Jim Steinman RIP

I just heard about Steinman's passing this past weekend.  I wrote about "Bat Out of Hell II" recently and since then, I have been feeling sentimental about Steinman's contributions to music.  I knew about many of his non-Meatloaf compositions for some time but it was only a year or two ago that I stumbled upon the knowledge that he co-wrote and produced some of Sisters of Mercy's biggest hits ("This Corrosion", "More", "Dominion").  It makes perfect sense once you know, at which point you can't unhear Steinman's influence in future listens.  And it figures that Steinman would be the best person to bring out the OTT hilarity in goth rock.  

Which was the more impressive achievement, BOOH I or BOOH II?  The first album was famously rejected by every major record label but went on to become one of the biggest selling albums ever.  It's hard to understand why no label thought it would be marketable, considering that the 70's was a decade full of overproduced histrionic rock excess.  The 90's gets repped (by rock fans) as the decade of grunge and alternative rock, but the truth is more complex.  In the early 90's, Bryan Adams, Tom Petty, Aerosmith, and Eric Clapton hit their commercial peak.  Each was highly recognizable thanks to heavy rotation on MTV and some memorable videos.  So there was plenty of space for rock "veterans" even as the landscape was shifting.  However, each of them were active during the 80's and continued their success into the 90's. By 1993, Meatloaf was a burnout and a nobody who made a completely improbable comeback to the upper strata of the industry.  Even more improbable was how BOOH was promoted as a Big Event Album despite Meatloaf not being relevant for over a decade.  "I'd Do Anything For Love" hit the airwaves/MTV and its astonishing success seemed almost preordained.  That speaks to Steinman's continued clout in the industry, the value in the BOOH name, and of course, the unexpected quality of the album.  The music was a black sheep completely out of place and out of sync with everything else happening at the time.  There was no indication that this type of music would make a comeback -- and in fact, it didn't.  Steinman-inspired rock wasn't a returning fad, BOOH II was in a bubble of its own success.  It was influenced by nothing except itself and inspired no copycats. It appeared out of nothing and then vanished into the ether.  BOOH I is the better album, but BOOH II's triumph ran contrary to all sense and logic of the time, and still stands as the more impressive overall achievement.