TWISTED SISTER – How DEE SNIDER Reinvented Himself After The Year He Made $0; Video

In 1984, Twisted Sister hit it big with their rebel anthem, “We’re Not Gonna Take It”. It was the moment that lead singer Dee Snider had dreamed of since he was a kid listening to artists like David Bowie and Alice Cooper.

“I was an outcast,” Snider tells Oprah: Where Are They Now? “I was a kid who didn’t fit in with any particular clique.”

Just one year after releasing its smash album Stay Hungry, Twisted Sister began its swift downfall. The band’s next album, Come Out And Play, wasn’t nearly as successful.

“The biggest thing that surprised me about fame was that it was fleeting,” Snider says. “You work so hard to get there and you just assume that it’s some sort of finish line, or you take a victory lap and maybe spike the ball, run around the field screaming ‘Goal,” I don’t know.”

Snider says the band’s image may have had something to do with it. Glam rock was out and grunge was on its way in, leaving Twisted Sister behind.

“Wearing the makeup and the costumes was a blessing and a curse,” he says. “It helped define my band but it also limited us because it’s very difficult for people to take you seriously when you look as outlandish as we did and as I did.”

Read more, and see more video footage at HuffingtonPost.com.