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| re: Meat Loaf: The Musical | |
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pidunk 10:00 am UTC 09/05/07 |
| In reply to: | Meat Loaf: The Musical - Bright_Eyes 02:27 am UTC 09/04/07 |
> Recently I gave the bootlegs of the OTT/TDE shows a fresh > listen, and tried to form an opinion about the lead male > singer on them. Bear in mind, I was not at any of the > Joe's Pub or Mohegan shows so this impression is from > bootlegs only. > > I found myself imagining that there was a new Broadway > musical called "Meat Loaf: The Musical", and the singer on > the bootlegs was one of the guys who came in to audition > to be the Broadway version of Meat Loaf. This as a concept is a sparkling refreshment to the mind. I love it! If we think of Meat Loaf as a character, and the songs he performs as the character's evolution, then we have this kind of a presentation. There are so many vocalists trying to sound like Meat Loaf in the songs. But I have not heard these bootlegs, so I am making a generalized statement. It is a little bit strange that people would model their voices after his, though. No particular reason to do that. Nobody is clamoring to sound like Dionne Warwick to sing any of the songs she recorded which were written by Burt. >That's not to say > the singer really sounds a lot like Meat Loaf. It's more > that he's performing material I'd associate with Meat's > younger voice, but with a Broadway voice and a Broadway > style. I've heard some recordings which were easily mistakeable for Meat Loaf, and when I hear someone who is at another part of the performance style (Broadway is SOoooo NOT what BAT had evolved to, mainly because what one associates with Broadway music is easy listening kinds of music, not get up and rock kinds of music....not even Hair was really all that exciting....which was why Jim made that slogan for The Dream Engine poster, "Makes Hair look like Hello Dolly" If I am remembering this correctly...didn't look it up before typing...so a paraphrase then, if not.) Broadway styles are so formula within a certain kind of vein, because the Broadway tradition is so oriented to general audiences. Show tunes, and show performers, are just good for each other, and it is a certain kind of training, and a certain kind of sound, that I do not feel is right for the work that Jim has created, but this is not to say that Jim's works do not belong on Broadway. A new and better try at "Dance Of The Vampires" would be a nice thing to see, because the Preview version is soooooo much better than the final, and if they would have left it alone, this thing would have been great. Who to blame, does not matter now. But someone put alot of effort into dicing and slicing it better than any Ron Popeil gadget. Dark, yes, funny, yes, long, yes, it all can work, and work well, given the right support on it. But the only reason I ever thought of Meat as a Krolock is because he can get down to the sinister parts probably better than anyone else I've seen and rise up to be seductive all in the same scene. Without voice being the issue, what the material needs is dramatic versatility. > > That's neither praise nor criticism. Some really like the > singing style of Broadway singers, and some would much > prefer somebody who sounds more like Meat Loaf. I do like > listening to the singing of M.L.T.M., as I call him. But > both the sound of his voice and his style of singing are > very Broadway, much more so than most of the songs > themselves seem to be. I do not think that emulations of Meat Loaf are goals to reach, as the songs can be carried by any good male singer with the versatility to express. Broadway styles do lack some expression, and Meat as a younger singer must be a reference to his days with "More Than You Deserve" and "Rocky Horror" because it was not the same level as was reached in the "Bat Out Of Hell" album. In fact, the whole performance of "Hot Patootie" was really not a whole lot of the same excitement as he later cultivated in performance of "Paradise By The Dashboard Light", and "For Crying Out Loud". Meat developed and grew into a singer who could act, instead of an actor who could sing, and the difference is how much emphasis is placed into the importance of the song as a story vehicle. There are no male performers on Broadway who say to directors that they can sing....and so they can also act. Directors look for actors, who happen to be able to sing. There are a surprising number of male actors who can't sing. But still the priority is placed on the acting. What this ultimately means is that just because a man is on stage in a musical does not mean that he is there because his voice is great....it is a testament to the fact that he can carry a tune! > > I don't think he really has a "rock voice" and a "theater > voice", it's more like "theater voice #1" and "theater > voice #2". > > This obviously would create a division as to who would or > would not like his singing, as it seems to have done even > among Jim Steinman fans. But that isn't really saying > anything, because any voice will have some who like it and > some who don't. I've yet to find a singing voice that > pretty much everyone says they like. > > During the time I've read this board, I noticed that > M.L.T.M. got hyped up big time around the time that a > general dissatisfaction with Meat Loaf grew. I believe the > hyping up of M.L.T.M. was like a side effect of growing > dislike, for various reasons, of Meat Loaf. Yes, but they still seem to need the portion. I personally don't see Meat as the quintessential necessity either as Meat Loaf the Musical in emulation, or the man himself, because any singer of good dimension can carry the elements. I'm a little bit tired of the emphasis on Meat, tired and bored with the issues and the squables about Meat, and if someone takes a representation of him to some other extent, that would only perpetuate it further. I can't see how a replication would avoid old issues from cropping up. | |
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