BAT Live the official Meat Loaf tribute UK dates

[nightinr]

What do the band members do for money these days?

[ThatWriterGuy]

Originally Posted by nightinr

What do the band members do for money these days?

Favors for sailors, mostly.

I mean, that's just what I heard.

Trusted source, an' all.

[Jayd]

Originally Posted by AndrewG

"Karaoke theatre" Literally tonight:



People have every right to compare these tribute acts, fully endorsed or not.

With the amount of dates Steve Steinman is playing I'd say the fully endorsed act has some catching up to do if they want to be as popular in the UK.

If you put yourself out there you can expect to be criticised and compared to the original artist even if you are just attempting to perform these songs, it's inevitable.

I'll leave judgement of the performance till I see it but a lot of stuff I've seen and heard so far just doesn't impress me the way they are going about it.

Look at the revved up single artwork. It's just strange and seems more like what I expect Paul Crook likes rather than it fitting in with Steinman and Meat's music:



Even the cover of the album (IF that what it is) seems self indulgent, very lazy and not even well put together. There is something quite off about Randy in front of the girl.




Are you telling me the "karaoke theatre" tribute artwork is "less Meat Loaf" simply because it isn't endorsed by Meat?

Get real.

These band members played with Meat for 20 years, some less, some more, they know what Meat wanted in a show, how he wanted it done and how he wanted the audience to feel. I put more trust in these guys than a tribute act, although I must say successful one, but these guys knew Meat inside and out. I went to a Steve Steinman show back in Manchester over 10 years ago, before he started the Vampires Rock stuff and I wasn’t all impressed, as I said “karaoke theatre”. I went to see The Neverland Express back in February in Red Bank, NJ and it was a great night, the only think to let it down was The Vogel at Count Basie Theater, which wasn’t great for sound!!!

[letsgotoofar]

If Steve can sell a show as Steve Murray, without trading on the names and works of Jim, Meat, and their franchise, I'll be happy to watch it.

[AndrewG]

Originally Posted by letsgotoofar

If Steve can sell a show as Steve Murray, without trading on the names and works of Jim, Meat, and their franchise, I'll be happy to watch it.

You'd probably be the only person in the audience if he did that.



Creating a brand with completely original music isn't so easily done and making lightning strike near impossible, especially in this day.

There are a few outliers but even then they quickly get accused of plagiarism these days.

More often than none will you see bands, artists, musicals, movies created from an existing idea and expanding on it. Even then if you only consider original music such as Jim Steinman you can quickly find heavily inspired threads which I'm sure would be too much for some purists to consider original. See the use of the E Street Band members on Bat etc.

Are the likes of tribute bands for everyone? Nope, sure as hell not.
Can people have a great night, yes absolutely and this is better than sitting at home and worrying about who "has the right" to perform certain music and who hasn't.

[rockfenris2005]

Apologies for my not posting much these days, but I saw this and had to say something.

I get why people think that, but that hasn't stopped us from trying. We just put out the cast album of our musical my friend and I have been working on for the past 10 years, and it's not even based on a famous story or anything. OK, it was inspired by Beauty and the Beast and Phantom of the Opera, which does make it relatable for an audience, but we have completely tried to put something out from the ground up. I actually know now how Meat Loaf and Jim must have felt when they were putting out "Bat out of Hell".

The thing that drives me crazy the most is all these people saying that there isn't any good music anymore, there isn't any Rolling Stones, Beatles, Queen, Pink Floyd, Meat Loaf, Jim, Elton John, Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen. These artists (and rightly so) are put on a massive pedestal but where it's almost impossible with some people for a new artist to have any kind of relevant voice. But you switch on the radio and they play stuff like One Direction, Justin Bieber, Shawn, and I really just don't get that kind of music, as much as I wanted to. And "Night Changes" is actually the best pop song I've heard since the Backstreet Boys, but even that's nearly 10 years ago now.

But hey, I believe in this stuff that we're doing, and we and probably thousands of other artists are out here trying to put our stuff out while we try to make a living at other stuff, because it's so hard to make money now. After four years, I've almost made five dollars off these singles. I am proud of that, as much as my award 11 years ago, because we put it out and made money. It just drives me crazy because I wish I could tell those people who are sad about the state of music now that hey, maybe we can be there. Maybe! Very frustrating experience, and sort of like everything is moving in sloooooow motion.

[eltmatt]

Originally Posted by nightinr

Anything above £20 seems ludricous for this tour

Most tributes in Theatres are at least £26 + booking fees these days, plus they've got to travel from the states etc. The costs involved in putting a show on are huge (I work in Theatres).

I saw the Meat Loaf by Candlelight at Durham Cathedral and that was over £30 I think.

[eltmatt]

Originally Posted by AndrewG

Starting to regret buying a ticket for one of the UK shows a bit, it seems more like a Paul Crook show than anything else. Maybe going to a Steve Steinman show would be a safer bet. At least he has Lorraine Crosby.

Oh God, have you heard him try and sing

This is far better, world class musicians playing the songs how Meat presented them with a world class singer, not cheap gags between songs.

[AndrewG]

Originally Posted by eltmatt

Oh God, have you heard him try and sing

This is far better, world class musicians playing the songs how Meat presented them with a world class singer, not cheap gags between songs.

Even if the world is exactly how you describe it, which I refuse to believe as I've seen Steve Steinman a few times and he can certainly entertain a crowd, no one but the hardcore fans or those by chance looking at what is coming to their local theatre would know going by the absolute lack of even a single mention of these shows coming to the UK on Meat's official FB page etc.



This reeks of something similar to the UB40 split mess. In the end the fans will just go to what they have heard of before and at the moment in the UK that is Steve Steinman and not Celebrating Meat Loaf / Bat The show.

[eltmatt]

What has Meat's paged posted recently like? I can't see as he blocked me haha.

[stretch37]

Originally Posted by AndrewG

He may be on the album, but I highly doubt Steve Buslowe will play a single date, but we will see.

As for the Paul show, maybe it's a harsh criticism but I doubt the band would exist without him.

I'll let you in on something: the others just don't seem as passionate. This was quite evident backstage at Manchester 2013 to be honest. It was great speaking to Paul about Meat possibly coming back for another London and Manchester show and he was super enthusiastic about Braver Than We Are - the song (which I do agree sounds great considering all things). But I just didn't get a vibe others were bothered about more shows and saw it mostly just as work. Even Patti for that matter who wasn't fired yet at that point.

Paul constantly talking about Meat, even now, as his boss, is something I do very much appreciate.

Honestly, this much has been evident for some time. Still, it's the most authentic band. It's everyone except Meat. I'll reserve judgement until I hear the full album.

[AndrewG]

Originally Posted by eltmatt

What has Meat's paged posted recently like? I can't see as he blocked me haha.

His FB page? His wife talking about Thanksgiving is the last I saw.

I don't mind this but there doesn't seem to be any talk about Meat's successes.

We all know there were many. It just seems such a waste this isn't celebrated "officially" anywhere.

Even a simple website such as what Janis Joplin has would be better than that forgotten .net mess.

It makes me furious knowing how many talented people could whip something like that up in no time and probably do it for free too. But then why should anyone do it for free. I'm guessing SOMEONE is still receiving royalties from the recordings right?

[nightinr]

Who is actually controlling Meat's facebook account?

[rockfenris2005]

Originally Posted by AndrewG

His FB page? His wife talking about Thanksgiving is the last I saw.

I don't mind this but there doesn't seem to be any talk about Meat's successes.

We all know there were many. It just seems such a waste this isn't celebrated "officially" anywhere.

Even a simple website such as what Janis Joplin has would be better than that forgotten .net mess.

It makes me furious knowing how many talented people could whip something like that up in no time and probably do it for free too. But then why should anyone do it for free. I'm guessing SOMEONE is still receiving royalties from the recordings right?

I'm going to go down this rabbit hole then, but what about a 45th anniversary box set for Bat out of Hell? With demos, all the live concerts released at the time, given a state of the art remaster along with the original album? What about Dead Ringer or Jim's Bad for Good? There's so much potential here. The record companies handling Bat 2 and Neighbourhood have always been very good, so I'm almost going to expect something there, what with the Bat 2 30th coming up next year.

There's still loads of stuff they could do with Bad Attitude and Blind Before I Stop that they haven't even done the first time. What about all those single B sides and remixes?

Or have we passed the point for box sets in physical media now? Wait, physical media? Is the most we can expect is Joseph's amazing Technicolor dreamcoat of Bat being issued in seven different coloured vinyls with no extra features at all? No CD, just that?

All I want to see is this music being celebrated. Even a compilation, which almost sounds amazing in hindsight compared to ten years ago when the record companies kept putting them out every other month.

[2jaxx]

For my taste, Steve Steinman takes too many liberties. He replaced a lot of the "golden notes" and phrasings from the original recordings and does his own thing. Fair enough. Caleb on the other hands stays very close to the recordings. There's still room for adapting a few of Meat's live mannerisms, I think. Or he makes the songs his own, but please, not the way Steve Steinman does. In my opinion, many of those liberties he takes are not very tasteful.

[AndrewG]

Originally Posted by 2jaxx

For my taste, Steve Steinman takes too many liberties. He replaced a lot of the "golden notes" and phrasings from the original recordings and does his own thing. Fair enough. Caleb on the other hands stays very close to the recordings. There's still room for adapting a few of Meat's live mannerisms, I think. Or he makes the songs his own, but please, not the way Steve Steinman does. In my opinion, many of those liberties he takes are not very tasteful.

Agreed, I've seen/heard several tribute artists do this and that sort of stuff is a shame.