What Meat Loaf actually meant when he sang ‘I won’t do that’

Deep Loaf

With the deeply saddening announcement that music legend and actor Meat Loaf has passed away aged 74, people are rightly diving back into some of his greatest lyrics. He's undoubtedly best known for his Bat Out of Hell album trilogy, as well as playing Eddie in cult-classic Rocky Horror Picture Show - but perhaps one of his greatest tunes is the iconic, "I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)". https://twitter.com/JOE_co_uk/status/1484440010917134338?s=20 That being said, fans are once again wondering what exactly that is, which has become somewhat of a joke over the years. However, while music, like any art, is always about your own interpretation, he did actually tell us - in the song... Speaking to Yahoo's Ali Wentworth back in 2014, Meat Loaf (real name Michael Lee Aday) said that despite being one of the most puzzling and often misunderstood lyrics ever, the answer to what he wouldn't do is said throughout: "It's the line before every chorus." The near eight-minute epic works so well because whatever that is actually changes every verse it's mentioned in and the performer counted nine times when he literally tells those listening what he won't do. For instance, he won't: "forget the way you feel right now", he'll "never forgive myself if we don't go all the way tonight", he'll "never do it better than I do it with you", and so on and so forth. During the interview, he mentioned at the time that the original songwriter, Jim Steinman - known for all manner of hits throughout the years - did think that “People aren’t gonna know what that is.” While Meat Loaf insisted, “of course they are. How can they not know?”, Steinman was certain “they’re not gonna.” Turns out he was right, for the most part. Nevertheless, you know now and we're sure this rock ballad sounds even more beautiful than before because of it. Rest in peace to a legend.

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