One Person's Paradise: How Bat Out of Hell Became My Nemesis

by editor Michele Catalano

I probably would not have bought an album by a guy named Meat Loaf if not for two distinct pieces of information: He starred in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, a movie I spent many hours watching in the Mini Cinema in Uniondale, Long Island; and the album was produced by Todd Rundgren, an artist to whom I had dedicated a small altar in my house.

I bought Bat Out of Hell on a whim, thinking it would be novel to own an album by the big biker from Rocky Horror. If nothing else, it would be a conversation piece when Meat Loaf disappeared from the discourse. I did not expect it to be a very popular album. See, I was 15 and an expert on current music trends, like every 15-year-old out there. I knew just from the cover that it would fail. It was cheesy. Yet there I stood one Saturday afternoon, in the record department of Modell’s department store, with my $5.98—or whatever the price of an album was in 1977. I couldn’t pass up listening to something Todd had a part in. I’d put it in my shrine.

Wikipedia calls Bat Out of Hell “Wagnerian Rock,” as good a description as any for an album that is often indescribable. It’s part opera, part rock and roll, full on cheesiness. It’s majestic throughout, bombastic in places. It’s a roller coaster ride that has you screaming with delight, even when it dips a little. I was overwhelmed when I heard these songs on my stereo for the first time. The song “Bat Out of Hell” itself left me breathless. Most of the rest of the record had me hooting and hollering in my room. What a ride it was. This Meat Loaf guy was all right. Jim Steinman, who composed all the songs, was basically a genius. And Todd Rundgren squeezed every last ounce of sweat out of Mr. Loaf. I was drained by the end.

I listened to Bat Out of Hell a lot that fall, mostly on my own in my room, because my friends didn’t care for it. I remained enamored with it into the spring, when albums by Springsteen and The Rolling Stones came out. I eventually forgot about the album, until I was reminded of it in the bleakest manner possible.

Meat Loaf burst into my life again, completely against my wishes, at my sisters wedding in 1997. I was minding my own business, maybe a little drunk, watching old people attempt to dance to “Funkytown,” when that song ended and a very familiar guitar lick sounded throughout the catering hall. It was “Paradise By the Dashboard Light.”

I was just about to drag my sister out for a smoke when the strangest thing happened. As soon as the first note emitted from the speakers, a roar went up from the crowd and the dance floor was flooded with revelers. All the people who had been sitting on their asses for the great dance songs all night were suddenly lined up on the floor. Guys formed a line down one side; ladies did the same on the other side. It was reminiscent of a movie musical, in which everyone somehow knows all the words to the songs. Maybe I hadn’t been to enough weddings or bars lately, but I had no idea that “Paradise" had become a line dance/interactive favorite. It was the new Hokey Pokey!

Let me tell you, even with a couple of shots of tequila under my belt, and even with the giddiness that comes with complete exhaustion, there was no way I was loopy enough to join that crowd on the dance floor. No, I just stood back and watched as grown men and women—including town councilmen and judges and the president of the local Kiwanis—took turns singing the boy/girl parts and totally acting the part of lust-filled teenagers in a steamy car. One couple actually stood in the center of the two lines and acted out the whole Phil Rizzuto baseball play-by-play call. When my jaw dropped, a cousin, who realized I was stunned, told me that this went on at every wedding and in every bar, every night of the week on Long Island, and I needed to get out more. “No, no,” I told her, “I need to never leave the sanctity of my house again.”

My kid’s religious ed teacher did a sliding split into the middle of the dance floor, holding up her hand and singing, “STOP RIGHT THERE!” My uncle twirled his way beside her and responded with the “Let me sleep on it” verse. Then everyone did the whole back-and-forth thing. This went on until the very end of the song, when they all did some bizarre dance as they whispered, Glowing like a metal on the edge of a knife.

I thought I had been transported to the ninth level of hell and Satan himself was going to rise out of the dance floor. I was mortified for these people. I knew they were just having a good time. But I couldn’t get the image of the Town Supervisor on his knees, singing “Let me sleep on it” like he meant it.

From that point on, “Paradise” was my nemesis. I never wanted to hear it again. This went on for maybe twenty years. I cringed if I happened to catch even a note of it unexpectedly. I became known for my hatred of the song. I wrote long blog posts about it. I harbored resentment toward it. It became the bane of my existence.

That was more than 25 years ago, and I remember every little thing as if it happened only yesterday. But you’ll be happy to know that I eventually stopped cringing at the song. When I recently found a copy of it at Looney Tunes Records for $3.99, I immediately picked it up. I wanted to welcome songs like “All Revved Up” and “Bat Out of Hell” back into my life. But how would I feel upon hearing “Paradise” after all these years?

I let the album play out. I raised my fists during the title song. I got up and danced during “All Revved Up” and whispered along with “You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth.” When I got to “Paradise,” I waited for my reaction. I thought I would cringe.

It was gone. The visceral reaction I had to that song since 1995 was gone. It was no longer my enemy. The bad vibes had washed away. Sure, I still thought about that night at the wedding. I still have a perfect, detailed memory of every atrocity that transpired on that dance floor. But I look at it now from a different perspective: I can’t let a bunch of old people having a great time ruin a song for me.

I’m glad I picked up that used copy of Bat Out of Hell. I was happy to get reacquainted with it, to accept its songs back in my life, even “Paradise by the Dashboard Light.”

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