That Boy Could Dance

[Mr. Rooney]

I mean.... after listening to the entire Bat Out of Hell album, I half expect Al to break out into the "though it's cold and lonely" slow bit in Paradise by the Dashboard Light (though I highly doubt Al'd write a song like that).

[kyky27]

its a fairly good song i think. kindaq annyoing but fairly good nonetheless

[Mr. Rooney]

Alright, here's what you do:

1) Listen to the "let me sleep on it" segment of "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" by Meat Loaf.

2) Immediately after you finish listening to the section where both vocalists sing at the same time, listen to any segment of "That Boy Could Dance"

3) Notice how similar in style each is.


:-D

[TMBJon]

This song just came up on my iTunes shuffle. Hadn't heard it in years for obvious reasons.

I'll give Al the music itself, but is this possibly the least funny Weird Al song of all time? All of the remotely funny jokes were done way better in Genius in France.
Earlier people in this thread have speculated on what he may have been trying to do a style parody of. My initial impression is he was just trying for straight up original 1984 pop here, though I do see the Meat Loaf and Johnny B. Goode comparisons.

[Orthography Enthusiast]

I think there are unfunnier Weird Al songs, although not many. This one, though, I find kind of geekily charming, in the underdog-gets-the-girl way that UHF is. Or, for that matter, as I said way way upthread, like in the A. Lavigne (she's Jewish, right?) song Sk8er Boi

[Big Spoon]

I couldn't agree with you more, Jon. This may not be my least favorite Al song overall, but it's certainly one of them.

[TMBJon]

A. Lavigne (she's Jewish, right?)

Not Jewish, French-Canadian. If Jewish, it'd be Levine.

[Orthography Enthusiast]

Not Jewish, French-Canadian. If Jewish, it'd be Levine.

Jon, Jon, Jon. That was an allusion to Al's joke on her name in his Al-TV interview with her.

[TMBJon]

Oh, geez. Too much food inside me to remember AL-TV

[Skippy]

So I was going through this topic for my timeline project to see if anyone felt like this was a style parody, since it's not one that's mentioned very often. I also don't really care for this song (and am still downright flabbergasted that it was the b-side on the "Eat It" 45) but I think I agree with Mr. Rooney (who seems to be long gone from this site) that this is a style parody of Bat Out Of Hell era Meat Loaf (whereas "Stop Forwarding" is more Bat Out Of Hell II era.) It's not as thorough as Al's style parodies typically are now, but there are definite similarities. So, for now, that's what it's going in the timeline as.