Metal, Hardcore, Indie, Rock
As one of the longest-serving members of Megadeth aside from Dave Mustaine, former bassist/vocalist David Ellefson possesses a distinctive viewpoint regarding the thrash metal band’s discography, as per theprp. In the most recent episode of the latter’s ‘The David Ellefson Show’, he imparted some of that knowledge while expressing his opinions on Megadeth‘s just-released final studio album after finally obtaining a copy. The self-titled album came out on January 23rd and has recently become the first Megadeth album to reach #1 on the Billboard 200. Ellefson and Mustaine, of course, had a disagreement in 2021 following Ellefson being involved in a sex scandal. His role in Megadeth was ended shortly after, with icy remarks being traded between the two in the media since then. Ellefson shared his first impressions on that self-titled work.
I hear it and I go, ‘Okay this is a Dave solo record.’ This is Dave and his new band, Dave and his new guys. It says Megadeth, so obviously it gets all the attention, but realistically I hear it, and to me it just doesn’t sound like Megadeth. And that’s just me, period. You know? It’s like Dave, doing what Dave does, but with a different set of guys in a new day. And this is Dave‘s retirement, you know? So that’s my view on it.
Regarding the frequently discussed addition of a Metallica cover, “Ride The Lightning,” to the album, Ellefson noted the ironic nature of the situation. The song, released by Metallica after Mustaine’s dismissal from the group in 1983, listed Mustaine as a co-writer.
The funny thing is [Mustaine] was mad at Kirk Hammett [Metallica guitarist] for playing his [Mustaine‘s] solos and now here’s Dave playing Kirk‘s solo, unless that’s Teemu.
David Ellefson has previously expressed his regret over Dave Mustaine’s fixation on Metallica. Mustaine himself recently confirmed that his relationship with Metallica members James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich is still broken due to a royalty disagreement from 2015-2016, following a period of on-again, off-again friendship. In this recent discussion, Ellefson also touched upon his understanding of the early development of the track “Ride The Lightning.“
I remember being at some party down in Orange County and I think I remember the woman who owned the place, but that was Dave‘s haunts, right? It was Orange County. It’s kind of where he came out of. I remember Ron McGovney was there from Metallica, the former bass player. He was there with his girlfriend and it was a big party, and somebody there had the new Metallica album, ‘Ride The Lightning‘, and we listened to it.
We put it on and I remember Dave goes, “They f*cking stole my riff.’ That’ dah-dah-dah-du-dah-dah-dah’ right? Because we had that. Dave used to play that in the apartment. Greg Handevidt seems to think that was actually in ‘Set The World On Fire‘. And he may be right. It may have been in that song. And then we had to take it out because they [Metallica] used it.
So, you know, they clearly used a couple of Dave‘s riffs. Dave speaks about it now like they were all sitting in the room writing ‘Ride The Lightning‘ together. I wasn’t there, so I can’t, you know, I don’t know the details of it. But it seems to me if it was really a finished song, it would have been on ‘Kill ‘Em All‘, but it wasn’t. It was a couple years later.
So look, did Dave have a participation? Yeah, but it seems to me more like that song was sort of put together after he was out of the group. But again, I wasn’t there. But I do know this, James is a very different lyric writer than Dave was. So by ‘Ride The Lightning‘, you hear very much James coming into his own as his own lyricist, as I hear it.”
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