Meat Loaf's dad tried to kill him with a butcher's knife

Meat Loaf has opened up about his difficult childhood in a poignant new interview, with the 68-year-old rocker revealing that his alcoholic father once tried to kill him with a butcher’s knife.

The star was raised by his dad after his mother tragically passed away from cancer, and he insists that he has now forgiven his dad for his horrifying behaviour.

Real name Michael Aday, Meat Loaf shared: “My mother died young, of cancer. My father was an alcoholic, and coping with him, that’s really how I learned to act.

“But I love my father, I’ve forgiven my father.

“He tried to kill me with a butcher knife but all of that is just life. Alcoholism is a disease. You deal with it, you go on, you don’t hold grudges.

Meat Loaf went on to add to the Sunday Telegraph that after learning to act through his troubled childhood, he always puts on a persona when on stage or screen.

He explained: “You never see Meat Loaf, the one that’s talking to you, on that stage. And on any record I’ve ever done, you’ve never heard Meat Loaf sing a song.

“They’ve all been characters. Every time.”