The live band Meat Loaf thought were better than Cream: “Undoubtedly”
Growing up in Detroit, music was all around Michael Lee Aday. He was desperate to be part of it all. But it would take a while before he was christened Meat Loaf and broke through as the beloved ‘Bat Out of Hell’ madman who was born, by his own admission, “bright red”.
While his crimson pallor may have subsided in time, he remained an atypical frontman. When he was 12, he was 157cm and 110kg, so when he stepped on the football coach’s foot and the coach yelled, “Get off my foot, you big hunk of meatloaf,” his new nickname stuck. He didn’t mind, Aday liked the outsider things in life.
In fact, it was the more individualistic artists, the ones who paired music with a profound sense of theatre, that he longed for during his frequent trips to the Grande Ballroom. In the hallowed walls of the beer-scented domain, he witnessed the great and the good week-in-week-out, searching for his own original angle.
He knew that if he was going to make it, it would have to be on his own terms. While his pipes and passion were impeccable, during this era in pop, he knew he couldn’t just imitate Robert Plant. But then came a local group quite clearly following their own muse, and having a ball in the process. In fact, they were even changing the world a bit, too.
“Undoubtedly one of the best live bands ever,” he said of his Detroit heroes. “The Grande Ballroom played host to all the visiting superstars like Cream, Hendrix, Janis Joplin, but the local superstars were MC5. They were brilliant. Along with Joe Cocker and Buffalo Springfield, MC5 are the band I saw the most times live.”
While Cocker had comparable blunderbuss vocals and Buffalo Springfield and sweet melodies, MC5 attracted Meat Loaf through pure performative energy. The original proto-punks kicked out the jams with poise and purpose and remained one of the greatest acts he had ever seen right up until the late clairvoyant singer passed away aged 74 back in 2022.
“I knew the guys really well and they were always great fun to watch,” he told Classic Rock. “They mixed politics with theatrics. Their manager, John Sinclair, was a member of the White Panthers and facing a heavy rap for possession of dope. The stage would be covered in American flags and they would have this preacher introduce them, and then it would be straight in: ‘Kick out the jams, motherfuckers!’”
That classic quip wasn’t just a statement of their showmanship either, because the track that followed was a riot that could match anything the major acts were throwing out when it came to rock ‘n’ roll catchiness too.
As Mr Loaf continued, “It was a cross between the James Brown revue and The Rolling Stones. LA didn’t get it, New York didn’t get it; it was a Detroit thing.”
In a marriage of rough and tumble with Motown ideals of melody, this purposeful band inspired a plethora of young onlookers no end, not all of them would’ve gone on to win a Grammy for their vocals, you can bet that just about all of them at least skateboarded down to their nearest polling station. Few bands can claim to have that impact while never surpassing a chart peak of 30th.
