Songoftheday 1/24/19 - Some days it don't come easy some days it don't come hard, some days it don't come at all and these are the days that never end...
from the album Bat Out Of Hell II: Back Into Hell (1993)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (five weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 18
Today's song of the day comes from rock singer and actor Marvin Lee Aday, who is much better known as his recording moniker Meat Loaf. Aday, who grew up in Dallas, got his nickname from his school football years, moved to Los Angeles where he stumbled around trying to start his career. He finally landed in that city's production of the Broadway musical Hair, where his performance earned him a record deal with Motown's rock label Rare Earth. Pairing him up with Hair co-star Shaun Murphy (calling her "Stoney"), the christened "Stoney & Meatloaf" released a self-titled album in 1971. A single from the set, "What You See Is What You Get", became a top-40 R&B hit in America (#36), while slipping up to #71 on Billboard magazine's pop Hot 100 chart. However neither any other singles nor the album got much notice, so Aday went back to acting and singing on stage, first going back to Hair in New York this time, then a few other shows, including one with a songwriter named Jim Steinman.
In 1973, Meat Loaf joined the cast of the Broadway musical The Rocky Horror Picture Show, which parlayed into his iconic performance as Eddie in the movie version of the show, which came out two years later. He was also working on his own solo debut album Bat Out Of Hell with Steinman doing the songwriting, but it took years for the pieces to come into place (in the time where he both sang on a Ted Nugent record and then met singer Ellen Foley on one of his stage gigs). With the legend Todd Rundgren producing with his band Utopia and a couple members of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band playing, still it was near impossible to find a label who wanted to release the kind of overdramatic rock-style meld with showtunes flair that they were aiming at. Finally, small start-up Cleveland International Records picked it up. Released in the fall of 1977, it wasn't until the spring of the following year that radio and record stores started to react to the already-touring band, including Bruce and Bob Kulick (who would go on to work with KISS). The first single, "You Took The Words Right Out Of My Mouth", originally stiffed in the States (it would make the top-40 on re-release), but the second effort, "Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad", finally got pop radio on board, and music fan reaction quickly followed. The track, which was the most "standardly rock" of the album, climbed to #11 on Billboard's pop Hot 100, spending almost 6 months on the chart (the song also went to #9 in New Zealand). In the UK, where the album had an earlier push from his TV appearances there, "You Took The Words" hit first in the spring, peaking at #33, followed by "Two out of Three", which topped out at #32. The album, which peaked at a modest #14 in the United States per Billboard, went on to be one of the biggest-selling records of all time, selling over 15 million copies in America alone. The title track solidified his British fans' love, climbing to #15 on their singles chart in 1979.
Despite the eventual massive success of Bat Out Of Hell, Meat Loaf had trouble keeping up with that momentum. After trouble with his voice kept him from releasing an immediate sequel to the set (Steinman recorded it himself as Bad For Good), he kept to acting, starring in Roadie in 1980, before reuniting with Steinman the year after for his second album Dead Ringer. While the campy retro single "Dead Ringer For Love", featuring Cher, was huge in Britain, reaching #5, the only single to get any attention in America was the epic "I'm Gonna Love Her For The Both Of Us", which stalled way down at #84 (it got to #40 in New Zealand and #62 in the UK). Meanwhile the album went to #1 in Britain, while missing the top-40 on the albums chart in the U.S. at #45.
After the chaos of the promotion and recording of Dead Ringer, Meat Loaf and Jim Steinman had a major falling out, with the former having to hire song doctors to come up with his contractually-required next set, Midnight At The Lost And Found. It bombed in America, while in the UK he did manage to eke out a top-40 hit with the title track "Midnight At The Lost And Found" (UK #17). Meanwhile, also in 1983, Steinman was enjoying a double-shot of success as his compositions "Total Eclipse Of The Heart" and "Making Love Out Of Nothing At All" by Bonnie Tyler and Air Supply respectively placed at #1 and #2 on the American pop chart. The next year Meat Loaf returned with Bad Attitude, which did nominally better (at least this one made the albums chart in America), with track "Modern Girl" hitting #17 in the UK and making it on rock radio in the States at #41. Again faced with having to produce an album for then-label Arista, Aday put out Blind Before I Stop produced by pre-Milli Vanilli svengali Frank Farian in 1986, which again stiffed in the States, and even in the Britain, where he was still hot, it was his first solo album to miss the albums top ten, with single "Rock N Roll Mercenaries" with "St. Elmos Fire"-hot John Parr managing to climb to #31 in Britain.
During the 1980s, Meat Loaf and Jim Steinman had reconciled their differences, but the manic music business pace kept them from collaborating again until 1990, when they started on work on what would became Bat Out Of Hell II: Back Into Hell. Taking three years to arrive, with Bat Out Of Hell alums Todd Rundgren, Ellen Foley, and Roy Bittan along for the ride, the second opus was released in the fall of 1993. The lead single fulfilled all the promises of that wait, with a twelve minute epic love story which was somewhat condensed for radio (and the music video) to a five to seven-minute stretch, still huge for that time. Instead of Foley or a proposed star cameo, "I Would Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)" featured back-up single Lorraine Crosby, who sung on the demo, to provide the stunning coda at the end of the song. The video, with Meat Loaf as a Quasimodo-ish but rich guy in love, enticing a woman into his world...
"I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)" became Meat Loaf's biggest hit in November of 1993, spending five weeks at #1 on Billboard's pop Hot 100 chart in America. The song also climbed to #10 on their Mainstream Rock airplay chart, while making it to #9 on their Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") radio format list. Internationally, the song returned Meat Loaf to his greatness in Britain, spending seven weeks at #1. The single also topped the charts in Canada, Australia, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Sweden, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, New Zealand, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland, and got to #4 in France and Finland. "I'd Do Anything For Love" won Meat Loaf his first Grammy Award in 1994 for Solo Rock Vocal Performance.
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Here's Meat Loaf singing live at the Grand Gala Du Disc, the Dutch equivalent to the American Music Awards, in 1993...
And next up is Meat Loaf in 1993 in concert...
I believe this one is from his Storytellers appearance on VH1 in 1999...
We'll skip a couple years to 2001 with Meat Loaf singing with a full orchestra on Night Of The Proms (it sounds so much better with all the lyrics intact...)
and finally, Meat on his 3 Bats tour in 2007...
Up tomorrow: A singer born in Trinidad makes a dance jam you can bob your head to.
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