For Megadeth frontman Dave Mustaine, fractured relationships and persistent adversity have often been fuel for his creative endeavors. Now 64 and staring down retirement amid growing health concerns, Mustaine has seemingly become more reflective than reactive.
In the book of metal, one could devote at least a chapter or two to the 1983 ousting of Mustaine from then rising thrash metal legends Metallica. Fed up with his substance abuse and combative attitude, the band infamously ejected him mid-tour. The indignation and anger from that firing spurred Mustaine to strike it out on his own, creating a thrash metal pillar of his own in Megadeth.
While his strained relationship with his former bandmates in Metallica would influence much of Megadeth‘s early career, the various truces he and ‘Tallica vocalist/guitarist James Hetfield and drummer Lars Ulrich struck over the decades since never seemed to last for long. As it stands now, they once again remain on the outs, following a 2016 royalty dispute over the early Metallica demo “No Life ‘Til Leather“.
While Mustaine continues to express his hopes that they could all collectively once again bury the hatchet and hit the road together before Megadeth hang it up in the coming years, there doesn’t appear to be much in the way of movement in that regard. In a newly published interview with the Los Angeles Times, Mustaine admitted as much.
Despite Mustaine revisiting Metallica‘s track “Ride The Lightning” — a song he had writing credits on when it was released by Metallica after his firing — for Megadeth‘s self-titled farewell album as a proverbial olive branch to his ex-bandmates and a way of ‘closing the circle’, no one from Metallica appears to have reached out to him over the track.
Speaking in this new interview on that, Mustaine offered:
“There may not be a chance to ever say hello to James or Lars again. I knew some people would have a hard time with me doing the song, but that’s OK because I wanted to pay tribute and show my respect. If they like it, fine. If they don’t like it, fine. If they listen to it, fine. If they don’t, fine.”
He went on to add:
“You know, I had a great time when I was in Metallica, and we did something tremendous. It’s a shame what the booze did, but we were all kids and, aside from Lars, we came from pretty broken families. Lots of stuff has happened over the years, but I felt like it would be great to make everything good with them before we stop. We should be friends. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t be friends.”
Earlier in that very chat, Mustaine spoke of the motivation he drew from the then acrimonious relationship he shared with Metallica amid Megadeth‘s early years, and the pressures he claims they exerted upon him. He stated:
“Think of it. Where would I be right now if I didn’t have one of the biggest bands in the world spending their time trying to hold me back? They don’t do it anymore, but most of the time when they did, it just made me shake my head. And it wasn’t just Metallica, it was everybody. For a long time, it very much was me against the world. It was like, OK, if you’re not with me, you’re against me.”
