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(More customer reviews)One can easily make the argument that Meat Loaf's career is intertwined with songwriter Jim Steinman. Meat Loaf has enjoyed his greatest success when he has teamed up with Steinman."Bat Out of Hell" and "Bat Out of Hell II: Back into Hell" are considered two of the all-time legendary albums. For all practical purposes, these albums are Rock Operas (or commonly referred to as Wagnerian Rock). The concepts for these two albums basically revolved around the thoughts and stories of a teenage and young adult male.One thing that really made the "Bat Out of Hell" albums special was the combination of Steinman's songwriting with Meat Loaf's powerful and passionate vocals. Both Meat and Steinman come from a theatrical background - and both Steinman's music and Meat's vocals are clearly a product of this background. I think its safe to say that Steinman provides the infrastructure for Meat to deliver these powerful vocals while Meat's vocals make Steinman's music come alive.It is this style of music that almost seems tailor-made for being heard live - and the collection "Live Around the World" gives Meat Loaf fans a chance to hear what this music sounds like in a live setting. Despite some minor quirks, this collection does not disappoint.
The content of the performances is of a high level. When I review a live album, I usually prefer the album to basically be a full recording of a concert. In other words, I prefer the tracks come a single night's performance and be arranged in the order that they were played in concert. I normally am not one for edited concerts or live compilations.In the case of Meat Loaf's "Live Around the World", the tracks are a mixed bag. This compilation is basically an anthology of Meat's greatest live performances from 1977 through 1996. Because this is the way this album has been put together, this album cannot be used as a gauge for the what a Meat Loaf concert really sounds like. However, the album does attempt job to arrange the songs to give a perception that this could be a Meat Loaf concert.The ordering of the songs is done well, but I can't say this is done perfectly. For example, while "Paradise By the Dashboard Light" is the last song on the first CD, I probably would have made it the last song overall.I do give the album credit for flowing one song into another nicely - creating the "illusion" that this is a live show. While I understand when putting this album together, bringing together an anthology of Meat's live performances seemed like a good idea - I think it would have been better to assemble a CD of one or two actual concerts (The Police's "Live" album basically did this). Yes these are quirks that do bother me about this collection, but it doesn't take away from the content - this is some really good stuff. Meat's performances live up to the high expectations I had for this collection.
As one would expect, most of the performances included on "Live Around the World" come from "Bat Out of Hell" and "Bat Out of Hell II". In fact, all seven songs from "Bat Out of Hell" are included on here. There are seven songs that are included from "Bat Out of Hell II". I am pleased that there are four songs beyond "Bat Out of Hell" that are included. These songs are "Dead Ringer for Love" (from "Dead Ringer"); "Midnight at the Lost and Found" (from "Midnight at the Lost and Found"), as well as "What You See is What You Get" and "Hot Patootie". The nice thing is that Meat shows that his career wasn't just limited to the "Bat Out of Hell" albums - he does a terrific job on these four songs. The one Meat Loaf song that isn't included on this collection is "Everything Louder than Everything Else". This is a terrific song in the true Steinman-Theatrical sense. This is especially disappointing since the prelude to that song, Steinman's spoken "Wasted Youth" is included on this collection.
As mentioned, the performances are incredible. You can hear Meat's passion on every song. Every song is truly a performance. Meat handles co-producing duties for this collection. While Steinman and Todd Rundgren were give a lot of credit for producing Meat in the past, Meat proves he can produce and deliver the product. I was very pleased the full 12 minute version of "I Would Do Anything for Love" kicks off the collection. "Paradise By the Dashboard Light" lives up to my live performance expectations. It is a much longer version than the studio version.Although Ellen Foley isn't doing the co-vocals, Patricia Russo does a great job as "girl". There is an extended dialogue at the end that really makes this a true performance. Russo handles the lion's share of the female lead vocals on this collection. The performance of "Dead Ringer" is very much up there as well - much thanks to Russo's lead vocals. Russo's performance even eclipses what Cher did on this song. Russo also does a great job on "I Would Do Anything for Love" on the vocal exchange that occurs at the end of the song.
One thing that does disappoint are the liner notes. The liner notes do list each of the tracks and the location from which each was recorded. The one thing that isn't included are the dates of the performances. I think for this particular style CD, it would have gone a long way to include the performance dates. As for the musician credits, I would have also liked to have seen each musician's credit listed aligned with each song - insread they are all listed in one place. Overall, if you are a Meat Loaf fan and crave for his level performances in a live setting - this is the CD to get. Highly recommended.
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