Bonnie Tyler's voice made 'Total Eclipse of the Heart' one of the most recognisable songs in music history. More than four decades after its release, the soaring power ballad has racked up well over a billion streams, returned to the charts during solar eclipses and become a karaoke staple across the world. But despite being forever associated with the song, Tyler reportedly earned very little from its phenomenal long-term success. Why? Because she didn't write it.
A Voice That Defined an Era
The Welsh singer, who died this week aged 75 following complications after emergency intestinal surgery, leaves behind one of the most distinctive voices in pop music. Tributes have poured in from across the entertainment world, celebrating the singer who turned 'Total Eclipse of the Heart' into an anthem for generations. Her death was confirmed on her website in a statement which read: 'Bonnie's family and team are heartbroken to announce that Bonnie unexpectedly passed away last night in hospital in Portugal.' They confirmed her death was 'as a result of the illness that she was being treated for.' 'We will issue a further statement shortly but for now ask for privacy to deal with this tragedy,' her family added. Tyler was previously admitted to a hospital in Faro, Portugal, where she has a home, and had emergency intestinal surgery after feeling unwell around a month ago. Earlier this month, her representative confirmed to Metro that she was 'no longer in a coma' but still in intensive care and 'very unwell.'
The Bittersweet Reality of Royalties
Behind her most famous song's extraordinary success lies a bittersweet reality. Although Tyler performed the track, all publishing royalties belong to its writer, legendary songwriter Jim Steinman, because she never received a songwriting credit. That means the money generated from streaming, radio play and countless cover versions largely flowed elsewhere rather than to the woman whose voice made the song famous. Steinman, the theatrical songwriter behind Meat Loaf's 'I'd Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That)' and Celine Dion's 'It's All Coming Back to Me Now,' originally never intended 'Total Eclipse of the Heart' to become an 80s pop classic at all.
A Vampire Love Song in Disguise
Instead, he had been writing music for a stage adaptation of Nosferatu and originally conceived the song as a gothic love story between vampires. 'I was trying to come up with a love song and I remembered I actually wrote that to be a vampire love song,' Steinman once explained, adding that its original title was 'Vampires in Love.' 'If anyone listens to the lyrics, they're really like vampire lines. It's all about the darkness, the power of darkness and love's place in the dark.' Tyler herself admitted she had no idea about its supernatural origins when she first heard it. 'The first time I heard it was when Jim Steinman just played it on the piano in New York,' she recalled. 'He sang the song all the way through and I was like, "Oh my God, this song is amazing. I can't believe Jim is giving it to me."' Initially, however, she wasn't convinced anyone else would feel the same. 'When I recorded the song, I thought no one is going to end up playing this because it's so long. The original version is eight minutes long,' she said. Fortunately, radio stations disagreed. After the track was cut down for airplay, it shot to number one in both the UK and the US, becoming one of 1983's defining hits and cementing Tyler as an international star.
A Near Miss for Meat Loaf
The song also came with one of music's greatest sliding-doors moments. According to Tyler, Steinman had originally hoped longtime collaborator Meat Loaf would record it, but after vocal issues prevented that from happening, the song landed in her hands instead. 'Every time I saw Meat Loaf, he said, "Bonnie, that song should have been mine,"' she once joked. 'I said, "Well, Jim gave it to me."' It became a performance that would define her career forever. Even if, financially, it never truly belonged to her.
