Dave Mustaine Speaks

[haVoc 0]

Megadeth's Dave Mustaine posted this on Megadeth.com about what's going on in their camp.

 

"Here is what I have been saying in the interviews, what happened chronologically that caused the demise of the band, why [drummer] Nick [Menza] was fired, [guitarist] Marty [Friedman] quitting, records turning out the way they did, and finally me walking away.

 

 

"When 'Countdown To Extinction' came out, the band and I were ecstatic to have a number 2 record. But if you could believe this, also during that time there were a lot of the 'movie-type intervention group therapy meetings' with me in the middle of a session of what rapidly was referred to as a 'Dave Bashing' session. There were all of these complaints and trying to get me to stop using drugs, as well as comments about my leadership skills. I remember them all taking a test and grading me as well as numerous other shameful and painful exercises meant to crack me or break me down.

 

 

"Well, this really hurt all of us, mostly me. The members at these sessions were Nick, Marty, Junior, Ron Laffitte (manager), Raymond May (counselor), David White (counselor – and not Gadget, the guitar tech). Ultimately, it made me start to be very cautious of everything and we instituted a no-drinking, no-drug clause, that everyone would agree to, myself included. There would be random testing and so on, and this was because of Ron's friendship with AEROSMITH's manager and how this 'process had worked for them.' I allowed more input from not only management, and the band, but also the counselors and even Max Norman, who had gotten more permission in the next record which was called Youthanasia.

 

 

"By the time Youth was done, I had so much inner turmoil that I wanted to leave Megadeth, but instead I asked to do a solo project. I had been writing songs for the next Megadeth record after Youth and because Countdown to Extinction had come in at #2 and Youth at #4, Capitol agreed to keep me happy. I set out to do a punk metal record with Lee Ving called MD.45, and they gave me $250,000 to do the project.

 

 

"As cool as this is for them to have admitted it, Capitol did not market MD.45 at all because it would have possibly interfered with their other priority, the successful band Megadeth. However, the great people of EMI have allowed me to go back in and re-issue this record, which I am totally pumped about.

 

 

"After I faced that I had not succeeded with MD.45 I was ready to do the next Megadeth record called Cryptic Writings. However, before this record, Ron Laffitte called me to tell me that he was going to be taking a job at Elektra Records, and we parted ways very badly. This is where the phrase you have heard 'difficult' came in. Ron and I have since made amends but the damage of his comments about me and the inside damage to my heart from the 'Dave Bashing Sessions' had changed the dynamics of Megadeth forever. And to this day, no one has ever apologized for it.

 

 

"I had gotten a new manager after Ron left named Mike Renault that I really liked, and he had a partner named Bud Prager that came out to meet me and took over, without my consent, or Mike's knowledge, and started to try to convert Megadeth to a different band, a band he had managed before called FOREIGNER. The first days we talked about the writing of Cryptic, how I write, that he wants me to run everything past him, that he was going to assess critically the other band members' music, and he would write with me as a ghost writer. Although you have seen on Risk there was no more ghost writer. This hurt me, hurt my relationship with the band, and Bud's relationship with Mike, and most importantly my relationship with you.

 

 

"'Cryptic came out and while it was really good, it was not really thrash or speed metal anymore. You see, when Countdown to Extinction came out, there was another record called Nevermind out at the same time too. And now there was a fork in the road. Does Megadeth follow the alternative road, does it follow the road it's on, which will lead to going underground, or does it do nothing? I think you can tell by the haircuts, fancy shoes, and clothes that the road opposite the underground was chosen, although we never really chose to follow alternative. Yet.

 

 

"I was very pleased with the results of Cryptic, regardless of the music genre, and relished in the moment. But that was short-lived. The others were fighting with Bud and with me; Bud had convinced me to give the all 10% each of my publishing, which is a sacred way of earning money, one of only two ways you make money off of selling a record, unless you are fortunate enough to get royalties from ASCAP or BMI, of which I belong to BMI. He suggested to buy them out, and he would get them to leave me alone. This is something that he told me was done in Foreigner, a band he managed. But, he never said that he was going to want publishing, that he was going to bring in outside writers, that he was going to give away more of my points to the production team.

 

 

"Now, Countdown to Extinction was 2X Platinum, Youth was 1X Platinum, but Cryptic failed to reach Platinum. It did make Gold status in the USA. Meanwhile, I had a falling out with Nick about an injury in his leg and the hidden drug problems he was having that was affecting his playing. I let him go, but I loved him enough to stay in close contact with him over the next five years. He told me that Junior has called him all of twice in five years. In comes DeGrasso, and I knew him from MD.45, but this was different. Many of my friends told me that he would not be the right guy, and that I was making a big mistake. How could I be making a mistake with a person that played that well? I didn't understand or believe them and went on with it. We started to write Risk.

 

 

"By now the letters had been going out by Bud to the other band members like 'Your songs are a dime a dozen, maybe a nickel,' 'This is awful, like Ali Baba's 100 Arabian nights.' And this anger for Bud ended coming back at me. I didn't want to have to deal with anyone anymore, and Bud was totally power drunk. His relationship with Mike Renault was on the rocks, and it wasn't long until Mike left Bud's firm. On this record Bud suggested making the song 'Crush 'em' and that we use an outside songwriter that he manages named Brian Howe, the singer of BAD COMPANY. He also tried getting me to write with the Country Music Songwriter of the year, some chick that I would have to move out to Nashville to work with for a few days or weeks.

 

 

"Droogies, I did take a huge risk and that was why it was called Risk, because even though I felt this was going to be career suicide, Cryptic had done great at radio. I just hadn't learned yet that radio doesn't always translate into record sales, sales which you need to stay in business. It isn't just about the record sales that keep you in business either. If it appears that you are not selling records, you will more often than not be put into a smaller venue, and so on. The noose gets tighter.

 

 

"When Risk was done, I believed it was a great record, it just was not a Megadeth record. Marty has confessed that he and the management, and the A&R department of Capitol were the ones trying to make Megadeth alternative, and after all of the 'internal terrorism' that I mentioned in Vortex, I just started to give in to this fatal democratic leadership. I surrendered.

 

 

"Once Risk came out and we watched the fans freak out that it was not Megadeth, I said, 'We need to make a metal record, yep we are going to make a metal record!' This is why I believe Marty quit. Sure, he will tell you the songs were simple, or my lyrics were dark, or a hundred other reasons, but I think Marty was happy with the fact that Megadeth was trying to turn alternative; that was until Dann Huff stuck the knife in his back by not telling me that he had not told Marty that he had erased his solo and put a solo by me there instead. Marty was visibly hurt, I was hurting for him, and I knew we were just on life support. In comes Al Pitrelli after Marty has his nervous breakdown.

 

 

"Meanwhile, Roy Lott, the president of Capitol Records made up a fake gold record award to give to me and I couldn't even look at the cameras when they ask us to pose with them. This is because it said to 'commemorate 500,000 sales worldwide' not in America. I purposed hung this record crooked in my office to remind me of who was working on this record. Risk only sold 350,000 copies approximately.

 

 

"So I started The World Needs A Hero with Al, who was a leader for TRANS SIBERIAN ORCHESTRA, and also SAVATAGE. It took a lot for Al to submit to not being a leader and being second fiddle, but Junior did not allow him to be second; that was his spot, and Jimmy wouldn't allow him to be third; that was his spot. So by taking the gig, Al went from the front of the line to the back of the line. I have no hard feelings for Al, he married a nice lady, and I wish him the best.

 

 

"Back to the record: When TWNAH was finished, we took it to Capitol and told them that we wanted off of the label, and they said, 'Give us two songs, let us put out a greatest hits record, and don't release this new TWNAH record that we are going to give back to you for nine months so that it won't interfere with our greatest hits record that we are going to put out.' It made sense to me, and we agreed.

 

 

"Somehow the A & R guy from Capitol Steve Schner (possibly), and certainly someone from Capitol had sent out what seemed like hundreds of promotional copies of TWNAH. We found them all over eBay, and every person selling them had the same story, which lead to the suspicion; 'We found it in a used record bin in a box on the street in NYC.'

 

 

"Sure ya did.

 

 

"And this continued for nine months of illegal downloading on Napster and the like, so that when the record finally came out, it only sold a little over 200,000. This is great for some bands, but it was not great for me. I was watching everything I had built for 20 years die in front of my own eyes. I started drinking in the back of the bus with Al at night, and eventually one day is was in San Diego and was supposed to play an acoustic radio show for KIOZ and found out for all of our trouble and for all of their gratitude, they were playing the song only 2 times that whole week prior to the special show we were doing for them.

 

 

"That night I got loaded.

 

 

"I eventually finished the tour, but I couldn’t stand to be around any of the guys. Junior would walk up to me on stage and I would walk away, Jimmy would miss parts and timed choreographed segues because he was off of his drums yelling at the monitor man. This is the point at the end of the tour I went in to rehab, and where I fell asleep on my arm. While I was in rehab, I had told the band's manager at the time, Larry Mazer, that I needed a vacation and that I was having a breakdown, and that he should pull the plug for a while. He didn't listen.

 

 

"While I was in the treatment center, Junior, Larry, and the others went to the label and said we were starting the new record and that we need a third of the budget, which was $333,000. And when Sanctuary, the label, asked where Dave was, Larry said, 'On a horse retreat.' Now, all of my friends at the label knew I was afraid of horses, and that something was up. So when I got home I told Larry that I was done and that I was firing him and that I was breaking up Megadeth.

 

 

"I told Junior that I wanted to meet him and explain why and show him my hand, which he saw, contrary to his, 'I only know what he told me' statement in Metal Sludge. I told him that I was going to hand everything over to him so that people would recognize him and at first he thanked me profusely, then later that day he started screaming at me in front of my son, in a public parking place. Even though he hurt my son, and me in the eyes of my son, I did not kick his ass. So, I took back the offer to have him run the Estate. Junior said, 'If you're going on with your career, then I am going on with mine.'

 

 

"I called Jimmy to tell him and his girlfriend said, 'You are not living up to your potential to be a decent human being.' I guess she would [know] what that looks like from experience. And then she called me 'a liar.'

 

 

"I wrote the press release and left all of this stuff out because I thought after a year or two that Jimmy would change his attitude, maybe say some good things about his time in Megadeth, maybe call up, and apologize for his girlfriend's rudeness, but that never happened. And I also tried to keep in touch with Junior, but he always seemed to want to know what I was doing, which I would have told him if he wouldn't have been so rude. He was forgetful that for the last 20 years I took care of him and employed him, even after three last three producers and even his lead guitarist wanted to fire him for not being good in the studio.

 

 

"Six months after I last saw Ellefson, I started to play and 13 months later I did a benefit for someone that worked for me and had died. It was very awkward and I left as quickly as I could because I did not want to have to be interrogated by him. Eighteen months later I told Ellefson that I was considering doing a new record and that if he wanted to play with me on it, knowing full well that by asking Marty and Nick, that it would be a 'RIP' line-up record, and NOT A REUNION. I stated numerous times to all three of them, 'It is just a record, not a reunion.'

 

 

"I told him that the offer was exactly what his share is that is in the original contract that he signed with Sanctuary, which is 20% of all Megadeth's earnings on the record, and remember, someone had gone to the label and taken $333,000 of the recording fund. I certainly got my share of it sent to me, but it is still sitting over at the band's business manager's office.

 

 

"You are now completely up to speed on a simple thumbnail sketch of what happened from CTE thru TWNAH and why the songwriting ruined the chemistry of the band, why the records sales went down, and Marty quit, why my arm got hurt, and I will answer in very intense detail all of the questions on the poll when they are chosen.

 

 

"But for know, that's it. I know I did the right thing when I sold all of my personal gear to pay off all of the bills that was owed for Megadeth, bills that none of them volunteered to pay.

 

 

"I wished they would have done the right thing by now, but they didn't. And Junior is suing me and Megadeth. Don't worry though, because after you hear this new record and you see me and Nick together, none of this will matter.

 

Credit: Metal-Sludge.com

[haVoc 0]

MEGADETH mainman Dave Mustaine has posted a message on the group's web site explaining the debilitating injury in 2002 that caused severe nerve damage to his left arm and hand, and rendered him unable to play the guitar. Mustaine's message reads as follows:

 

"In December of 2001, a few days after Christmas, I went out to La Hacienda Treatment Center in Hunt, Texas. I had relapsed and you will find out with the other questions what led up to that, and now it was time to go to get detoxed again.

 

"On January 7th, 2002, while at the hospital, I sat on a chair which I hung my arm over the back of. The hard edge along the top of the seat back cut off the circulation to my radial ulnar nerve. After approximately two hours I woke up and my left hand was numb. I went to the nurse's station and they said it was the hair-tie I had on my wrist. I wish. I had to go into town to see a specialist and he said that I would be lucky if I ever gained even 80% of the use of my arm again. This was unacceptable for me, so I left the rehab, against medical advice and when home to Scottsdale, Az. to get my arm checked out by a city doctor. My Dr. Rahj Singh, a expert in nerve damage, spinal damage, etc. said that I may get 100% use of my arm, but that I would never play the same. He then prescribed the braces you see [here]: Photo#1, Photo#2, Photo#3. I then proceeded to Nathan Koch for physical therapy for 4 months of sessions, three times a week, 1-1.5 hours a day. After I finally got my feeling back in my hand, I realized that I could not even hold a feather in that hand and started a grueling 1-year weight-training program. 13 months after I hurt myself, a personal assistant that had worked for me died in hospice of drug damage, and I was asked to play. It was the first time I had held a guitar since November 17, 2001. Since then, I have completely healed and started taking lessons intermittently to re-learn my trade. After an additional 5 months I decided that I was going to play again, but that is another story.

 

"I know that there are going to be people who are relieved to finally hear the truth, and I apologize for taking so long to tell you, I just wanted to make sure it was finished healing."

 

Credit: Metal-sludge.com

[haVoc 0]

From Blabbermouth.net.

 

MEGADETH mainman Dave Mustaine has hit out at his former bandmates in METALLICA in a recent interview with journalist and author Joel McIver in Record Collector magazine. Read the full article in the U.K. magazine's September issue, out on August 5. A few excerpts from the interview follow (as obtained by BLABBERMOUTH.NET):

 

Record Collector: Rumor has it you aren't happy with the way you come across in the forthcoming METALLICA movie, "Some Kind Of Monster"?

 

Dave Mustaine: "No I wasn't. They edited out a lot more stuff than was there and they sent it to me for my approval. I said, I don't want you to use it. It was two days after 9/11, on my 40th birthday. I was supposed to be at home getting an AMG CL55 Mercedes from my family as a present, and I'm here with one of the guys that I've hated the most in my entire life — my entire existence on the planet — making a video tape in San Francisco, because I can't fly to Phoenix to see my family. And they sent me the tape and I said, 'No, I don't want you to use it,' and they went ahead and used it anyway. I'm like, 'Why send it to me for my approval if, when I say I don't like it, you go ahead and use it anyway?' "

 

Record Collector: Wasn't your approval a legal requirement?

 

Dave Mustaine: "Well, see, they said that I signed the paper so they figured, 'Fuck him, he's signed the paper.' You may remember September 13th, New York was still on fire, we had been up non-stop watching CNN. Everywhere you went, people were freaking out over white powder, there were bomb threats everywhere, you were having all kinds of fuckin' radical military maneuvers and shit... it was a war.

 

"I really don't care to discuss it that much, but what I will say is that I had aspirations at one point of becoming friends with James (Hetfield) and Lars (Ulrich) and doing something again some day in my career, but that door is shut now. That was the final betrayal. And if I ever see Lars again it'll be too soon. I don't care any more. He told me that this was supposed to be about healing. And it was more furthering his career at my expense. I'm done with Lars Ulrich. I haven't heard 'St. Anger', I'm done with them".

 

 

 

 

METALLICA drummer Lars Ulrich has responded to a verbal attack by former bandmate Dave Mustaine over the inclusion of a scene in METALLICA's "Some Kind of Monster" documentary in which Ulrich sits down with Mustaine for a one-on-one therapy session.

 

Earlier this week, BLABBERMOUTH.NET exclusively reported that the new issue of Record Collector magazine would feature comments from Mustaine, who called the inclusion of the scene a "final betrayal," as he had asked the band to cut it from the finished film.

 

Lars Ulrich told Launch that he has no idea why Mustaine is complaining: "The only thing I can say is, I myself felt that when I saw some of the scenes, individually and out of context, they were awkward. But playing in the context of the movie, I think it flows very well. And I hope that he gets a chance to see the film, or sneak in and see it, or somebody sends him a copy, maybe he'll feel different about it."

 

Ulrich also told Launch that the scene was a faithful depiction of what happened during the session: "It's a pretty accurate representation of what went on in the room that night. Look, I don't know — we sent him a copy of the scene, and he asked us if we would not put that in the movie. And we sat down and really respected his inquiry, and we decided it was too integral a part of the movie to leave out. And we kept asking, 'Why?,' and 'Is there anything...?'. Look, I can't tell you. I haven't spoken to him since that day."

 

Ulrich said Mustaine's on-camera outburst was shocking: "I was stunned by the fact that when he looked back on his 15 years of being in a very successful hard rock band called MEGADETH, that the main thing that he saw in that rear-view mirror was METALLICA. It just stunned me."

 

Ulrich said that — despite what Mustaine might be saying — he has positive feelings for his former bandmate: "Look, I've always had a soft spot for him. I've always thought he was very gifted, and kind of a sweetheart. And we've had some good moments over the years. But I was glad that we had an opportunity to throw some of that stuff onto the table. Especially for him, because he just needed to get some of that stuff out there."

 

Lars said the air isn't clear yet: "Well, James [Hetfield] wasn't there. So that was a big part of it. I think I've always been a little bit more forgiving than James, and I think I was more forgiving of Dave than James was, especially early on. So I think that James and Dave have some stuff that they kinda have to wind through."

 

Credit: Metal-sludge.com

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

Ok, now shut up and play your guitar.

[Guest FrigidSoul]

If I ever met Lars Ulrich I would seriously beat the ever living piss out of him. He's got to be the most 2 faced man in music that is always on camera and thinks the world loves him.

 

Hopefully Dave can convince Friedman to come back if he hasn't already. The two of them working together is just orgasmic. Either way though MEGADETH has been and always will be Mustain and Ellefson. If they stick together and write the type of music they want to write then it'll be good.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

I think Mustaine should just go with my old MegaDave idea, where he gets only people in the band named Dave..Add Grohl on drums and second guitar..that could actually happen.

[Guest FrigidSoul]

If I ever see David Ghroel playing within 10 feet of Dave Mustaine I'm going on an all tequilla and whiskey bender while traveling down to Florida to beat you in a drunken rage. Not only would they clash musically but your idea of MegaDave would faulter because Ghroel would want Pat fucking Smears playing rhythm.

 

In closing, lets never discuss this idea again.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

You must be drunk if you think I live in that shitty dick-lookin' state.

[Guest FrigidSoul]

Well once I got to Florida and realised you weren't there I'd go to wherever you were. Its that serious of an offense.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

The guy's already performed with an all star cast of grizzled headbangers on Probot. Playing drums in Megadeth wouldn't be that much of a stretch for him, and Mustaine probably wouldn't care at this point.

[Guest FrigidSoul]

If Mustaine wants to prove all of his nay-sayers wrong and really come back I would think he cares. Its bad enough that Iron Maiden and its fanbase has to put up with Janick Gers in order to have Dickinson around...but you want Ghroel in MAGADETH who is by far one of the most overated musicians of the 90s around and with him comes Pat Smears; The flat nosed, frosted hair tips, throw my homosexuality in everybody's face to annoying levels, can't play for shit guitarist that Dave for some reason has a hard-on for.

 

I love the original line-up for MEGADETH and would love to see them all come back. If they can't deal with Menza then they should go and grab Dave Lombardo. He isn't doing shit right now.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

Except touring with Slayer.

[Guest FrigidSoul]

why's he touring with Slayer when Bostaph is the drummer now? They doing reunion shit?

[Guest Anticrombie]

why's he touring with Slayer when Bostaph is the drummer now? They doing reunion shit?

I though Bostaph dropped out? But from what I've read from Kerry King, Lombardo is only going to be with Slayer temporarily.

 

Slayer's Kerry King Gives The Scoop On Their Current Drummer Status

 

Damn Kerry seems to be very frank in this interview...

Edited July 11, 2004 by anticrombie

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

They've been back together since last year, at least.

[Guest FrigidSoul]

damn Bostaph, he goes through bands like people go through underwear.

 

If Lombardo is only back with them temporarily then he would be a good replacement drummer for MEGADETH.

[Red Baron 0]

Megadave project...

 

Dave Mustaine

Dave Murray

Dave Lombardo

Dave Ellefson.

[Guest GreatOne]

Paul Bostaph left Slayer right after Xmas 2001, interestingly enough War At The Warfield wasn't that long before he left. To paraphrase the old Taker promo introing the ministry, "There was a reconciliation, brother Dave has returned" (as of like Jan or Feb of 02).

 

Saying Dave Lombardo should join Megadeth is like saying James Murphy should join them--a WTF moment.

[Guest FrigidSoul]

redbaron's line-up for MegaDave works for me.

 

It was pretty random to bring out Lombardo but I think his style would work with MEGADETH. He's been in the bussiness a long time so if he joined and then worked some of his tastes into Ellefson and Mustaine's tastes it would create some very high speed and ripping thrash.