While the relationship has been rocky between Metallica and Megadeth vocalist/guitarist Dave Mustaine over the years, there are positive signs that the years of bitterness over Mustaine being fired from Metallica are mostly behind them. Mustaine himself was of course among the early Metallica lineup of the group before being fired in the early 80’s due to his substance abuse problems.
While Mustaine still doesn’t seem to appreciate the many questions regarding Metallica he’s relentlessly asked via social media, Teamrock.com asked him to share his thoughts on Metallica‘s new album and surprisingly he agreed. An excerpt of what he had to say can be found below:
“I’ve always been able to appreciate the talent in Metallica. Every band has its strengths and its weaknesses. Personally, from everything I’ve heard so far, I think the new album is a good one. I hear that a lot of people have been making comments about Kirk Hammett and Rob Trujillo not writing anything on it. But sometimes that’s just unavoidable.
I guess I would’ve loved more writing from both those guys, because I loved [Rob Trujillo’s former bands] Infectious Grooves and Suicidal Tendencies and I always loved the lines Kirk wrote with Exodus, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles when you’re in the studio. The best songs make the cut. Everyone wants to pick the best things.
When it comes down to critiquing production stuff, it’s kind of a personal thing. One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. For example, I know a lot of people really dig Rick Rubin and the way that he produces stuff. While I respect Rick tremendously, I do think that what he does with bands like The Cult really works and then when he does stuff with metal bands it doesn’t necessarily translate in the same way.
Hardwired is definitely a different sounding record than, for example, St. Anger, and it sounds pretty good to me. I know it took ‘em eight years to make this record so I’m glad for them that people are digging it. It’s a small community, you know?”
You can find the rest over at Teamrock.com.
