Saturday 2nd February 08 - Steve Steinman's Bat Trilogy at The Futurist Theatre, Scarborough (1/2) By Steve Rudd

(1/2), (2/2).

Pulling out all the stops to put on an electrifying show, Steve Steinman and his hard-rocking entourage pulled into Scarborough on what was a freezing cold night. Fortunately, fans of Steve and his Bat Trilogy tour showed up in their droves, crowding into The Futurist to witness one of the first shows of his new tour... and with some scandalously talented new band members in tow too! As always, Jordan Bracewell lost himself in a riot of raucous riffs on lead guitar, while new boys Henry Bird and Ben Grimily played rhythm and bass guitar respectively, leaving Nikk Miller to pulverize the drums and Andrew Weeden to contribute masterful flurries of keyboard-based melody.

Blasting into Life is A Lemon without further ado, the stage was set for a perfect two-hour rock extravaganza, with Steve's huge voice vaulting into the fray so loud and so proud that any cobwebs which might have been nestling in the rafters would sure to have been instantaneously dislodged. Steinman possesses a set of vocal cords to die for; close your eyes and pin back your ears, and it really could be good old Marvin Lee Aday (a.k.a. Meatloaf) performing before you. But more than emulating Meatloaf in both voice and mannerisms, Steve successfully celebrates the songs of Jim Steinman, the musical genius behind the vast majority of classic anthems that have come to be associated with Meatloaf since the seventies.

While Steve's Bat Trilogy tour culls tunes from all three Bat albums, many of the songs featured in the first half of the show were lifted from the original Bat Out of Hell. The lust-fuelled All Revved Up With No Place To Go followed on from Life Is A Lemon, before You Took The Words Right Out of My Mouth and Two Out of Three Ain't Bad were brought to life in exquisite detail. Rock lovers who have had the good fortune to see Steve's Vampires Rock show will have recognized some of Steve's band. Emily Clark, for starters, performed the duets, her breathtaking voice echoing up to the heavens just as God intended.

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