Who sang the female backing vocals on Meat Loaf song ‘I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)’?
By the late 1980s, Meat Loaf’s commercial fortunes were starting to feel like a distant memory.
Having floated around the music scene since the late 1960s, nearly gleaning fame in the decade’s febrile Detroit scene and briefly signed to Motown, the fateful crossing paths with theatrical songwriter Jim Steinman would yield a confounding match made in heaven. Through development hell and label anxiety, the pair’s Bat Out of Hell record, dropped in October 1977, would eventually begin selling by the bucketloads after Meat Loaf’s performance on BBC’s The Old Grey Whistle Test, standing to this day as the ninth-biggest selling album of all time.
Yet, the following decade would pale in comparison. While maintaining a steady presence in the charts across both sides of the Atlantic, and propped up by the ever loyal UK fanbase, legal wranglings and song disputes with his former Steinman, Meat Loaf’s career hit rocky waters by the 1980s’ close. With Steinman’s output too waning, the pair set aside their difference to resurrect the Bat for another roll of the rock and roll dice.
A sequel to their blockbuster debut had been in the works as far back as 1978, with a bunch of songs eventually recorded for Steinman’s solo Bad for Good and the Pandora’s Box group. Dusting off the numbers for the much-awaited record among fans, Meat Loaf shocked the industry once again after much of the press had written off their relevancy, dropping Bat Out of Hell II: Back into Hell in September 1993 and scoring a UK and US album number one. Dollar signs were in the duo’s eyes.
While Steinman insisted their comeback was an “extension” of the Bat world, Meat Loaf curtly told the press at the time the title was decided upon “’cos that would help it sell shitloads”.
That it did. Selling over 14 million copies, the Bat sequel was pushed by the glossy power ballad ‘I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)’ the previous month. An epic, piano-thumping monster that topped the charts all over the world, the Wagnerian rock opera revived both Meat Loaf and Steinman’s careers, standing as the pair’s defining song, and was helped by Michael Bay’s flashy Beauty and the Beast promo.
Meat Loaf was back, but longtime fans and newcomers alike couldn’t help notice the backing vocals that raised the number’s billowing drama on the Billboard behemoth.
So who sang the backing vocals?
Hailing from England’s Newcastle, singer Lorraine Crosby had been touring regularly throughout the 1980s as part of a cabaret act for US and British servicemen.
After meeting partner and songwriter collaborator Stuart Emerson, Crosby sent Steinman some demos of the work they’d cut together, impressing him enough that they were soon pulled to the States and secured a deal with Meat Loaf’s label, MCA.
‘I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)’s backing vocal parts were initially mooted for either Melissa Etheridge, Bonnie Tyler, or Cher. While visiting MCA’s Sunset Boulevard studios, Crosby was asked to lay down scratch vocals intended as a guide for the real thing later on.
“In I went and sang it twice, and I never thought anything more of it until six months later when I got a phone call saying, ‘Would you mind if we used your vocals?’” Crosby recalled to the Sunday Sun in 2003.
The team had decided to keep Crosby’s recordings in the final mix, yet, as her sessions were under the guide track remit, no credit was given nor any payment save the obligatory PRS royalties. While lending supporting vocals to several other of the record’s numbers, model Dana Patrick was cast as the female voice in Bay’s video, and Meat Loaf doubled up all promotional and live appearances with regular duetting partner Patti Russo.
No hard feelings were had, however. Moving back to the Tyneside area, Meat Loaf invited Crosby on stage during his date at the local Whitley Bay Ice Rink during the Bat Out of Hell II: Back Into Hell Tour for a special live rendition of their ‘I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)’ as it was heard on record.
