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Last night my son & I were invited to the Liverpool Empire to watch the Meatloaf inspired Bat Out Of Hell Musical.  As we took our seats, the stage certainly looked interesting and then came the amusing announcement “please save your best Meatloaf impressions for your way home” – a brilliant way to ask the audience to remain in their seats! 

The show, as you’d expect was high tempo and full of energy. I’m afraid the story was a bit predictable based around a boy called Strat, who is the forever young leader of rebellious gang ‘The Lost’. He meets and falls in love with Raven, the beautiful daughter of the tyrannical ruler of Obsidian.  The story unfolds with the background of her parents relationship (quite raunchy scenes), her 18th birthday and – predictably – her running away with Strat. It doesn’t all go to plan as Strat’s best friend fears losing him and interferes. I’ll not tell you anymore for fear of ruining the ending. 

The music in Bat Out of Hell Musical was superb – Meatloaf has written some great ‘belting’ songs and boy were they belted out! The great thing about his music is that they work equally well with both male & female voices so there was a good mix & interpretation to listen to. The band were amazing and a couple of them including the conductor even managed a brief appearance on stage!

The stage set is something we definitely need to talk about. I’m not really sure how to describe it so here goes … the front of the stage was a normal stage and behind it was a tunnel denoting the underground network of tunnels The Lost gang lived in. Above the tunnel was an advertising hoarding, however this was also a screen which showed a close up of action elsewhere on the stage. To the right was a room with floor to ceiling windows which you could see into. This room was Raven’s bedroom so you could see how she was feeling and how exasperated she was with her parents.  While the action took place in this room there was a cameraman catching it all which had a live feed to the screen/advertising hoarding. This was great as you got to see facial expressions and feel much closer to the action but there were times when I wasn’t sure what to look at. It was a very clever, unique and creative way of set design … so hats off!

There was one scene which I alluded to earlier which I felt was unsuitable for my 12 year old son, when I asked him about it he replied that he was watching the baseball on the screen … I’ll let you work out what that represented but at least it meant his eyes were diverted! The guidance I have read recommends 12+ or 13 and while the majority is that I would say this scene is maybe more 15+ and it appears in the first act so is difficult to avoid.  Other than that there is some profanity & gestures but nothing offensive. There is quite a lot of humour too so it’s good fun.  I would recommend it for a good night out particularly if it you are a fan of Meatloaf’s music!

Bat Out Of Hell Musical is on at the Liverpool Empire until Saturday 15h October, to book : https://www.atgtickets.com/shows/bat-out-of-hell/liverpool-empire/

Bat Out Of Hell musical is currently touring the UK and Ireland, for details of where they visit next visit: https://www.batoutofhellmusical.com/uk-tour.