The Last Bass Outpost
Main Forums => The Outpost Cafe => Topic started by: uwe on January 22, 2022, 04:46:51 PM
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Guys, does it really have to fall on me to eulogize Marvin Lee (Now who might have inspired those two first names, answers on a post card? But it must be a coincidence, Lee Marvin was only just beginning his acting career when Meatloaf was born in 1947.) from Texas? Me, the resident Purple fan writing an obituary for the man who despised that band and sang the less than complimentary Rock'n'Roll Mercenaries about them?
But death is a great forgiver, so thanks Marvin for bringing high school teenage lust to the masses in a musical cinemascope fashion. You can now finally continue to quarrel with Jim who left us less than a year ago.
That number here was grand, like a Spielberg movie turned into an epic song:
https://youtu.be/3jPMv9zJ1LE
I never saw Meatloaf in his heyday, not that legendary gig in Offenbach in 1978
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUZk3mzwxNk
where he fainted (as an act or in real) on stage and became the talk of the town. I saw him in 1985 at an open air festival (headlined by Purple, that's when a lifelong friendship ensued, he raged and stormed on stage after backstage tensions with the main act, but it wasn't a great gig) and maybe 10 years ago when he didn't get one note right the whole evening, the female backing singer carried all the melodies in key, I don't know what key he was singing in, it was David Lee Roth-devastatingly bad).
No matter. Bat Out Of Hell and Bat Out Of Hell II were musical milestones if overproduced, larger than life drama with some rock components is your thing.
Rest in peace big man.
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So many public personalities have passed in the past 3 weeks. Having seen so many articles and tributes to Meat Loaf in the news and social media, I figured everyone here knew by now.
If you've never seen it, I highly recommend Roadie (1980).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjntmf3gwcI
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This video most likely isn't well-known to many people. It's Meat Loaf with a Norwegian singer called Marion Raven. She used to be part of a duo with Marit Larsen. I used to know a guitarist who was the moderator on Marit's forum for a few years. However, I always tended to lean more toward Marion. Her duo with Marit didn't work out well because Marion was a rocker and Marit liked folk and pop. Eventually, Marion was kind of pushed into pop, too, probably against her will.
I don't know the details of Marion Raven's experience working with Meat Loaf. I'm more familiar with her early career. But here they are.
RIP Meat Loaf
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=By82Udvc53w
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I like the Orson Welles/Citizen Kane look of him in that vid.
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Ellen Foley recalls her epic duet with Meat Loaf: 'Stop right there!' (https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/ellen-foley-epic-duet-meat-loaf-stop-right-there)
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Nice one.
I always dug her voice, that operatic, grand vibrato. And yeah, that cool rock chick, "raccoon eyes" look too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ydxcg3d6NhM
But neither Meatloaf, nor Ian Hunter/Mick Ronson nor Mick Jones (Clash, not Foreigner) could get her solo career to take off.
Karla (who sang Ellen's parts live, I don't think Ellen ever toured Bat Out Of Hell) didn't really fare any better with her solo career though I liked her voice (not quite Ellen's fervent vi-bra-bra-bra-brato, which many people thought an acquired taste, Karla was more throaty) and "Italo-American girl next door"-look too. She had a hand with other people's material:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT_WvyAdP2g
Best version ever of that particular John Fogerty song (including his own):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbZQyG9qkLQ
Here's both of'em more recently, really cute:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kh9QXC5SpuQ
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So many public personalities have passed in the past 3 weeks. Having seen so many articles and tributes to Meat Loaf in the news and social media, I figured everyone here knew by now.
If you've never seen it, I highly recommend Roadie (1980).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjntmf3gwcI
But Dave you hate blondie - them covering Cash musta killed ya.
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When did he say he hated Blondie? I keep track of everything he does, can't remember him saying anything, uhum, one way or another. They're not stadium rock, so that's a plus, they have guitars (not like Motown), so that's another one and Herr Westheimer has always been gentle on Punk and New Wave. Blondie don't even have loud keyboards (he doesn't like those either, except when Fats Domino plays them).
They never did much for me, Debbie Harry was a media package, a counter-culture icon, had a great image (if too artificial for my taste), I just never thought that she sang particularly well or with particular emotion and expression. It was oh-kay, nothing less, nothing more. The appeal of her voice was probably that it was edgier than most pop, not powerful enough for rock (like Ann Wilson or Pat Benatar), not pure like a folk singer's and largely uninfluenced by the great black voices - as such it sort of defied categorization and could be combined with different styles of music (you can't say that Blondie - the band - wasn't versatile as they gradually reduced their rock/new wave content more and more).
Now not every chick fronting a band has to have great pipes, I'm fine with Chrissie Hynde and Patti Smith who are both not exactly Aretha Franklin or Janis Joplin either.
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I never liked her voice or her ridiculous Ethel Merman imitation on One Way or Another. But she's just one musical act in the movie.
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I never liked her voice or her ridiculous Ethel Merman imitation on One Way or Another. But she's just one musical act in the movie.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmZdqsCW8vM
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I doubt that is still her real hair, but like a lot of singers that weren't that dazzling when they were young, her voice hasn't really diminished badly. At age 70, come on, all credit to her. And I never ever even liked that song.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPaXy3T50Lw
The one song I really liked was their debut on German juke boxes, a doo-wop cover (I like doo-wop for some reason), but catchy. Still, take that bathing suit away (as most of her fans would have no doubt hoped, but not the way I mean it here!) and as a vocal performance it's not exactly Whitey Houston tackling I Will Always Love You.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahGxiSV_LH0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1RwciS3Cnc
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The one song I really liked was their debut on German juke boxes, a doo-wop cover (I like doo-wop for some reason), but catchy. Still, take that bathing suit away (as most of her fans would have no doubt hoped, but not the way I mean it here!) and as a vocal performance it's not exactly Whitey Houston tackling I Will Always Love You.
Whitey Houston? ;D
I thought it was Whiney Houston.
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LOL, a(nother) blatant case of whitewashing a black artist!!! My public image is now ruined with all Americans.
Let's be inclusive: And black Americans too.
PS: Whitney, forgive me.
(https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRU2nF2eElCDOrKf59C74AoT-bAxZQVdLCDjw&usqp=CAU)
And you didn't always whine like that Westheimer dude has claimed either!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlNVTlfti2M
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Loved the live act in Paradise by the Dashboard Lights....it had the ring of truth to it.
And I never realized Ellen played on Night Court, one of my all-time favorite TV shows. But I recognized her immediately.
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In that case ... some further eye and ear candy for you - with a complementary Gibson RD Artist and the Ian Hunter Band on loan ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msLUDUJKA24
Plus some historic background why she didn't tour with Meatloaf and her coming of age in NYC:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfTbfi9vUGs
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LOL, a(nother) blatant case of whitewashing a black artist!!! My public image is now ruined with all Americans.
Let's be inclusive: And black Americans too.
PS: Whitney, forgive me.
(https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRU2nF2eElCDOrKf59C74AoT-bAxZQVdLCDjw&usqp=CAU)
And you didn't always whine like that Westheimer dude has claimed either!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlNVTlfti2M
This is the only Whitney Houston song I ever liked. She is a good vocalist I just wasn't into the songs or the production (which made her voice more peircing).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYTFJvgxx5Q
Wait for it - spoiler alert: she joins the JAMs in the end.
How's that for whitewashing? Knowing those guys, even ignoring Scottish stereotypes, I doubt that was legit (predates their ABBA lawsuit).
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LOL, musical discussions at the Outpost are always risky business for me - the discussion on Blondie that came up here had me rethink whether my "Blondie Collection" (consisting of a Best Of and two of their more recent albums) really gave me enough meat to pass comprehensive judgement on the band - fast forward a few days and here I am now with a 11 CD or so complete discography of the New Yorkers to wade through, listening to their sophomore album Plastic Letters just now (at this early stage of their career, Debbie was certainly not yet someone you would call a "singer", more like a female Lou Reed, but it sure has New Wave charm). Perhaps, by the end of the week, I might turn into a (late) convert!
But I'm balancing this with also listening to a 10 CD box of Ella Fitzgerald (her Porgy & Bess with Satchmo is amazing)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3kQt14_5OQ
and catching up with Ozzy's complete output (I had some gaps there).