It's been a hot minute since I've had meatloaf. It's also been a long time since I've listened to Meat Loaf. I hit his opus debut, Bat Out Of Hell, in 2021, dove into his first 80's album, Dead Ringer, in 2023, and then dug into his 90's comeback, Bat Out Of Hell II: Back Into Hell, in 2024. Things, however, went dormant for me and the artist.
Meat Loaf has always seemed to be one of those artists that people take or leave. He's either making massive hits, or forgettable fodder. The highs seemed to come when he was paired with writer, Jim Steinman, and the lows when left to his own devices.
The latter was the case for his 1983 released, Midnight At The Lost And Found. Contractually obligated to Epic Records for a second album, Marvin Aday, AKA Meat Loaf, turned to Steinman for material. Unbeknownst to Meat, his collaborating partner had just handed him gold in the form of Total Eclipse Of The Heart, and Making Love Out Of Nothing At All. Unfortunately, these would later be withdrawn when the label refused to pay Steinman for the songs. As I'm sure most of you know, these songs would go on to be massive successes for Bonnie Tyler and Air Supply. Just think; Would the trajectory of Meat Loaf's career could have been if he actually recorded them? Or would the songs have flopped in his hands?
Without a song writer, but needing material, Meat turned to multiple sources, basically anyone who would step in, and even contributed to songs himself. However, he would later go on to say how he felt the material was weak, as he was not much of a writer.
Upon its release, Midnight In The Lost And Found would fail to find a foothold outside the UK. Even then, while it spawned three singles abroad, none of them would crack the top ten; The Razor's Edge (peaking at number 59), If You Really Want To (peaking at number 41), and the title track (peaking at number 17).
Playing through it, it's what I would expect from Meat Loaf. A lot of "dated" operatic rock and roll. He's big on duets, choirs, and layers of vocals. You can definitely pick one of his songs from a crowd. He has his own sound.
The UK listening crowd was definitely on to something. The three aforementioned singles; The Razor's Edge, Midnight At The Lost And Found, and, If You Really Want To are fairly solid tunes. I also kind of liked Keep Driving, and Fallen Angel.
Overall, it's definitely an average album. I don't think there's anything here that I would actively seek to listen to again, but I also won't pan it. I dig Meat Loaf as a whole, and like I said above, when he's on to something, he smashes it out of the park. Sadly, there's none of those kinds of songs to be found here.
Things would unfortunately go downhill fast for Meat Loaf around this time. Poor money management, and over forty lawsuits totaling eighty million dollars, including ones from Steinman left the singer no choice but to file for bankruptcy. In addition to financial loss, he would also lose the rights to all of his songs to date, and to top that mountain off, he even lost his home, and all of his assets.
Still contractually obligated to Epic Records, the label held him in breach for not delivering any further albums, resulting in them ceasing payment to him of any further royalties. This would only serve to dissolve the relationship between the artist and the label.
That's quite a predicament to be in, and I can only imagine how it feels to fall all the way from the top to the bottom, losing everything in the process. But, things for Meat Loaf would ultimately get better, granted not for another decade. For now, we'll have to follow him through the remainder of the 80's. Check back tomorrow for the continuation.
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| THIS WEEK ON THE CHARTS December 4, 1982 |
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