This morning, I heard the news that Meatloaf had died, aged 74. I’m not sure if I’m surprised or not. He was always big, and sweaty on stage. So, it’s no real shock, but it is starting to bring back memories of my teens, which isn’t always a good thing to do.

Memories get boxed away by me, never to be re-opened. That’s how it works. Box memories up and file them unprocessed in to the attic of your brain, never to be seen again. That’s how it works, isn’t it? It’s not how it works. You know that.I know that. But when that’s the only tool available, that’s what I / we do. And when these unprocessed memories come back we may not be ready for them.

The problem is that good memories get thrown in the box when you throw everything in. Right now I don’t know if I have a sense for loss for the old rocker, or the old me. It could well be that my feeling of loss is for the me I could have been. Or am I the best I could have been, given the circumstances? I’ll never know, of course. None of us will ever really know that. Meatloaf could have recorded another LP as great as Bat Out Of Hell, but he didn’t. Although, he did record some good stuff afterwards. For example, Midnight At The Lost And Found.

Somewhere, in the attic (we call it the loft) will be my vinyl single of Midnight………..This was my one and only double single in a gatefold. It was an unusual thing to do and I haven’t seen it since. Having said that, you can’t walk in to many shops and pick a record from a shelf these days. And this almost never happened. I may be wrong, but the price was £2.50 and I only had £2. My money was going to go in to an arcade machine until the man in the shop called me over and sold it. For a while, it was a prized possession. But before long, it was in the attic, and then my mental attic, until now.

Some good has come from this. I downloaded the full album and listened to it this afternoon. And I can tell you that it’s an absolute banger! Good and bad feelings have come back, leaving some overall contentment. I remember when we had music and books. I didn’t read much at all, so you had music and books.

I need to visit my attic and see what else is up there.

***CORRECTION***

It’s Meat Loaf.