hearing many of these for the first time as well, even when the reaction has been incredulous. Yes we are. We are, like,

Emma:

we're properly enjoying this. We're

Sam:

enjoying this. We often take Meat Loaf and Jim to task over sometimes silly things, sometimes massive things, but we wouldn't be here if we weren't fans of their stupid, brilliant work. I haven't heard you talk about this particular song yet, but heard someone in the Mailbag segment talk about the Hang Cool Teddy Bear album, and it prompted me to write in. Wanted to know if you guys were aware yet of the song, California Isn't Big Enough For Me.

Emma:

No. I haven't listened

Sam:

I know you guys appreciate, loose quotes, the over the top lyrics you've come across, so I wanted to point out that includes the line, I can barely fit my dick in my pants.

Emma:

pants. Hhha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Wooh!

Sam:

Not joking, I think you just have to listen to the song to believe it exists. This sounds amazing. Thank you, Stephanie. Keep up the good work. If you ever come to LA, would love to catch your comedy.

Emma:

to catch our

Sam:

catch our comedy in LA as well. I'm just mentally adding up the cost of a flight to L. A. and wondering if it's not the most expensive a gig run will do. A return flight to L. A. will cost us less than an Edinburgh run, is And if Stephanie's guaranteed to come, we'll probably sell more than

Emma:

ha ha ha However, do keep your eye out on crosslandandwilkinson.com for future shows.

Sam:

So thank you Stephanie. So That does bring us to deciding our songs next time. So we've had a little chat and we've had a few requests in. So what we're gonna do for next time, we're gonna randomly draw from our mailbag of requests and assign one of them each. So Emma, would you like to roll for me a standard four sided dice?

Emma:

Oh yeah, here I go. I have rolled the

Sam:

number two came out.

Emma:

and number two has come

Sam:

have drawn Los Angeloser.

Emma:

Oh no.

Sam:

Ha ha ha ha now if you'd like to roll for me a standard D3 or sided dice, which, as all the nerds who are listening will know, doesn't exist.

Emma:

You have rolled a one.

Sam:

I've got more!

Emma:

More?

Sam:

the song he wrote for the Sisters of Mercy, which Meat Loaf later did on his very shit last album. That sounds quite good, that! Yeah. But Emma, when are we returning?.

Emma:

A little bit of a break over Christmas, but don't worry, there'll be some treats in your stocking. I hate myself. Yeah. Do

Sam:

Do you want to retake it? No! Okay. we should use it. Alright, we're using it. Yes, There'll be some weird bonus Christmas content that Charlie Etheridge Nunn forced to have, so look out for that on Christmas Day. Don't do anything special to listen to it on

Emma:

sake, don't listen to it with your

Sam:

listen to it with your family. Oh the regular episode will be on Monday the 6th of Jan, you airy. I say Jan, because I'm in too much of a hurry.

Emma:

have got a lot to do.

Sam:

I have got a lot

Emma:

to do.

Sam:

As always, please keep your general Meat Loaf thoughts and anecdotes flying in. Did you see Meat Loaf at McDonald's tucking into a big box of nugs? Let us know! ChatOutOfHell at gmail. com or Hashtag DearMcDonalds, please send some of your nugs to Sam and Emma from the really good podcast thank you all for listening once again. That's been Chat Out Of Hell. See you next time. Bye. Bow now, now. now.