Bat Out of Hell 2

Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It's fifteen years since my last confession. I've told a couple of lies, Father, and I've had a few impure thoughts. Actually quite a few of them, Father. And I once made blasphemous remarks about the Holy Ghost for, despite being the real father, not showing up for the birth of baby Jesus. I thought he was afraid he might bump into Joseph, but apparently he was seen flitting all over Jerusalem like a bat out of hell.

Which reminds me, father. I don't know if this is a mortaller or not, but I was the man responsible for the Irish marketing campaign for the first Bat Out of Hell album. But I didn't really intend to hurt anybody, father, not really. It was meant as a bit of a joke, father, like say, Humanae Vitae, that sort of thing. But the people took it seriously!

Yes, I know that it gets played at funerals and weddings, father, but begging your father's pardon, don't you think that the decision of so many priests to give the album as penance in confession could have given us the impression that the church was fully behind the campaign, father? After all, it was hell that the bat was getting out of, and sure I heard that Jesus himself wouldn't hurt a fly, never mind locking a bat up in hell forever.

What did you say, father? Three Hail Marys and listen to volume two? Review it? But sure then I'd have to listen to it twice! Could you not make me listen to Father Michael Cleary's radio show instead? I'II tell you what. I'll listen to Father Michael every night for three months, with me fingers in an electrical socket and me feet in a basin of Holy Water, if we can just forget about the reviewing part. Like there's penance and penance, father!

But father, are you aware that the very first track, 'I'II Do Anything For Love', although a very Christian sentiment, is twelve minutes long? And it takes ages even to speak the title of another song, 'Objects in the Rearview Mirror May Appear Closer Than They Are.' That's sheer purgatory, father!

And there's another song on it that says 'Good Girls Go to Heaven'. Would that include Madonna, do you think, father? It'd be a great incentive, like, to some of the lads if you could confirm that, father, at the Saturday sodality. The boys might respond to that kind of encouragement. And you wouldn't want to leave them in limbo over the issue, would you, father?

One final question, father. Do you still think the devil still has all the best tunes?

• Jackie Hayden