THAT'S NOT WHAT MEAT LOAF SAID... :

In the summer of 2019, my daughter, Hannah, spent a few days helping her grandmother and aunt run a retail/merchandise booth at the Raleigh Supercon.

When I dropped her off, I handed her an original vinyl copy of “Bat Out Of Hell.”

Meat Loaf was one of the many guests at that year’s convention and was available for autographs, photos, etc — for a fee, or course.

I wanted him to sign the cover of the record. But, I had a special request.

Hannah's mother hates Meat Loaf.

And her degree of distaste for his music has become a running joke amongst our family and a group of our friends.

So, Hannah was instructed to ask Meat Loaf to sign the album this way — “To Nathan. I’m sorry your Hannah's mother has SHITTY taste in music.”

My daughter walked up to the singer, handed over the album, told him it was for her dad and read those words off her phone to him.

Much to her amazement, Meat Loaf took her phone right out of her hand and started typing.

A few seconds later, this message popped up on my phone.

“Tell your mom she is just lazy. Yes, it requires work to understand our music. Smarten up, beautiful!”

Stunned, I showed the text to my Hannah's mother.

“You told Meat Loaf I didn’t like him?,” she sent in a text to Hannah.

“Sorry,” Hannah replied.

“No you’re not. I just have good taste,” she responded.

“That’s not what Meat Loaf said,” Hannah said.

I still have screenshots of those texts on my phone. I went back and read those messages again on Jan, 20, 2022 after hearing the news that Meat Loaf had passed away at the age of 74.

They made me smile.

Just like his music always did.

Meat Loaf — aka Michael Lee Aday — was an original, a character whose creation couldn’t have been concocted by the most clever of authors or Hollywood agents.

His voice was distinctive and his acting career, which included roles in memorable movies like “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” and “Fight Club,” - and less-than-memorable ones, like "To Catch a Yeti," - made him a familiar figure to millions of more people.

Meat Loaf’s music, of course, doesn’t appeal to everyone.

And he knew that.

“People either hate ‘Bat Out Of Hell,’ or absolutely worship it,” Meat Loaf said in a 1999 documentary about the classic album.

There has been much more love than hate.

“Bat Out Of Hell,” which was released in 1977 and featured songs written by Jim Steinman, is one of the best-selling albums of all-time with an estimated 43 millions copies sold worldwide.

It’s an indescribable collection of broadway-inspired rock n roll rebellion, wrapped in operatic opulence with plenty of teenage lust and even a fatal motorcycle wreck thrown in too.

It’s ridiculous in so many ways.

And yet, so perfect.

Almost five decades later, songs like “Paradise By The Dashboard Light,” You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth” and “Two Out Of Three Ain’t Bad” are still heard on the radio every day.

Meat Loaf fell out of the spotlight after the success of “Bat Out Of Hell,” and the singer suffered from a nervous breakdown.

He returned triumphantly — and most unexpectedly — in 1993 with “Bat Out Of Hell II: Back Into Hell.”

That album would give him the biggest hit of his career, “I Would Do Anything For Love, (But I Won’t Do That),” and introduced him to a whole new generation of fans.

Like me.

When I went off to college a few years later, “Bat Out Of Hell” was almost constantly in my car’s CD player.

The cover of that iconic album now hangs on the wall at my house.

Meat Loaf, unfortunately, didn’t sign it in the humorous manner which I had asked — or paid him $40 — to do.

He simply wrote, “To Nathan, ‘Rockin’ — Meat Loaf.”