Bonny Tyler's Total Eclipse Of The Heart: classic or dud?

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It's because Scott Stapp is a gigantic cockfarmer and his band is deeply, deeply mediocre at best.

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:23 (twenty years ago) link

How long does it take for TEOTH to repeat? 1:30? 2:00? I love songs like that. Anyway, excellent song that is probably hard to screw up.

― Vinnie (vprabhu), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:23 (twenty years ago) link

are none of you feelin' ms braxton ? wtf

― Vic (Vic), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:24 (twenty years ago) link

Oh, any love for Ms. Tyler's "Holding Out for a Hero"? Same urgency but with the weirdest drum solo ever!

― Vinnie (vprabhu), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:25 (twenty years ago) link

I need to download "Holding Out.." - oddly enough I loved that one when I was 10 despite hating Eclipse.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:29 (twenty years ago) link

me too!

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:31 (twenty years ago) link

sweet jesus, is that song good. it's on the footloose soundtrack. i wore out like three copies of it when i was little.

"where have all the good men gone and where are all the gods/where's the streetwise hercules to fight the rising odds"

― lauren (laurenp), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:35 (twenty years ago) link

I think my feelings on Toni Braxton are abundantly clear (ie TONI I LUV U COME SNUGGLE WITH ME).

"Unbreak My Heart" was one of the best singles of its year.

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:36 (twenty years ago) link

where is Toni Braxton? not bankrupt again i hope

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:40 (twenty years ago) link

song: classic / video: extraclassic

― Dean Gulberry (deangulberry), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:41 (twenty years ago) link

but the Powar Ballad is alive and well in nu-metal surely
WAKE ME UP! Wake me up inside
etc

― Alan (Alan), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:44 (twenty years ago) link

If you put tape over the tabs of the Footloose tape and erase "Footloose" it becomes the best soundtrack of all time. "Let's Hear It For the Boy"!!! Good God!

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:47 (twenty years ago) link

i don't like either beautiful or unbreak my heart,i hate dont want to miss a thing,and love total eclipse and pass the dutch...
does this mean i love or hate fun?

― robin (robin), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:49 (twenty years ago) link

also whatever about dizzee rascal there's a fair bit of gabber in pass the dutch
(if i remember right,i only heard it once)

― robin (robin), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:49 (twenty years ago) link

where does Daniel Bedingfield's "If You're Not the One" fit in all this?

― Michael B, Monday, 27 October 2003 17:57 (twenty years ago) link

right in my heart.

― g--ff c-nn-n (gcannon), Monday, 27 October 2003 17:59 (twenty years ago) link

I think http://www.jimsteinman.com/wwwboard/fantasy.htm says everything that needs to be said.

No, really. Go look right now.

― Douglas (Douglas), Monday, 27 October 2003 19:06 (twenty years ago) link

!!!

...I cry now.

― cis (cis), Monday, 27 October 2003 19:11 (twenty years ago) link

"We take a bath together in Strawberries and Creme and drown in ecstasy. Oh-la-la!"

Dude, that's not cool.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Monday, 27 October 2003 19:23 (twenty years ago) link

"Jim comes to my door when I'm not even expecting him. He says that he knows how big a fan I am because he lives next door even though I never knew. He says he's watched me through the window many times when I've been masturbating to his music and that he is really turned on by the way I move my body and that I'm very much in harmony with the music. He then asks me if I'm willing to come to his place and help him work out some of the kinks he's having with some of the new songs he's been writing. I tell him I'd be happy to help but I don't know how I could. He says that I could let him watch me masturbate myself and that would be his inspiration because he would tell by the way my body responds if he's making the right adjustments. I'm more than happy to oblige and off we go. (For some reason this is a reoccurring fantasy I have whenever I do myself - that he asks to watch and I let him.)"

Well, Jim certainly looks pleased.

http://www.jimsteinman.com/wwwboard/jim198.gif

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Monday, 27 October 2003 19:25 (twenty years ago) link

"Beautiful" is vile and, in Michael Parkinson's words I'll punch any man who says otherwise (except Enrique, perhaps, cos he's a good egg). the question is: what do we think of "We Don't Need Another Hero"? I can think of some contexts where that song Makes More Sense than almost anything else, and other contexts where it is just absurd.

― robin carmody (robin carmody), Monday, 27 October 2003 19:56 (twenty years ago) link

I'm amazed that this thread has gotten this far without anyone mentioning the wedding scene in "Old School".

"And I need you now tonight / I fuckin need you more than ever"

"Beautiful" is ass.

― Tom Breihan (Tom Breihan), Monday, 27 October 2003 19:57 (twenty years ago) link

Does anyone else remember the '84 David Copperfield special where Bonnie Tyler sang "I Need A Hero" to him from the North Rim of the Grand Canyon while Mr. Copperfield levitated over the thing? The split screen image of Copperfield in a full lotus, arms crossed, eyes closed, hovering 1,000 feet above the canyon floor while Bonnie called him home in song is one of those things that makes childhood seem like an endless acid trip.

― Mark (MarkR), Monday, 27 October 2003 22:48 (twenty years ago) link

Taking sides: "Total Eclipse..." original version vs. "Total Eclipse..." house/trance/etc remix?

― Mark (MarkR), Monday, 27 October 2003 23:17 (twenty years ago) link

I'm still upset that Limp Bizkit covered "Behind Blue Eyes" instead of this. I dunno if it's classic or not (I only hear like parts of it on the radio, like most Jim Steinman songs) but it's better than "Behind Blue Eyes."

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 27 October 2003 23:18 (twenty years ago) link

trance remixes of eighties songs are the worst thing ever...

― robin (robin), Monday, 27 October 2003 23:22 (twenty years ago) link

Was "Total Eclipse..." in the running for a limpbizkit cover, Anthony?

― Mark (MarkR), Monday, 27 October 2003 23:23 (twenty years ago) link

Yup, along some Love And Rockets song I never heard of. THE MIND BOGGLES.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 27 October 2003 23:26 (twenty years ago) link

I repeat, NIKKI FRENCH = ROWR

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 27 October 2003 23:28 (twenty years ago) link

I suspect the secret of the original "Total Eclipse of the Heart" is how it wants "Power of Love" to be "Wuthering Heights", or vice versa.

If there's a problem with Diane Warren/Celine Dion effect it's that it has tended to iron out all eccentricity in the power ballad. That's partly why Bedingfield's "If You're Not The One" is so great, and why "Never Gonna Leave Your Side" or whatever it was is so drab.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Monday, 27 October 2003 23:58 (twenty years ago) link

it has tended to iron out all eccentricity in the power ballad

Ah, bless you Mr. Finney. Again you are a genius. :-) But yeah, this sums it up. There is also very little sense of...well, 'camp' is such a loaded word, but the lack of same in favor of sheer pointless formalism in so many of these ballads is wearying. I was thinking of this in particular when watching an episode or two of Pop Idol with Martin during my UK trip, the sheer dullness of one soundalike ballad after another -- more than a few selections coming from Ms. Warren's pen in particular, I seem to recall -- made the whole exercise pure pain. There was nothing to get excited about, no reason to care.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 00:55 (twenty years ago) link

Ha ha Australian Idol has been *much* better in this regard!

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 01:18 (twenty years ago) link

I misread the thread title and thought that Bonnie "Prince" Billy had covered "Total Eclipse of the Heart". Now *that* would be fucking awesome.

― Nick Mirov (nick), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 05:42 (twenty years ago) link

it's overblown, camp, manipulative tosh and humanity is poorer for liking it!

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 08:58 (twenty years ago) link

c'mon julio, tell us what you REALLY think!

the song is indeed camp, overproduced, manipulative tosh - and i LOVE it. although maybe it's because i remember asking this cute girl maria to slow dance in grade 7 to this song and she said yes, so i guess it has some sort of significance on a personal level only...

― Rob Bolton (Rob Bolton), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 09:40 (twenty years ago) link

jim steinman is THE MAN, and if anyone says otherwise i will beat them up.

― The Lady Ms Lurex (lucylurex), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 22:10 (twenty years ago) link

it's overblown, camp, manipulative tosh and humanity is poorer for liking it!

Like Rob says, it's great BECAUSE it's so overblown, camp and manipulative.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Tuesday, 28 October 2003 22:26 (twenty years ago) link

no, that's too obvious. not all that's *really* bad becomes good.

that just reeks of some stuck-in-1992 gen-X cliche

― paulhw (paulhw), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 03:34 (twenty years ago) link

"it's great BECAUSE it's so overblown, camp and manipulative" <> "all that's *really* bad becomes good"

HTH

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 03:36 (twenty years ago) link

come on...is it such a stretch?

― paulhw (paulhw), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 03:39 (twenty years ago) link

"it" (singular) <> "all" (plural)

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 03:41 (twenty years ago) link

(*yawns*)

― paulhw (paulhw), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 03:45 (twenty years ago) link

ImImpressedOrEvenCare = False

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 03:51 (twenty years ago) link

Just last week I was thinking how it's totally an airsupply song but with way more testosteronesupply.

― brian nemtusak (sanlazaro), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 04:00 (twenty years ago) link

(CLASSIC.)

― brian nemtusak (sanlazaro), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 04:01 (twenty years ago) link

Why are overblown-ness, campness and manipulation bad things? In a novel perhaps they would be - in a movie possibly - but in a pop single??

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 10:56 (twenty years ago) link

Exactly! PS is Tico Tico the silent recently but presumably with good reason Tom Ewing? I'm not sure about the concept of manipulation in general. The world doesn't work like that, you can't avoid what gets termed 'manipulation'.

― Enrique (Enrique), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 11:02 (twenty years ago) link

Tico Tico is Tom Ewing when he's not being a moderator, which at the moment is indefinitely.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 11:03 (twenty years ago) link

Why are overblown-ness, campness and manipulation bad things? In a novel perhaps they would be - in a movie possibly - but in a pop single??

they are not as long as there's an element of 'smarts' to it - not necessarily irony. also if you apply these to other genres (rock, dance) you will surely then have a pop single anyway?

― stevem (blueski), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 11:21 (twenty years ago) link

In a pop single it is actually worse bcz its concentrated in 3 minutes.

In a 500 page novel if the overblowness etc isn't there all the way through it could be tolerable. Same with a movie: certain awful scenes but its a two hour thing.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Wednesday, 29 October 2003 11:54 (twenty years ago) link

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