One of the great music biz anecdote clips, Jim Steinman’s surprising gifts as a gonzo raconteur prove worthy of the acknowledged master of that art, Peter Ustinov
If anything truly captures what innovation is all about, including not only the innovation itself, nor even the story behind it, but also an authentic sense of the creative experience as both a participant and as music technology guru Todd Rundgren’s acolyte, this is it.
This classic video gets off to a rather slow, rambling-sounding, unpromising start, but you soon find yourself transported to a magical episode where Steinman’s excruciatingly infantile (but impressively re-enacted) whining drives Rundgren to new heights of creativity.
Such is the wonder of web video, that only a little more searching after watching this lead me to discover that the bike story emanates from the production of a rather well known track from a rather well known album.
Here is a certain Mr Loaf to give his own take on exactly the same bike story.
If like me, after watching that last clip, you actually found the actual effect itself a teeny-weeny bit less less exciting than either of the two reminiscences about it, here’s what, to my untrained ear sounds like an altogether more convincing effort (but then again, Rundgren was doing it with technology from three decades earlier)
And for completeness sake, here is Ustinov, with, of all things, an ‘education technology innovation’ story in the middle of a clip from a DVD of a classic performance which showcases his many extraordinary talents, with a veritable galaxy of 1988 celebrities in the audience.
