49 Fun Facts About Meat Loaf

By his own account, an advert for which brand drove Meat Loaf to drop his birth name, Marvin?

Levi's. He said a commercial with the line 'Poor fat Marvin can't wear Levi's' haunted him so badly that he legally became Michael Lee Aday.

In which city was Meat Loaf born?

Dallas. At 16 he was at Love Field when President Kennedy landed on the morning of 22 November 1963, and after the shooting he and his friends drove to Parkland Hospital.

By Meat Loaf's own account, his father said that as a newborn he looked like several pounds of what?

Ground chuck. He said he was born bright red, so his father had 'Meat' written on his hospital crib; the 'Loaf' came later, in a story he told a dozen different ways.

In Meat Loaf's telling, who gave him the 'Loaf' half of his name by shouting 'meatloaf' at him?

A football coach. He said classmates taped a note reading 'Meat Loaf' to his locker the next day, though he told the story of his name in so many ways that one interviewer counted a dozen.

Under what name did Meat Loaf's first band start out in Los Angeles?

Meat Loaf Soul. The group took a new name with each change of lead guitarist, becoming Popcorn Blizzard and then Floating Circus, and opened for the Who and the Grateful Dead.

Which musical gave Meat Loaf the publicity that led to a Motown invitation?

Hair. The show carried him from Los Angeles to Detroit, the home of Motown, and later on to Broadway, which is how a Texas rock singer ended up in New York theatre.

With which singer, billed as 'Stoney', did Meat Loaf record a 1971 duet album for Motown?

Shaun Murphy. Motown billed the pair as Stoney & Meatloaf, running his name together as one word, and the album sank without troubling the charts.

At the audition for which show did Meat Loaf first meet Jim Steinman?

More Than You Deserve. He auditioned with a soul number called (I'd Love to Be) As Heavy as Jesus, and Steinman told him on the way out, 'You're as heavy as two Jesuses.'

On stage in The Rocky Horror Show, Meat Loaf played Eddie and which second character?

Dr. Scott. When the show was filmed in 1975 the role went to Jonathan Adams, leaving Meat Loaf only Eddie, the lobotomised biker.

For which guitarist's 1976 album Free-for-All did Meat Loaf sing lead on several tracks?

Ted Nugent. He was a hired voice on the million-selling record, and said labels then pressed him to stay with acts like Nugent and drop his own songwriter; he refused.

Meat Loaf was understudy to which comedian in The National Lampoon Show?

John Belushi. Meat Loaf got his songwriter hired as the tour's pianist, and the two began writing together in the afternoons on whatever piano the theatre had.

Who produced Bat Out of Hell, believing the duo already had a record deal?

Todd Rundgren. He took the job because he heard the songs as a spoof of Bruce Springsteen, and ended up paying for the sessions himself when the supposed record deal fell through.

Which label finally took a chance on Bat Out of Hell in October 1977?

Cleveland International Records. The small Epic offshoot said yes after more than two years of rejections; Clive Davis, one of the executives who passed, later admitted he had misjudged the singer.

Bat Out of Hell grew out of which Steinman musical?

Neverland. Steinman's rock retelling of Peter Pan gave the album its title song, Heaven Can Wait and All Revved Up with No Place to Go before the two men decided the songs deserved a record of their own.

Which two members of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band played on Bat Out of Hell?

Roy Bittan and Max Weinberg. Steinman had watched Springsteen's band at a New York club in 1975 and came away saying the pianist was better than he was, so he hired him.

Which Yankees announcer calls the baseball play-by-play in Meat Loaf's Paradise by the Dashboard Light?

Phil Rizzuto. He long claimed not to know the call stood for sex, but Meat Loaf said the old shortstop was in on the joke and pleaded ignorance only after a priest gave him grief.

Who sings the female part on the album version of Meat Loaf's Paradise by the Dashboard Light?

Ellen Foley. She recorded it by sitting Meat Loaf in the vocal booth and singing straight at him; when she declined to tour, Karla DeVito took the part on stage and mimed to her voice in the video.

On the cover of Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell, what comes bursting out of a grave?

A motorcycle. Comics artist Richard Corben painted its rider erupting from the earth, and the bike is on the record too: the songwriter insisted on an engine in the title song, so one was faked on an electric guitar.

Which saxophonist plays on Meat Loaf's All Revved Up with No Place to Go?

Edgar Winter. His horn was set against the album's female singer on the line 'Do you know what it's like?', so that, as she put it, her voice and his sax played together.

Meat Loaf said which TV show broke Bat Out of Hell?

Saturday Night Live. He said the album went from selling almost nothing to five times platinum after the broadcast; it has since sold an estimated 43 million copies.

As of 2022, Bat Out of Hell was the best-selling album ever in which country, by official certifications?

Australia. It reached 26 times platinum there in 2022, and in Britain, after a slow start, an airing on the BBC's Old Grey Whistle Test was enough to set sales off.

Which band did Meat Loaf open for in Chicago at the first show of his Bat Out of Hell tour?

Cheap Trick. Seeing 'Tonight: Cheap Trick, with Meat Loaf' on the marquee, he joked that people would think dinner was being served, and the headliners' fans booed him from the start.

How did Meat Loaf finish his 1978 tour after breaking his leg coming off a stage in Ottawa?

In a wheelchair. He kept the shows going, but the injury came as sudden fame was overwhelming him, and the months that followed ended in a breakdown and the loss of his voice.

Which album, written as the follow-up to Bat Out of Hell, did Jim Steinman sing himself after Meat Loaf lost his voice?

Bad for Good. Doctors found nothing physically wrong with Meat Loaf, yet he could not sing, so in 1981 the songwriter released the songs under his own name; four of them returned on Bat Out of Hell II.

Who sings the female lead on Meat Loaf's 1981 hit Dead Ringer for Love?

Cher. The duet missed the American chart altogether but reached number five in Britain, an early sign that Meat Loaf's most loyal audience was no longer at home.

Which film did Meat Loaf star in as Travis Redfish while waiting for his voice to return?

Roadie. He played a Texas trucker swept into the rock circus alongside Alice Cooper, Blondie and Roy Orbison, but the comedy flopped, taking only about $4 million.

Which Bonnie Tyler hit did Meat Loaf say Jim Steinman had first written for him?

Total Eclipse of the Heart. He said his label would not let him record his old partner's songs in 1983, so it went to Tyler and reached number one; he added that he bore her no grudge.

By his own account, what forced Meat Loaf into bankruptcy in the 1980s?

Lawsuits. He said 45 suits worth $80 million were 'thrown at' him after the split with his songwriter and manager, and that his Bat Out of Hell royalties did not reach him until 1997.

Which rock singer duets with Meat Loaf on the title track of his 1984 album Bad Attitude?

Roger Daltrey. One reviewer called the Who singer's duet with him a gladiatorial battle of the tonsils; Meat Loaf had wanted Jim Steinman to write the whole album, but settled for two songs that were already out.

While making Bat Out of Hell II, what about Meat Loaf reportedly dismayed Jim Steinman?

He had lost weight. Steinman held that the singer's vocal cords were 'directly related to his id', and is said to have left doughnuts around the studio to put the pounds back.

Which TV character's single ended the British number-one run of Meat Loaf's I'd Do Anything for Love?

Mr Blobby. His novelty single ended seven weeks at the top for a song whose 'that' still puzzles listeners, though Jim Steinman said the lyric spells it out about six times.

Who was the female vocalist credited only as 'Mrs. Loud' on Meat Loaf's I'd Do Anything for Love?

Lorraine Crosby. The little-known British singer was only laying down a guide vocal, but it was so good that it stayed on the record, and a model mimed to her voice in the video.

Which Grammy did Meat Loaf win in 1994 for I'd Do Anything for Love?

Best Rock Vocal Performance, Solo. The Grammy sealed a comeback: a decade after bankruptcy and sixteen years after Bat Out of Hell, its sequel gave him his only American number-one single.

Who directed the three music videos from Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell II?

Michael Bay. Years before Armageddon and Transformers he shot all three as miniature blockbusters, and even worked a fiery plane crash into Objects in the Rear View Mirror.

Which future star plays the runaway girl in the video for Meat Loaf's Rock and Roll Dreams Come Through?

Angelina Jolie. She was years from fame, and the song had waited even longer: it was written for the follow-up album Meat Loaf lost his voice before he could record, back in 1981.

Meat Loaf's I'd Do Anything for Love video retells which fairy tale?

Beauty and the Beast. Jim Steinman said he had written the song as that kind of story, so the video put Meat Loaf in heavy make-up as the Beast, with a model miming the woman's part.

Which songwriter wrote Meat Loaf's 1995 hit I'd Lie for You (And That's the Truth)?

Diane Warren. With his old partner supplying only two leftover songs for the album, the ballad specialist wrote this duet and its follow-up single, giving Meat Loaf what proved to be his last American hit.

Meat Loaf's collapse at Wembley Arena in 2003 led doctors to find a rare condition of which organ?

His heart. Tests found Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, an extra electrical pathway he had been born with; surgeons removed it within days, and he told fans the outlook was excellent.

Who produced Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell III: The Monster Is Loose in 2006?

Desmond Child. The Bon Jovi and Aerosmith hitmaker took over because Jim Steinman, after a stroke and bypass surgery, could not make the album; Meat Loaf later said it should never have happened.

What was at stake when Meat Loaf sued Jim Steinman and his manager in 2006?

The "Bat Out of Hell" trademark. Steinman had registered the title as his own in 1995; the case was soon settled, and Meat Loaf always insisted that it was their managers, not the two friends, who had gone to court.

Which Green Day producer worked with Meat Loaf on 2010's Hang Cool Teddy Bear?

Rob Cavallo. Meat Loaf said he had fired everyone after his previous album and that with Cavallo the record 'just flowed'; Queen's Brian May and Steve Vai both play on it.

Which character did Meat Loaf play in Fight Club?

Robert Paulsen. He said he sat behind director David Fincher for most of the ten-month shoot and was called into the trailer to help choose between takes, of which there were often more than forty.

What job does Meat Loaf's character, Dennis, have in the film Spice World?

The bus driver. Asked to unblock the tour bus toilet, Dennis sends up his own biggest hit: he loves the girls and will do anything for them, 'but I won't do that'.

Meat Loaf appears as whose father in Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny?

Jack Black's. Rock's most overblown showman was cast as one of the most strait-laced characters he ever played, a stern father, though he still sings on the opening number, Kickapoo.

With which fellow contestant did Meat Loaf have a televised showdown on Celebrity Apprentice?

Gary Busey. Meat Loaf erupted because he thought Busey had taken his paints and sponges; they turned out to be sitting untouched in a corner, and he apologised in tears.

Which English football club did Meat Loaf support?

Hartlepool United. He took to the club after meeting its fans on a television show, and in 2003 his spokeswoman said he was ready to spend £1m on a home near the town.

Meat Loaf's adopted daughter Pearl married the rhythm guitarist of which metal band?

Anthrax. Scott Ian became his son-in-law, and he and Pearl, a singer who took the surname Aday when Meat Loaf adopted her, went on to form a band of their own, Motor Sister.

Which 2016 album reunited Meat Loaf with Jim Steinman's songs for the last time?

Braver Than We Are. All ten songs were Steinman's, but most came out of his archives, some written decades earlier for other singers, because he was by then too ill to write new ones.

In which state was Meat Loaf living when he died in January 2022?

Tennessee. He had settled in Brentwood, just outside Nashville, where one neighbour recalled first meeting him while out trick-or-treating; no cause of death was ever made public.