“Bat Out of Hell” by Meat Loaf

The title track of Meat Loaf's 1977 album Bat Out of Hell is Jim Steinman's bid for the most extreme crash song ever written, a teenage tragedy blown up to Wagnerian size. Steinman had drawn it, like most of the album, from Peter Pan, meant for a rock 'n' roll sci-fi take on Neverland, and he took his cue from death-disc weepers like "Leader of the Pack" and "Tell Laura I Love Her".

Todd Rundgren produced, engineered and mixed it and plays guitar all over it, and he brought in muscle: Roy Bittan's piano thunders, Max Weinberg drives the drums like a runaway motorcycle, Kasim Sulton holds down the bass and Roger Powell's synths shriek. Meat Loaf sings it flat out, with Ellen Foley and Rory Dodd among the backing voices. It went out as a single in Australia in 1978 and in the UK in 1979.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.