Singing legend Meat Loaf has died at the age of 74 after a stellar career spanning six decades.

Born Marvin Lee Aday in Texas in 1947 – but known as Michael Lee Aday thoughout his life – Meat Loaf shot to fame with his powerful, wide-ranging voice.

The rock veteran sold millions of albums worldwide, with the Bat Out Of Hell trilogy among his most popular musical offerings.

He was honoured with the Hero Award at the annual Q Awards music ceremony in 2016, which he dedicated to everyday heroes and called on people to “bring love back into this world”.

The rock veteran had been plagued with health issues and rumours that he’s dying ever since he collapsed onstage in June 2016 and has appeared in a number of interviews with slurred speech, with even Katie Price telling him she thought he had died.

He was forced to deny he’d passed away.

But he did have back surgery nearly two months ago to remove a cyst on his back – and he’s explained for the last time ever, just what the bat out of hell is going on.

“Listen, I am not dying. After three months of therapy I will be fine. I am sick of talking about it. I don’t want to talk about it from now on,” he said.

“And anyone else who asks me the question, I’m not going to respond to it.”In 2012, Meat Loaf claimed dying on stage would be the “best thing” that could happen to him.

“I’ll die for ya,” he said in an interview with Tinnitist.

“I literally will die for an audience. The best thing that could ever happen to me is that I die onstage.

“Because then I’m dying doing what I love. I hate to cut us off but I gotta go.”

Meat Loaf was last pictured on March 27 last year when he performed with country artist John Rich at Redneck Riviera in Nashville.

'Our hearts are broken'

In a heartbreaking tribute posted on the star’s official Facebook page, it was revealed the star passed away on Thursday night with wife Deborah by his side, The Sun reported

The statement reads: “Our hearts are broken to announce that the incomparable Meat Loaf passed away tonight with his wife Deborah by his side.

“Daughters Pearl and Amanda and close friends have been with him throughout the last 24 hours.

“His amazing career spanned 6 decades that saw him sell over 100 Million albums worldwide and star in over 65 movies, including Fight Club, Focus, Rocky Horror Picture Show and Wayne’s World. Bat Out of Hell remains one of the top 10 selling albums of all time.

“We know how much he meant to so many of you and we truly appreciate all of the love and support as we move through this time of grief in losing such an inspiring artist and beautiful man.

“We thank you for your understanding of our need for privacy at this time. From his heart to your souls…don’t ever stop rocking!”

Meat Loaf’s cause of death has not yet been revealed.

Bat Out of Hell

His colourful career saw him not only wow fans with his music, but also with his theatrics as he appeared in more than 50 movies and television shows – including the 1997 film Spice World.

Written and produced by Jim Steinman, singles from Bat Out of Hell, Two of Three Ain’t Bad and Paradise by the Dashboard Light, were both certified platinum in 2018.

He sold more 100 million albums worldwide.

After a slow start and mixed reviews, Bat Out of a Hell became one of the top-selling albums in history, with worldwide sales of more than 40 million copies. Meat Loaf wasn’t a consistent hit maker, especially after falling out for years with Steinman. But he maintained close ties with his fans through his manic live shows, social media and his many television, radio and film appearances, including Fight Club and cameos on Glee and South Park.

Steinman died in April.

His biggest musical success after Bat Out of Hell was Bat Out of Hell II: Back into Hell, a 1993 reunion with Steinman that sold more than 15 million copies and featured the Grammy-winning single I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That).

A native of Dallas, Meat Loaf was the son of a school teacher who raised him on her own after divorcing his alcoholic father, a police officer. He was singing and acting in high school (Mick Jagger was an early favourite, so was Ethel Merman) and attended Lubbock Christian College and what is now the University of North Texas. Among his more notable childhood memories: Seeing John F Kennedy arrive at Love Field in Dallas on November 22, 1963, then learning the president had been assassinated and driving to Parkland Hospital and watching a bloodied Jackie Kennedy step out of a car.

He was still a teenager when his mother died and when he acquired the nickname Meat Loaf, the alleged origins of which range from his weight to a favourite recipe of his mother’s. He left for Los Angeles after college and was soon fronting the band Meat Loaf Soul. For years, he alternated between music and the stage, recording briefly for Motown, opening for such acts as the Who and the Grateful Dead and appearing in the Broadway production of Hair.

By the mid-1970s, he was playing the lobotomised biker Eddie in the theatre and film versions of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, had served as an understudy for his friend John Belushi for the stage production of National Lampoon and had begun working with Steinman on Bat Out of Hell. The dense, pounding production was openly influenced by Wagner, Phil Spector and Bruce Springsteen, whose bandmates Roy Bittan and Max Weinberg played on the record. Rundgren initially thought of the album as a parody of Springsteen’s grandiose style.

Steinman had known Meat Loaf since the singer appeared in his 1973 musical More Than You Deserve and some of the songs on Bat Out of Hell, including All Revved Up With No Place to Go, were initially written for a planned stage show based on the story of Peter Pan. Bat Out of Hell took more than two years to find a taker as numerous record executives turned it down, including RCA’s Clive Davis, who disparaged Steinman’s songs and acknowledged that he had misjudged the singer: “The songs were coming over as very theatrical, and Meat Loaf, despite a powerful voice, just didn’t look like a star,” Davis wrote in his memoir, The Soundtrack of My Life.

With the help of another Springsteen sideman, Steve Van Zandt, Bat Out of Hell was acquired by Cleveland International, a subsidiary of Epic Records. The album made little impact until months after its release, when a concert video of the title track was aired on the British programme the Old Grey Whistle Test. In the US, his connection to Rocky Horror helped when he convinced producer Lou Adler to use a video for Paradise By the Dashboard Light as a trailer for the cult movie. But Meat Loaf was so little known at first that he began his Bat Out of Hell tour in Chicago as the opening act for Cheap Trick, then one of the world’s hottest groups.

“I remember pulling up at the theatre and it says, ‘TONIGHT: CHEAP TRICK, WITH MEAT LOAF.’ And I said to myself, ‘These people think we´re serving dinner,'” Meat Loaf explained in 2013 on the syndicated radio show In the Studio.

“And we walk out on stage and these people were such Cheap Trick fans they booed us from the start. They were getting up and giving us the finger. The first six rows stood up and screamed. … When we finished, most of the boos had stopped and we were almost getting applause.”

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