Meat Loaf rocks Newmarket On the 16th August I went to Newmarket racecourse with my ten year old son and a number of friends. Watching the horse racing, or betting on it, wasn’t the purpose of the visit – instead the trip into Cambridgeshire was undertaken in order to see a living legend of the rock’n’roll world – the larger than life “Meat Loaf”.
The trip was organised by my good friend Michael Costantini and my lad and I are extremely grateful to him for thinking of us.
The event heralded a few firsts because my son had never been to a gig before and, I, despite attending hundreds of gigs over the last few decades, had never seen Mister Loaf perform. In addition I had never been to a racecourse (well of the horsey variety anyway), experienced the sights and sounds of a race meeting or actually seen race horses galloping by from such close quarters. Finally I have never been to a rock gig that had a dress code excluding blue jeans, trainers, and tee shirts (the staple wardrobe of any self-respecting gig-going rocker).
At Newmarket the horse racing was the primary event and the gig was in effect the day’s cabaret performance. As such one’s personal attire was governed by the dress code rules for the racecourse and further compounded by the requirements of the premier/VIP enclosure that our tickets entitled us to access.
Much of the clothing on show from males and females alike was expensive, often brightly (occasionally garishly) coloured, sometimes very business-like and in many instances - inappropriate for a night of jubilant dancing and singing. I saw fellas wearing suits made of bizarre cloth, or ladies dressed up like they were going to a film premiere – to be frank there was a whiff of catwalk mixed with a soupcon of narcissism and a tablespoon of attention seeking.
The gig stage basically faced the finishing line of the course and given that you need to have premier tickets to get into that area, those turning up to listen to Meatloaf were required to meet the minimum attire standards considered fitting for ‘premier’ (or perhaps more fittingly, wealthy or posh) people. I don’t suit the preceding labels and will freely admit that I have never been to a gig in a collared shirt and wearing brogues. What’s more, I don’t expect to repeat the experience in the near future.
Attire requirements aside, the scene was set for a good night because the weather was glorious (and let’s face it, that makes a massive difference for an outdoor gig) and it was to be preceded by some entertaining people watching.
The Costantini party arrived around 5:30pm following a challenging journey up from St Albans in Friday afternoon traffic. The road trip was much improved by good conversation punctuated with signing along to the Meat Loaf CD in Mike’s Ford Galaxy. After some expensively (exorbitant might be a better adjective) priced fast food, we adjourned to the VIP enclosure to wait for Meat Loaf to take to the stage.
The kids, plural, because Mike brought his two eldest boys along were struggling with boredom during the wait but at around 8:00pm when the gig kicked-off and the serious fun began, the kids were as engaged as the adults.
Over the next two hours Meat, renowned as a showman, performed with gusto and commitment. He belted out many of his most popular numbers including ‘Bat out of hell’, ‘Dead ringer for love’,’ I’d do anything for love’, ‘You took the words right out of my mouth’,’ Two out of three ain’t bad’ etc.
I danced and sang along to all these tunes but was delighted when Meat sang my favourite tune ‘Paradise by the dashboard light’. Years ago I learnt the words to this song, across all eight and a half minutes of it and have never forgotten them. In my opinion this song is Meat Loaf’s equivalent of Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody for pure singalongability (I made that word up). I sang along loudly, and admittedly badly, but really enjoyed myself.
The show had a passionate, lusty undercurrent and Meat, despite his age managed to flirt with his female backing singers in a way that was vaguely convincing and that suited his rock-God status. His younger backing singer, whose name I really should remember (28, beautiful, slim, big-boobed, peroxide blond, occasionally dressed in leather basque, short leather skirt and hold-up fishnet stockings) was hot, admittedly in a clichéd kind of way, but just right for the show.
On the subject of sexual suggestion, at one point towards the end of the gig, Meat and his ‘girls’ came on to the stage holding what looked like enormous dildos. These proved to be compressed air canons that were loaded with tightly rolled white tee shirts (honestly the tee shirts looked like big tampons) that were fired into the audience. Bizarre but amusing! Fortunately the kids were unaware of the connotations and no difficult questions were asked.
Meat Loaf, is getting on a bit, he’s a pensioner and is not in the greatest of health; in fact a number of gigs on this tour have been cancelled due to his health problems and at times at Newmarket he looked tired and slightly doddery. The ‘Last Bat Tour’ has been positioned as his last and it may well be (although of course that may prove to be nonsense). His voice wasn’t perfect all of the time - he hit a few duff notes and sang out of tune on occasion. Having stated that; he had enough energy to get to the end of the set and even perform an encore too.
During the set, Meat said to the audience that he expected people to love or loathe the concert and that indifference was unacceptable - in my opinion Meat rocked and I am bloody delighted that I got a chance to experience a Meat Loaf concert before the hero retires.
By the end of the evening, and perhaps fittingly, my voice was as hoarse as the equine surroundings.
Getting out of the course car park after the concert proved to be a challenge of similar duration to the gig itself but, like the trip up, it was made more bearable thanks to the CD based encore. If Meat Loaf hit some duff notes you should have heard the caterwauling from the Costantini party bus.
Mike – thanks again, you rock too.
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The trip was organised by my good friend Michael Costantini and my lad and I are extremely grateful to him for thinking of us.
The event heralded a few firsts because my son had never been to a gig before and, I, despite attending hundreds of gigs over the last few decades, had never seen Mister Loaf perform. In addition I had never been to a racecourse (well of the horsey variety anyway), experienced the sights and sounds of a race meeting or actually seen race horses galloping by from such close quarters. Finally I have never been to a rock gig that had a dress code excluding blue jeans, trainers, and tee shirts (the staple wardrobe of any self-respecting gig-going rocker).
At Newmarket the horse racing was the primary event and the gig was in effect the day’s cabaret performance. As such one’s personal attire was governed by the dress code rules for the racecourse and further compounded by the requirements of the premier/VIP enclosure that our tickets entitled us to access.
Much of the clothing on show from males and females alike was expensive, often brightly (occasionally garishly) coloured, sometimes very business-like and in many instances - inappropriate for a night of jubilant dancing and singing. I saw fellas wearing suits made of bizarre cloth, or ladies dressed up like they were going to a film premiere – to be frank there was a whiff of catwalk mixed with a soupcon of narcissism and a tablespoon of attention seeking.
The gig stage basically faced the finishing line of the course and given that you need to have premier tickets to get into that area, those turning up to listen to Meatloaf were required to meet the minimum attire standards considered fitting for ‘premier’ (or perhaps more fittingly, wealthy or posh) people. I don’t suit the preceding labels and will freely admit that I have never been to a gig in a collared shirt and wearing brogues. What’s more, I don’t expect to repeat the experience in the near future.
Attire requirements aside, the scene was set for a good night because the weather was glorious (and let’s face it, that makes a massive difference for an outdoor gig) and it was to be preceded by some entertaining people watching.
The Costantini party arrived around 5:30pm following a challenging journey up from St Albans in Friday afternoon traffic. The road trip was much improved by good conversation punctuated with signing along to the Meat Loaf CD in Mike’s Ford Galaxy. After some expensively (exorbitant might be a better adjective) priced fast food, we adjourned to the VIP enclosure to wait for Meat Loaf to take to the stage.
The kids, plural, because Mike brought his two eldest boys along were struggling with boredom during the wait but at around 8:00pm when the gig kicked-off and the serious fun began, the kids were as engaged as the adults.
Over the next two hours Meat, renowned as a showman, performed with gusto and commitment. He belted out many of his most popular numbers including ‘Bat out of hell’, ‘Dead ringer for love’,’ I’d do anything for love’, ‘You took the words right out of my mouth’,’ Two out of three ain’t bad’ etc.
I danced and sang along to all these tunes but was delighted when Meat sang my favourite tune ‘Paradise by the dashboard light’. Years ago I learnt the words to this song, across all eight and a half minutes of it and have never forgotten them. In my opinion this song is Meat Loaf’s equivalent of Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody for pure singalongability (I made that word up). I sang along loudly, and admittedly badly, but really enjoyed myself.
The show had a passionate, lusty undercurrent and Meat, despite his age managed to flirt with his female backing singers in a way that was vaguely convincing and that suited his rock-God status. His younger backing singer, whose name I really should remember (28, beautiful, slim, big-boobed, peroxide blond, occasionally dressed in leather basque, short leather skirt and hold-up fishnet stockings) was hot, admittedly in a clichéd kind of way, but just right for the show.
On the subject of sexual suggestion, at one point towards the end of the gig, Meat and his ‘girls’ came on to the stage holding what looked like enormous dildos. These proved to be compressed air canons that were loaded with tightly rolled white tee shirts (honestly the tee shirts looked like big tampons) that were fired into the audience. Bizarre but amusing! Fortunately the kids were unaware of the connotations and no difficult questions were asked.
Meat Loaf, is getting on a bit, he’s a pensioner and is not in the greatest of health; in fact a number of gigs on this tour have been cancelled due to his health problems and at times at Newmarket he looked tired and slightly doddery. The ‘Last Bat Tour’ has been positioned as his last and it may well be (although of course that may prove to be nonsense). His voice wasn’t perfect all of the time - he hit a few duff notes and sang out of tune on occasion. Having stated that; he had enough energy to get to the end of the set and even perform an encore too.
During the set, Meat said to the audience that he expected people to love or loathe the concert and that indifference was unacceptable - in my opinion Meat rocked and I am bloody delighted that I got a chance to experience a Meat Loaf concert before the hero retires.
By the end of the evening, and perhaps fittingly, my voice was as hoarse as the equine surroundings.
Getting out of the course car park after the concert proved to be a challenge of similar duration to the gig itself but, like the trip up, it was made more bearable thanks to the CD based encore. If Meat Loaf hit some duff notes you should have heard the caterwauling from the Costantini party bus.
Mike – thanks again, you rock too.
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