{"id":5892,"date":"2012-04-27T18:26:10","date_gmt":"2012-04-28T01:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/?p=5892"},"modified":"2012-04-27T18:26:36","modified_gmt":"2012-04-28T01:26:36","slug":"meat-loaf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/2012\/04\/meat-loaf\/","title":{"rendered":"MEAT LOAF"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"MEAT LOAF\u00a0<\/strong><\/h1>\n

Telling big stories, going for broke and having a hell of a time<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

\u201cI think dramatically,\u201d declares Meat Loaf. \u201cMy albums are big, complicated stories.\u201d Indeed, nearly every project Meat Loaf undertakes is bigger than life, starting with 1977\u2019s smash rock opera Bat Out of Hell<\/em>. Produced by Todd Rundgren and composed by classically trained songwriter Jim Steinman, the album has sold more than 14 million copies in the U.S. alone.<\/p>\n

Meat Loaf\u2019s career has at times sputtered since that rip-roaring early success, but lately he\u2019s been on a creative tear. For his latest album, Hell in a Handbasket<\/em>, the Dallas native born Marvin Lee Aday (although he changed his first name to Michael in the\u00a01980s) worked with a variety of songwriters and covered favorites like the Mamas & the Papas\u2019 \u201cCalifornia Dreamin\u2019.\u201d Guests include Sugar Ray frontman Mark McGrath, country star John Rich and hip-hop luminary Lil Jon, all of whom he worked with on the NBC-TV reality show The Celebrity Apprentice 4<\/em>. Public Enemy\u2019s Chuck D also adds a rap to the mid-album medley \u201cBlue Sky\/Mad Mad World\/The Good God Is a Woman and She Don\u2019t Like Ugly.\u201d Now 64, Meat Loaf first caught the public\u2019s imagination with his appearance in the 1975 movie classic The Rocky Horror Picture Show<\/em>. He continues to balance music with acting,\u00a0having recently wrapped next year\u2019s A White Trash Christmas<\/em>. Meat Loaf spoke with us from his home in L.A. about the new album, the madness of today\u2019s world and a nagging problem he still has with Bat Out of Hell<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Did any one song dictate the new album\u2019s direction?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cMad Mad World.\u201d I\u2019ve wanted to do that song ever since Tom Cochrane wrote it 20 years ago. I played our version for Tom and he liked it, so I decided I would build an album around that. I watch a lot of cable news\u2014MSNBC and Fox News and CNN\u2014and the things people say on those channels\u00a0make me want to reach out and strangle them. The commentators twist everything\u00a0out of context. The story I wanted to tell kept shifting around, but everything had to do with the world going to hell in a handbasket.<\/p>\n

How does \u201cCalifornia Dreamin\u2019\u201d fit?<\/strong><\/p>\n

People think it\u2019s a nice little pop ditty, but it\u2019s not. That first line\u2014\u201cAll the leaves are brown and the sky is gray\u201d\u2014should be enough to make you say, \u201cWait a second, this is not a happy song.\u201d I knew [co-writer] John Phillips, and he wasn\u2019t necessarily a happy guy. In the video for \u201cCalifornia Dreamin\u2019,\u201d the Mamas & the Papas are all snapping their fingers, smiling. I feel certain John must have hated that. If he were alive today I believe he would say to me, \u201cYou got it right.\u201d It\u2019s not really about California dreaming. John was approaching things metaphorically, writing about people who are afraid to follow their dreams.<\/p>\n

Have you ever had that fear?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I went out to California in 1967 and put my money where my mouth was. I was willing to live in a car. And when I no longer had a car, I lived in people\u2019s garages. I knew a lot of guys in the \u201960s and \u201970s who were in bar bands who were terrific songwriters. I would ask them, \u201cWhy don\u2019t you do your own songs instead of Bachman-Turner Overdrive and Blood, Sweat & Tears covers?\u201d They would say, \u201cWell, the band is taking home $2,500 a week doing covers. I can\u2019t see risking that.\u201d You could tell they wanted more, but they weren\u2019t willing to do what it took.<\/p>\n

Does acting affect your music?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I started out as an actor and I still think like an actor. I don\u2019t think like a musician. I think theatrically, in terms of scenes and pictures. I do things on a grand scale. I also try to be metaphorical, although there\u2019s obviously a lot of political stuff on the new album. I\u2019m not like Midnight Oil. I don\u2019t hit you over the head with a hammer.<\/p>\n

Do you write much?<\/strong><\/p>\n

People think I don\u2019t write, and that\u2019s partly true. Songwriters often ask me to write with them. My response is, \u201cYou don\u2019t want me in the room with you when you start writing. If I am, the song will never make the album.\u201d I can cite several examples of that. In most instances a song is about three-quarters finished before I get involved. Take \u201cAll of Me,\u201d from the new album [penned by Dave Berg]\u2014I changed the lyrics on that one here and there, but I\u2019m not interested in getting a writer\u2019s credit for something I had little to do with. I don\u2019t play that game.<\/p>\n

What drew you to rap?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t a matter of trying to be hip or cool. Meeting Lil Jon on Celebrity Apprentice <\/em>caused me to examine that art form. When I found that song, \u201cStand in the Storm,\u201d I knew immediately that I wanted him to do it. In the case of \u201cMad Mad World,\u201d my original intent was to mash it with a song by Johnny Cash. The guitar and piano players were trying to find the right key for my voice, and it suddenly occurred to me that someone else should sing it. I said, \u201cGuys, we need a rap artist to make this moment happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

How did Chuck D get involved?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Turns out my son-in-law, Scott Ian of Anthrax, is one of Chuck D\u2019s best friends. I rang up Scott and 10 minutes later he sent an email to both of us, saying, \u201cChuck, meet Meat. Meat, meet Chuck.\u201d I phoned Chuck and sent him the \u201cMad Mad World\u201d track, along with the Johnny Cash song \u201cGod\u2019s Gonna Cut You Down.\u201d But instead of doing the Cash song, he sent back \u201cThe Good God Is a Woman and She Don\u2019t Like Ugly.\u201d It was so perfect, I wasn\u2019t about to change a thing. It was as if Chuck had read my mind and seen what I wanted the album to be.<\/p>\n

How do you maintain your voice?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I do a multitude of voice exercises at my house two or three times a week.\u00a0When I\u2019m out on the road, I warm up and cool down. I try not to talk much. As long as I\u2019m properly rested, my vocals feel great. Early last year we were going out on weekends, and that was perfect. Then I went to Australia and made the mistake of doing 90 interviews in eight days before we started the tour. That\u2019s really stupid when you\u2019re my age. Sometimes I start to think I\u2019m like Justin Bieber, that I can do what I did 30 years ago. But I can\u2019t. I developed a swollen vocal cord and it started bleeding when we were in New Zealand.\u00a0It was a mess.<\/p>\n

Is Bat Out of Hell<\/em> ever an albatross?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I could never say that about an album\u00a0that\u2019s the third-best-selling album in the world. The only problem I ever had with\u00a0Bat Out of Hell <\/em>was that it was sped up\u00a0so that it would fit onto vinyl. It was\u00a052 minutes long, and that was too much for two sides. From day one, people have told me that onstage I don\u2019t sound like I do on the album. Well of course I\u00a0don\u2019t\u2014I\u2019m not Alvin from the Chipmunks!<\/p>\n

\u2013Russell Hall<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MEAT LOAF\u00a0 Telling big stories, going for broke and having a hell of a time \u201cI think dramatically,\u201d declares Meat Loaf. \u201cMy albums are big, complicated stories.\u201d Indeed, nearly every project Meat Loaf undertakes is bigger than life, starting with 1977\u2019s smash rock opera Bat Out of Hell. Produced by Todd Rundgren and composed by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[3541,3547,3542,3544,3545,3303,3543,3540,3546],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5892"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5892"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5892\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5895,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5892\/revisions\/5895"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5892"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5892"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5892"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}