AndyK
13 Mar 2007, 10:48
Found this on canada.com (http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/arts/story.html?id=4849524c-d77a-4d26-a57f-d510b3b16bed)
To me, one of the most dramatic moments in rock and roll is the menacing growl of a motorcycle on the song Bat Out of Hell. It marks the turning point in a sweeping epic. The revving engine pinpoints the moment when our doomed hero tears off on his motorcycle, leaving his love behind.
When the bike roared, I could picture it, a blacked-out chopper with a touch of chrome building up speed on a highway at night, maybe with flames spewing out the back.
Wait a second. Of course, it's not really a motorcycle -- it's Todd Rundgren on electric guitar, as I was reminded recently while watching the recent DVD on the making of Bat Out of Hell.
As my mental image adjusted itself from biker-on-the-highway to musician-in-a-studio, my feelings went from mild disappointment to "wow!" that bending a string could sound like twisting a throttle.
Wondering if this was a common pastime for guitarists, I ran it by a few friends who play. Although only one -- the Mighty Eagle Band's Shawn Hill -- admitted to attempting it himself, aided by a whammy bar, others pointed out that guitarists make all kinds of wacky sounds with their instruments. So why not a motorcycle, challenged Marty Sobb, the Raven Street Studio engineer who plays in the band Cheap Seats and has a broad knowledge of rock.
Bluesman Tony D provided a refresher on the guitar antics of Albert Collins and Jeff Beck, while my esteemed editor, Peter Simpson, drew my attention to the guitar-generated helicopter sound on the Black Angels' song, The First Vietnam War. Others saluted the many varied effects created by Eddie Van Halen.
A motorcycle owner, Phillipe Galipeau, who's in his 50s, recalled seeing a player demonstrate the technique when he was a teenager. The player used the tuning key to alter the pitch, mimicking the changing of gears. "It sounded exactly like a Harley," he wrote in an e-mail.
In the '60s, producer George Morton brought an actual motorcycle into the studio to get the effect on the Shangri-Las' hit, Leader of the Pack, while producer Bob Rock made sure Motley Crue had a similar sound in Kickstart My Heart.
Jim Steinman, the songwriter behind Meat Loaf's classic material, says the title track to Bat Out of Hell was inspired by his obsession with car-crash songs. He refers to Tell Laura I Love Her and Leader of the Pack as favourites.
"There's something so thrilling to me about an operatic narrative that involves a cataclysmic event, especially when it's so in tune with a teenager's world in rock and roll as a car or motorcycle crash," he says in the DVD. "I know I set out to write the most extreme car crash song."
In his mind, there had to be a motorcycle in the song. Steinman begged and whined until Rundgren caved in. The guitarist-producer twiddled a few knobs on the board, picked up his instrument and did his thing.
In the DVD, a clean-cut Meat Loaf recalls the moment, still amazed at the performance. "It's going to come right out to a solo," he says, guiding viewers through the process. "He never stopped it. (I was) just standing here watching Todd do this, mouth open, going 'unbelievable.'"
Meat Loaf knows all about cataclysmic events. He's had a few himself, including one that happened near the end of a frenzied concert at the Ottawa Civic Centre on April 22, 1978.
According to the Citizen review of the show, it happened during the second song of the encore, a "dynamic" reading of the Ike and Tina Turner classic, River Deep, Mountain High. The 300-pound Texan ventured a little too close to the edge of the stage and fell off. The concert ended abruptly and Meat Loaf was reportedly taken to hospital by ambulance.
His leg was broken and the rest of the tour was cancelled. From there, the life of Marvin Lee Aday went into a downward spiral. He lost his voice. He faced bankruptcy. Substances were abused. During a low point in his career, he returned to Ottawa in 1987 for a much smaller gig at Barrymore's Music Hall. On the way back up, he poured his heart out at the Robert Guertin Arena in 1994.
Both shows earned rave reviews, although they were far from the glory of the late-'70s heyday. Try as he might, Meat Loaf has never been able to make a record as gripping as his debut.
Then again, he probably doesn't need to. The original Bat Out of Hell still sells several thousand copies a week, and Meat Loaf appears healthy and prosperous. Recently married to woman from Edmonton, he's travelling Canada on a tour that brings him back to Ottawa Friday. His Seize The Night journey consists of the classic Bat material, along with newer material from the two sequel albums.
With last fall's release of Bat out of Hell III: The Monster is Loose, the ultimate crash song officially became a trilogy spanning nearly three decades. The evolution is complete: Bat out of Hell has morphed from a lean, mean chopper into a cushy Goldwing, complete with cruise control and airbags.
But in the final analysis, it's still a great song.
To me, one of the most dramatic moments in rock and roll is the menacing growl of a motorcycle on the song Bat Out of Hell. It marks the turning point in a sweeping epic. The revving engine pinpoints the moment when our doomed hero tears off on his motorcycle, leaving his love behind.
When the bike roared, I could picture it, a blacked-out chopper with a touch of chrome building up speed on a highway at night, maybe with flames spewing out the back.
Wait a second. Of course, it's not really a motorcycle -- it's Todd Rundgren on electric guitar, as I was reminded recently while watching the recent DVD on the making of Bat Out of Hell.
As my mental image adjusted itself from biker-on-the-highway to musician-in-a-studio, my feelings went from mild disappointment to "wow!" that bending a string could sound like twisting a throttle.
Wondering if this was a common pastime for guitarists, I ran it by a few friends who play. Although only one -- the Mighty Eagle Band's Shawn Hill -- admitted to attempting it himself, aided by a whammy bar, others pointed out that guitarists make all kinds of wacky sounds with their instruments. So why not a motorcycle, challenged Marty Sobb, the Raven Street Studio engineer who plays in the band Cheap Seats and has a broad knowledge of rock.
Bluesman Tony D provided a refresher on the guitar antics of Albert Collins and Jeff Beck, while my esteemed editor, Peter Simpson, drew my attention to the guitar-generated helicopter sound on the Black Angels' song, The First Vietnam War. Others saluted the many varied effects created by Eddie Van Halen.
A motorcycle owner, Phillipe Galipeau, who's in his 50s, recalled seeing a player demonstrate the technique when he was a teenager. The player used the tuning key to alter the pitch, mimicking the changing of gears. "It sounded exactly like a Harley," he wrote in an e-mail.
In the '60s, producer George Morton brought an actual motorcycle into the studio to get the effect on the Shangri-Las' hit, Leader of the Pack, while producer Bob Rock made sure Motley Crue had a similar sound in Kickstart My Heart.
Jim Steinman, the songwriter behind Meat Loaf's classic material, says the title track to Bat Out of Hell was inspired by his obsession with car-crash songs. He refers to Tell Laura I Love Her and Leader of the Pack as favourites.
"There's something so thrilling to me about an operatic narrative that involves a cataclysmic event, especially when it's so in tune with a teenager's world in rock and roll as a car or motorcycle crash," he says in the DVD. "I know I set out to write the most extreme car crash song."
In his mind, there had to be a motorcycle in the song. Steinman begged and whined until Rundgren caved in. The guitarist-producer twiddled a few knobs on the board, picked up his instrument and did his thing.
In the DVD, a clean-cut Meat Loaf recalls the moment, still amazed at the performance. "It's going to come right out to a solo," he says, guiding viewers through the process. "He never stopped it. (I was) just standing here watching Todd do this, mouth open, going 'unbelievable.'"
Meat Loaf knows all about cataclysmic events. He's had a few himself, including one that happened near the end of a frenzied concert at the Ottawa Civic Centre on April 22, 1978.
According to the Citizen review of the show, it happened during the second song of the encore, a "dynamic" reading of the Ike and Tina Turner classic, River Deep, Mountain High. The 300-pound Texan ventured a little too close to the edge of the stage and fell off. The concert ended abruptly and Meat Loaf was reportedly taken to hospital by ambulance.
His leg was broken and the rest of the tour was cancelled. From there, the life of Marvin Lee Aday went into a downward spiral. He lost his voice. He faced bankruptcy. Substances were abused. During a low point in his career, he returned to Ottawa in 1987 for a much smaller gig at Barrymore's Music Hall. On the way back up, he poured his heart out at the Robert Guertin Arena in 1994.
Both shows earned rave reviews, although they were far from the glory of the late-'70s heyday. Try as he might, Meat Loaf has never been able to make a record as gripping as his debut.
Then again, he probably doesn't need to. The original Bat Out of Hell still sells several thousand copies a week, and Meat Loaf appears healthy and prosperous. Recently married to woman from Edmonton, he's travelling Canada on a tour that brings him back to Ottawa Friday. His Seize The Night journey consists of the classic Bat material, along with newer material from the two sequel albums.
With last fall's release of Bat out of Hell III: The Monster is Loose, the ultimate crash song officially became a trilogy spanning nearly three decades. The evolution is complete: Bat out of Hell has morphed from a lean, mean chopper into a cushy Goldwing, complete with cruise control and airbags.
But in the final analysis, it's still a great song.