Meat Loaf’s 1977 release titled Bat Out of Hell went from almost never being made/released to being one of the top-selling records of all time. A grand opera-esque staging of songs about adolescent love, hearbreak and passion, performed by a singer with an amazing stage presence and composed by a song-writer who’d been equally influenced by music theater, prog rock and Bruce Springsteen, Bat Out of Hell continues to sell thousands of records per year (over 30 million sold to date) and stands as a testament to two people (Meat Loaf and Jim Steinman) who went through Hell to release what they knew to be their Magnum Opus.
The record was produced by studio wizard Todd Rundgren and features a host of great players in the band, including E-Streeter’s Max Weinberg and Roy Bittan, Utopia’s Roger Powell, Kasim Sultan and Willie Wilcox, Edgar Winter on sax, and Rundgren himself on a number of instruments.
The record ranked #343 on Rolling Stone Magazine’s “500 Greatest Albums of All Time” and the amazing cover, painted by the amazingly talented and controversial fantasy illustrator Richard Corben (of Heavy Metal/"Den" and Ghost Rider comic book fame), was also chosen as one of the "100 Best Record Covers of All Time" in 2001 by Q Magazine.
Jim Steinman also wanted to share top-billing with Meat Loaf on the cover, but had to accept a nicely-lettered “Songs by Jim Steinman” cover credit as a compromise with the record company, who wanted to take advantage of the singer’s fame for his roles in the musicals Hair and the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Fortune, opportunity, and fame – well, two out of three ain’t bad…(sorry)
