Meat Loaf biography
 

Is anyone looking forward to Mick Wall's soon-to-be-released Meat Loaf biography? From the page count it looks a fairly substantial piece, and Wall certainly has a track record (though I've not read any of his previous books, only articles and interviews). Fingers crossed it'll be a good one.

I pre-ordered from the UK since the author said no US publisher is releasing it soon. It should be interesting.

I think it's great that such a book is being released. When I first heard mention of it I thought it was going to be an insubstantial and badly-written little self-published thing. Great to see Meat being honoured by a professional writer and a big publishing company. Let's hope it does well.

Wait, theres a Meat Loaf biography being released?
Link?

"On the eve of the 40th anniversary of Bat Out of Hell, and the launch of a mammoth two-year farewell tour"

....erm.... oops. I guess the publisher was hoping for some extra publicity there!

Hope it's better than the "Last of the Giants - True story of Guns 'N Roses" he put out last year, That was just awful imho.

What was the problem?

The first 1/2 of the book was a rehash of one he wrote around the time the use your illusion cd's were released,the subsequent melt down, split up, solo projects and reunion are covered in very little depth at all, and very rushed.

Seems to me to just have been a way to get his first book on the band republished with some new material, masquerading as a whole new book.

Just my opinion tho!

I'll keep my fingers crossed, and hope for something better. Meat's own book ('To Hell and Back' 1999) was a fantastic read, of course, but it would be great to read something that goes into more detail on the post 70s/80s period. I find too many auto- or biographies have great depth until the subject starts to become famous, and then it gets a little scanty - as though people are only interested in the rise to fame rather than the artist's life afterwards, or the works that follow.

maybe he's still annoyed with get in the ring lolz

I'm looking forward to Meat's 100 Moments, which is still on his agenda :-)

That'd be nice if it happens. I asked him about this in London last year but said he had no current plans for it due to film & TV work lined up. Meat's a great storyteller, and his last book was an absolute joy to read. I for one will be sad if another one doesn't appear.

Many things can happen to thwart or delay plans, but a week or so ago it was definitely on his agenda :D

Does anybody know how many pages this book is? Is it full of pics etc? Is it the usual how Bat 1 was made etc zzzzzzzzz?

The comment about two year farewell tour is slightly concerning - was this ever the plan?!

The Amazon listing has a page count, but as to what the book contains - time will tell. I really hope it's more than just 'Bat 1'.

As for the tour, I seem to recall that meat had hoped to be doing some shows this year but called them off due to his health/recovery. I'm sure some dates were even provisionally booked.

The UK tour to support the album was booked and about to be announced - we approached Meat's tour booker to get him back to Liverpool UK and were declined in favour of Manchester.

If the book goes into more detail about the actual shows and the making of the albums it should be good. Reading about someone's childhood is OK for one book if the subject wrote it themselves, but I would prefer that a book that is written by someone else would focus more on the career.

The story of Meat's career from after Deadringer until Bat II happened is probably very fascinating and inspirational in how he kept working hard and did not give up.

Totally agree here - those years (and the ones since) have been hugely overlooked in articles, documentaries and previous books. A huge piece of Meat's life, not to mention most of his output!

And all he has done since Bat II; albums, tours, films, his residencies. Such a prodigious output of work across the board. How he kept going after Dead Ringer and refused to give up is more than touched on in his autobiography, but half his career as Meat Loaf followed Bat II and richly deserves a spotlight :-)

Yep, definitely looking forward to reading this! On order. :-P

I'm looking forward to reading people's reviews! I'm sure I will buy the book, but would like to see what others make of it first.

For anyone following this, the Amazon 'look inside' feature now lets you browse through a good deal of the book. It doesn't seem much like a traditional biography, and indeed doesn't seem to go into much detail about anything. It skims over Meat's life and albums, but probably offers nothing that you don't already know. Still, if anyone reads the full thing do let us know what you think of it.