Meat Loaf is the stage name of Michael Lee Aday (born Marvin Lee Aday on September 27, 1947), an American actor (stage and screen) and rock singer. He is particularly noted for his smash hit album Bat out of Hell and several famous songs from movies. Meat Loaf is also the name of the band he fronts, as its lead singer. In 2001, he legally changed his first name to Michael.Aday was born in Dallas, Texas. Despite setbacks (including bankruptcy, on more than one occasion), Meat Loaf is notable for the ultimate success of his music career, spawning some of the largest-selling albums of all time, and breaking several records for chart duration. Bat out of Hell, the debut album which had been four years in the making, sold over 34 million copies, becoming more profitable than Michael Jackson's blockbuster Thriller. After almost 30 years, it still sells an estimated 200,000 copies annually, and stayed on the charts for over 9 years.Each of the seven tracks on the album, eventually, also charted as a single hit.Although he enjoyed success with Bat out of Hell and Bat out of Hell II: Back into Hell, Meat Loaf experienced some initial difficulty establishing a steady career within his native United States; however, he has retained iconic status and popularity in Europe, especially the UK, where he has ranked 23rd for a number of weeks overall spent in the charts, and is one of only two artists with an album never to have left the music charts. In Germany, Meat Loaf became notably popular following the release of Bat out of Hell II but has enjoyed most success among pop/rock fans. He ranked at 96th on VH1's '100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock'.Meat Loaf has also appeared in over 50 movies or television shows sometimes even as himself, or as characters resembling his onstage personality, such as his memorable role in The Rocky Horror Picture Show. He starred (unrecognizably out-of-character) in the acclaimed feature film Fight Club, as a cancer-survivor support-group member whose former steroid abuse caused him to grow large breasts, and led to castration to prevent the spead of the cancer.
