The following article appeared in the 6th December edition of the Poughkeepsie Journal.

December 6, 2002
Rocker Meat Loaf keeps on cooking
Musician, film star brings show to city
By John W. Barry
Poughkeepsie Journal

Like the edible fabrication from which he takes his name, Meat Loaf the musician for some is a memory from younger years of an experience that played a critical role in growing up despite being a little too familiar.

You would be hard pressed to find anyone in their late 20s or early 30s who couldn't recite every line to Meat Loaf's generational anthem, ''Paradise By the Dashboard Lights.''

Meat Loaf, who was unavailable for an interview, has been successful in large part because of the cult-like status that one huge hit can bring. Meat Loaf's reign in the world of music has spread to a significantly lesser degree to celluloid, with each of his artistic roles maintaining the campiness of the 1975 film in which he appeared, ''The Rocky Horror Picture Show.''

And how about that urban legend regarding former New York Yankee Phil Rizzuto, who provided baseball play-by-play over Meatloaf's music on ''Paradise By the Dashboard Lights.''

It's true, says Kasim Sulton, who played bass on ''Bat Out of Hell,'' the album that was produced by Todd Rundgren, included ''Paradise By the Dashboard Lights'' and has sold 48 million copies. Sulton is set to appear at the Mid-Hudson Civic Center on Tuesday as musical director, opening act and bass player in Meat Loaf's latest ensemble.

Sulton was a Woodstock resident and member of Rundgren's band, Utopia, when he met Meat Loaf -- whose real name is Michael Aday -- decades ago. He said Rizzuto was unaware of the double entendre that his ''commentary'' on scoring would provide for ''Paradise By the Dashboard Lights,'' a song about teenage love and the interior of a car.

''He had no idea,'' said Sulton. ''All they did was say 'we want you to be on a record.' They just said 'just do a play-by-play for us.' He had no idea that his play-by-play was going to be construed in that sense.''

But even bigger than Rizzuto or Meatloaf himself is that song, which Sulton described as a rite of passage that has become larger than just lyrics set against a backdrop of music.

''That song is still played at weddings, proms and bar mitzvahs,'' said Sulton. ''Any kind of rite of passage -- that song will have something to do with.''

Garth Green, assistant manager of Alto Music in Wappingers Falls, said the impact of ''Bat Out of Hell'' on contemporary music is akin to Aerosmith's ''Dream On'' rather than ''Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band'' by the Beatles or ''Exile On Main Street'' by the Rolling Stones. But Green said Meat Loaf has certainly left his mark on music fans with a persona not too different than that of Blues Traveler's John Popper.

''I would say he had a very good presence coming onto the scene,'' Green said of Meat Loaf. ''It was great.'' Beyond his work with Meat Loaf, Sulton, a Brooklyn native who currently lives on Staten Island, has worked with Mick Jagger, Hall & Oates, Joan Jett and Patti Smith. He recorded with Rundgren many years before WDST (100.1 FM) set up shop in the rocker's Utopia Studios in the Bearsville Theater complex in Woodstock. Sulton also logged quite a bit of time at the Bardavon 1869 Opera House in Poughkeepsie while rehearsing with Rundgren's band in 1976.

And he recently released his third solo album, ''Quid Pro Quo'' on Sphere Sound Records.

''I taught myself to play guitar and play piano,'' Sulton said. ''The next logical step after becoming semi-proficient was to write songs. That was during the middle-to-late 1960s. It was all about Sgt. Pepper and ... writing songs. You could play everyone else's songs until the cows came home, but the real trick was to play your own songs and get that going.'' And how about Meat Loaf, the person? Beneath all that grizzle and glitter seems to be a nice guy, according to Sulton, who along with his boss will be joined on stage at the Mid-Hudson Civic Center by Meat Loaf's 25-year-old daughter and vocalist, Pearl Aday.

''He kind of keeps to himself,'' Sulton said. ''He expends so much energy when he walks out on stage. He's not 20 years old anymore. But when he goes out on stage and he's on stage for two and a half hours, and he never leaves the stage, at the end of the show, you'll find him right backstage, lying on his back, gasping for air, trying to catch his breath. He's just yelling and screaming and singing and running around on stage for two and a half hours.''