MEAT LOAF – Best Of [the MCA years] (2014)

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As title says, this “Best Of” from Michael Lee Aday, the American musician and actor better known by his stage name MEAT LOAF consists of material from his MCA Records years.
That are songs from his ’90s period where he finally enjoyed world-wide success.

Indeed, Meat Loaf earned a Grammy Award for Best Solo Rock Vocal Performance for the song “I’d Do Anything for Love” included in his ’93 Bat Out of Hell II: Back Into Hell album. Until then, Meat Loaf experienced some initial difficulty establishing a steady career within his native US.
However, he has retained iconic status and popularity in Europe, especially the UK. He ranked 96th on VH1’s ‘100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock’.

But for me, Meat Loaf it’s not Hard Rock, at least not this Nineties works. This is mainstream pompous rock, grandiose on arrangements and bombastic in sound.
Perhaps because before becoming a famous solo artist he joined the Los Angeles production of the musical Hair, this influenced his approach to music, and his songwriting partnership with musical theater guru Jim Steinman shaped his musical style as well.

“Best Of” offers a really good perspective of Meat Loaf’s biggest cuts like “I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That) in its Single Edit (which works better), the melodic rocker “Rock & Roll Dreams Come Through” or the power ballad “I’d Lie for You”. There’s also as extra, “Hot Patootie” from seventies “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” soundtrack.
Meat Loaf is ‘melodramatic melodious rock’, and I like it.

01 – I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That) [Single Edit]
02 – Rock & Roll Dreams Come Through
03 – I’d Lie for You (And That’s the Truth)
04 – Objects in the Rear View Mirror… [Radio Edit]
05 – Not a Dry Eye in the House
06 – Runnin’ for the Red Light (I Gotta Life)
07 – Life is a Lemon
08 – Everything Louder Than Everything Else
09 – Out Of The Frying Pan (And Into The Fire)
10 – Left in the Dark
11 – Hot Patootie / Bless My Soul

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