Megadeth’s Dave Mustaine Dishes on New Album, Autobiography + More

In an interview with Ultimate Guitar, Megadeth frontman Dave Mustaine talked candidly about his band’s 25th Anniversary of ‘Peace Sells…But Who’s Buying’ ‘as well their latest album ‘TH1RT3EN’ and his autobiography Mustaine: A Heavy Metal Memoir.

Mustaine discussed how much the 25th Anniversary of Megadeth's second studio disc, ‘Peace Sells…But Who’s Buying,' means to him: “It’s very rewarding for me on a lot of different fronts. One, I survived and two, there were just so many prophetic lyrics that have been written by this band over the years.”

He continued: “It’s not in any way gratifying for me to sit back and say, 'God, I told you all this stuff was gonna happen. Look at the world— it’s gone to s--- right now.' It doesn’t make me feel good at all but on the other hand it does kinda say, 'If I wanna find out what’s going on in the world, maybe there’s some merit in listening to heavy metal bands ‘cause maybe they have an angle I may not be aware of.'"

Jump ahead eleven records later to their new album, ‘TH1RT3EN.’ When asked if this could have been his last album, he responds by saying, “Yeah, absolutely. I just had my neck fused together. Did you know that? I went to the Watkins Spine Institute in Marina Del Rey on my wife’s birthday of all days and I had to undergo spinal surgery.So that’s the beauty of this thing even happening. When I went in to go do the procedure, they found a bone fragment that was in a vertebra that was in there pushing against stuff it wasn’t supposed to push against and it was causing me all that excruciating pain.”

Mustaine also spoke about reuniting with Dave Ellefson for ‘TH1RT3EN’: “With David Ellefson coming back, to a degree the bass is the same but it’s not. Dave has been woodshedding the eight years we’ve been apart because I know how good a guy is—I can listen to somebody and in just a couple minutes determine if they’re a hack or not.

"I know where Dave was at with his playing when he and I parted ways. He was really good and he was in that pretty untouchable league. And then he came back and he played again and I heard what he was doin’ and it was like, 'Wow, man, he’s gotten so much better in so many areas.' He’s just playing much more mature, aggressive bass playing and I was excited. The songs sounded fresh and new again.”

Mustaine recently released his memoir Mustaine: A Heavy Metal Memoir where he talks about playing the first Big Four Concert back in 2010. He respectfully stated that, “We had been friends for a while and when the four of us parted ways musically -- Kirk Hammett wasn’t part of the picture and Robert Trujillo obviously wasn’t either -- it was for a reason. The reason wasn’t really clear to me at the time. We have two great bands now. At the time I was upset about it and I think a lot of had to do with the fact my judgment was being clouded by alcohol. We all drank but one thing is for sure: We’ve always been friends.”

Mustaine has had a year of ups and downs, but one thing is for certain: Megadeth fans cannot wait for Gigantour next year where they will be joined by Motorhead, Lacuna Coil and Volbeat.