| My Review of Meat Loaf's New Las Vegas Show... (Some JS) (SPOILER ALERT) | |
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Posted by: |
John_Galt (brandon@brandonmartin.com) 06:05 pm UTC 03/16/14 |
| I went with my little brother to see Meat Loaf's new RockTellz and Cocktails show at the Planet Hollywood Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. It was Meat's best show in quite some time and worthy of a review. I've decided to write the review in the same lengthy, rambling style Meat used throughout the show. So... First in preface, let me just say that I sat at a table right next to Meat Loaf's daughter, Amanda, and her husband, who is a guitarist in Anthrax. She loves her Dad and watching her watch her father was no small part of what made the evening memorable. Second and also in preface, I sat just behind a man who was a complete dead ringer -- not for love -- but for Adolf Hitler. Except for the odd 1950s style suit, this guy could have been Hitler, same hair, same mustache, same facial structure. As far as I could tell, he came by himself -- not shocking really if you think about it -- and danced with genuine enthusiasm through most of the show. It was a little distracting and I caught myself staring more than once. Seemed like a nice enough guy. Perhaps, he just has an unfortunate sense of style. Finally, let me note in preface that this is the most "creative" work that I've seen from Meat Loaf. If you like Meat's personality blended in with your Steinman songs then this show is for you, and Meat's voice and the audio mixing was better than I've heard it in years. But, If you don't like Meat's personality, or you don't like Meat Loaf, this concert would have been the equivalent of ... I don't know... being the subject of Sam Kinison's lepper sex joke. Not pleasant. We walked in a little late despite valiant efforts to make it there on time. As we walked in, Meat was finishing Dead Ringer, I think. Then, and I'm not sure how to describe this, Meat took on the character of a blue collar, aging, Texas oilman (an oilman because he worked in a gas station) who was given free food and lodging to introduce Meat Loaf. This went on for a long, long time. Much of the monologue centered around Vegas and in the background while he spoke there were jugglers, scantily clad women/dancers, and clowns. Meat is going on 70 years old -- he mentioned he was 66 at least a half a dozen times during the show -- but, he has no concern with the idea that dropping f-bombs or acting like a dirty old man on stage is unbecoming of someone his age. There were two parts of the lengthy preamble that really made me laugh in shock. The first involved him going up to two middle-aged-to-elderly women in the front row, revealing to them the seat of his pants, and giving them the opportunity to squeeze his butt cheeks, after which they promptly stood up, reached out, and squeezed. The second involved a rather artsy display of a female clown on stilts blowing bubbles. Meat goes up to the clown and makes a little small talk and then, with pregnant pause says, "You look like you're wearing fuck me shoes today." This is, of course, the type of line that could only work for a rock star, but it was particularly odd because the clown on stilts did not have shoes on, at all. They were sort of metal stilt endings. I tried to stop my mind from following the implications, but it didn't help when the clown started to simulate felatio with her bubble blower. He then performed a pretty elaborate version of "Hot Patootie," a song I never really loved from a musical I never liked, but he nailed it and so did the band, and, well, the dancers made it worth including. The rest of the night included Steinman-songs exclusively. The ones I remember as particularly good renditions were Out of the Frying Pan, All Revved Up, You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth, and Bat Out of Hell (the Finale). His vocals on Bat were stronger than you'd expect and the version of All Revved Up surprised me, as well. He also performed Paradise By the Dashboard Light, but even though i don't mind Meat's show of a little "personality," he talked a lot and acted a lot through the song. The conclusion involves him insulting the girl a la Winston Churchill in response to her making a comment about his being overweight (something like "I can lose ten pounds in a week, but you my dear will always be ugly") and then her dropping an F-bomb inches from his face. The song gets lost in all this and the girl is only so-so on my admittedly very picky scale of attractiveness for women. And, of course, he played I Would Do Anything for Love, but used a very different, less distinctive arrangement for the intro. It sounded more "adult contemporary." People didn't seem to mind, but I thought it was probably an example of taking that bit about "if it ain't broke, break it" a little too literally. Still, aside from changes to the arrangement, his performance was great. Meat is apparently an Apple iOS fan -- like Rush Limbaugh, I suppose. He grabbed an iPad and used it for a biographical presentation that was... wait for it... actually really good. He showed pictures of his parents, grandparent, daughters, children. And, used self-deprecating humor that was endearing rather than clownish. During this 10 to 15 minute stretch of the show, he didn't try out any southern accents, delve into irrelevant tangents, or try out unfunny and pointless jokes. Sure, there were some things he said and I didn't know whether they were true or not. He talked about his relatively new wife and said that he took her last name so that it would be easier. He concluded by showing a photo of a young and shapely Susan Sarandon on the Rock Horror Picture Show set in her bra and then he dropped her name by saying that she'd just sent him an email last week. Probably the weakest part of the monologue as it seemed Hollywood whereas the rest was personal and revealed Meat as a kind of regular Joe. For what it's worth, I liked the "coach Meat" photos in which he showed the various kids he coached on various baseball / softball teams. You'd think from this show that he was more proud of that coaching than most of the non-Steinman-penned albums he's released... and that sort of makes sense. All in all, it was touching, personal, and Meat at his best. Many of you may be wondering, "Did Meat try to explain the songs or claim he wrote them or that they were about him?" No. Absolutely not. In fact, one of the oddest things about the show is that he let the songs speak for themselves. The only exception is that he felt like he needed to explain the "that" in "I Would Do Anything for Love" as he's done before. In doing so, he mentioned that Jimmy was aware that not everyone would "get" the song. In fact, if technology and interest would have permitted it, Jim Steinman would have been a member of the Jim Steinman and Meat Loaf band last night. A piano intro to Bat Out of Hell was played on a huge large screen monitor by a much younger Jim Steinman. Likewise, comments about the songs came from Jim in the form of snippets of a recorded interview -- I think circa the Bat II Michael Bay videos -- but at any rate, Jim was wearing the silver mirrored sunglasses in most of the snippets. For instance, Paradise By the Dashboard Light was introduced by Steinman talking about Ellen Foley having to have her stomach-lining massaged by Meat's tongue every night. The crowd freaking loved it and laughter ensued. Meat was good on Q&A. Last night's version of "How I got the name 'Meat Loaf'..." seemed truer and more sincere than most. But, a couple of drunk folks sort of shouted and heckled a bit during the Q&A. The place was packed, but it's still Vegas, you know. And remember, Meat is not talking about the origin of the songs, at all, so he's just talking about himself and he's sometimes a bit dismissive or funny (but not really) about questions people actually want answers to. He mentioned Jim only once in a story about meeting Phil Russuto before recording the play-by-play for Paradise. Phil: "Is this the type of record that young people have to take drugs in order to listen to." Jim: "It's probably best if they don't take drugs." Heckler-guy sitting near me: "Why not?" Meat: "You belong at a Grateful Dead concert." I liked the Q&A, but it was less personal and informative than the iPad presentation that came before and therefore didn't impact, as well. I'm going to close with a part of the show that I'm just not sure what to think about. And, I'll be honest here, had I produced this show it would have been Meat doing lush acoustic arrangements of Steinman songs without the Vegas-feel and the pyrotechnics and the scantily-clad women and the sex jokes. He's not too old to be a rock 'n' roll hero -- he would have been too old in the 1970s, but today he's actually not too hold for the part particularly if we're talking about top touring acts -- but he he might be too old to share the stage with dancing chicks in bikinis who are paid to look at him as if they'd do anything... anything at all. But, I digress, as Meat Loaf himself is wont to do... So, I'm sitting down and Amanda starts standing and others do, so I have to, as well. Now, I don't mind standing and dancing like a Steinmaniac at a concert, but I like listening to the music, too. Steinman's music is a dream engine of sorts for me and at many times when my life begins to seem to stale or being apathetic becomes a habit, a binge of Steinman tunes can wake me up to the reality of adventurous possibilities. Besides, Meat was already spitting all over us and standing wasn't going to help. (I think he was using something to stimulate saliva because of the dry desert climate and his voice, but my brother's comment on Facebook was as follows: "Just took a warm bath in the restorative sweat and spittle of Meat Loaf. Next time I bring a poncho...") But, I digress as Meat Loaf so often does... So, I stand up along with Amanda and my brother. As I'm doing so, I look down to make sure I don't knock over the beer bottle that Meat handed-out to the girl next to me from the stage -- a very trusting move on his part -- and when I look up, Meat is standing in front of me with a giant prosthetic penis in a broken condom preparing to shoot a wad of cum into my face. Now, let me be clear, this was not what I bargained for... now, thankfully for me, Meat's penis-canon is particularly strong and viral and was built to shoot quite a ways into the audience beyond me. It probably would have been a little too intense to take a wad shot into the second row... but, that's when Meat went a little insane. He runs over and stands directly in front of the Hitler-clone. And, you can see the look on Meat's face, you can see the look in Meat's eyes, there's a real chance here that even though it could hurt the Hitler impersonator and it's too close-range, Meat may very well score a hit for the ages and, in an ultimate sign of disrespect, shoot a wad of cum into Hitler's face. He stands there deciding for a few seconds, looks at his daughter and her husband, and then decides to keep it in his pants, after all. He continues with the rest of the show, but I think we all felt this sense of historical justice was missed. Nevertheless, I want to emphasize something: I had a great time and others in the audience did, too. In the past, I've been a little critical of how Meat's live shows are mixed -- sometimes the sound is muddy and that's not the way to hear Steinman songs live -- but, the sound was better and the venue was great and the jokes weren't all that bad :-). Like I said, I think some aspects of the show are not age-appropriate and are beneath the dignity of a man Meat's age, but then, again, I think people go to a Meat Loaf concert for a lot of things and dignity isn't probably too high on the list. The vast majority of the audience loved it and this was one heck of a Vegas show. Congratulations to Meat Loaf on a creative achievement. Great job! | |
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