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All right, nobody is young anymore -- certainly not kids. And the speaker of Bat II's songs is a bit frayed by time. In I'd Do Anything for Love (but I Won't Do That), it's the woman whose long wish list needs to be satisfied ("Will you cater to every fantasy I got? Will you hose me down with holy water if I get too hot?") and the man who must oblige. He must also face mortality. In Objects in the Rear View Mirror May Appear Closer Than They Are, he is haunted by three pushy ghosts: a friend, a father, a long lost love. The only substance this fellow abuses is beer; now he prays "to the God of Sex and Drums and Rock 'n' Roll."
But the deity is still Bacchus. Most of the songs are uptempo exhortations -- anthems for Animal House. The rollicking Everything Louder Than Everything Else has a mantra ("A wasted youth is better by far/ Than a wise and productive old age") that could be the fight song for the University of Wisconsin marching band.
Anachronistic? Defiantly. The blood on these guitars is Chuck Berry red. The production reverbs with the heavenly choirs, sleigh bells and mausoleum echoes of Phil Spector's wailing Wall of Sound. The lyric lines are long and chatty, with more pomp to the bomp. Bat II is the '50s, '60s and '70s, packed in steel and wrapped in Mylar. Or go back even further. Meat Loaf is not quite Jussi Bjorling, and Steinman ain't no Wagner, but in rock terms Bat Out of Hell II is a Gotterdammerung you can dance to.