Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
The great Rock Opera, derided by some for its excess and supposed almost pantomime exuberance, adored by many for its clarity of enthusiasm, the energy and dynamic beauty that is unleashed, set free from the chains of regulated time keeping and enclosed lyrics. Whichever camp you fall into, love it or loathe it, there can be no denying that it brings out the very best in some and when a partnership that has endured on and off for almost 40 years as Meat Loaf’s and Jim Steinman’s, that best is almost statesmen like, godly, true and infectious.
Much has been made over the years of Meat Loaf’s musical output without Jim Steinman urging him on, a percentage of it has been alright, passable, placed on the stereo you would never kick it off in favour of a musician with less taste or talent; however, it is with Jim Steinman the man truly excels with and the ability that Meat Loaf can bring, the sheer sense of drama and performance that lives in the mind of both men is able to become fused, enlarged and full of meaning.
Braver Than We Are, a return to the Rock Opera so many love. The voice may have become strained in parts, the touch of the delicate replaced by the gruff and the gravel like, yet that gravelly tone is one that is actually granite, sturdy and monumental when it wants to be and throughout the album what comes hurtling across is that without each other, the two men are not quite shadows but they are phantom-like, they are two strident forces lost in the turn of the world.
In tracks such as Going All The Way, which features the absolute talent of both Ellen Foley and Karla DeVito, Loving You Is A Dirty Job (But Somebody’s Gotta Do It), Skull Of Your Country and the change in style that envelops the opening of Who Needs The Young, Meat Loaf flexes the gloom that shrouded the previous album and dispels it with the demeanour of a man knowing full well that the light that shines just in the distance is one that was actually created by his past, his genius and flair, you cannot but wish the pair had worked on every album together.
A return to form, no matter how long it lasts, is enough to celebrate the voice and song writing of a duo who should be venerated and lauded.
Ian D. Hall