'I’ve got some physical things going on': Dave Mustaine on Megadeth's final album
Dave Mustaine and the other members of Megadeth. Picture: Ross Halfin
Spending more than 40 years as one of heavy metal’s Big Four alongside Metallica, Slayer and Anthrax, Megadeth are one of the genre’s best-loved bands, having been nominated for 13 Grammy Awards, winning one, and having four UK top 10 albums.
At the helm is long-haired frontman Dave Mustaine, who started the band after his departure from Metallica and guided the band through multiple highs and lows, and it’s clear from speaking to him that rock and roll is not just a job but his lifelong passion.
His band has recorded benchmark metal albums such as (1986), (1990) and (1992), and has had a number of UK hits including and a cover of Alice Cooper’s
However, now the band is preparing to release its self-titled final album, with Mustaine saying he can no longer continue.
“I’ve got some physical things going on with me, we made, I believe, one of our best records ever, and I’ve always said I wanted to go out on top, and I think this is a good time because I’ve got some things going on with my body,” the 64-year-old explains.
“I got cancer and beat it, but I have the damage that’s been left behind with my hearing and with my body, and I had to have my neck fused, my arm got injured, I have arthritis and Dupuytren’s contracture in my hand on my left side, and that’s from the Saturday night palsy.
“So… there’s a lot of shit that’s going on in my body, I’ve been fighting against it, and I think it’s the right time right now, and (it) doesn’t mean I’m not going to play any more, it means that’s our last studio album, and we’re going to go around the world and say farewell to all of our friends.
“We’re an American band, we’ve broken the barriers of just playing in America, like a lot of the national bands do here in America, we’re an international band, so we’ve played everywhere, except for the African continent.
“For me, I wished we would have been able to go down to South Africa, or any of the other countries there that have metal fans, but it just never materialised.”
But despite clearly being proud of his band’s final work, symbolised by a cover image featuring the group’s mascot Vic Rattlehead burning up, Mustaine explains that he did not know the record would be his last until work began.
He says: “We were working on the record and we were about halfway through it, and I had a really long session, we’d been working all day, from the morning until late at night for two weeks, and I was talking with our management, and I said, ‘you know what? My hands are really hurting right now’.
“And I said, ‘I don’t know how much longer I can do this’, so we were about halfway through, and then I thought, ‘I don’t know how much longer I can do this’.
“And then it turned into a conversation, and then the conversation turned into a decision, and then the decision turned into an action.
“We, the band and I, all discussed what the plan is, and everybody’s excited about this record and about what’s going on next, but, I mean, there’s that little, teeny devil on my shoulder that says World War Three is coming.”
Mustaine says that once he and the group knew the album would be their last there was “a lot of emotion” around the studio, but he says he has been left with little choice.
"What guitar player, what person who uses his fingers dexterously, like a guitar player, would want to get their hands operated on?", he adds
The final track of Megadeth’s final album is called but Mustaine reveals it was not initially intended to be the band’s final track, saying it was originally called Jumpers, before his bandmates said the original track was too dark.
Before the track spoke about the band’s end, it was initially inspired by a video of a man jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco.
“So I’m watching the beginning of it… he’s walking down the bridge, a typical punter, mid-length black hair, white shirt, black leather jacket, black pants, white high tops, and I’m watching him, and he swings his leg up over the railing,” Mustaine explains.
“And I looked at it, and I thought, he’s not, ‘oh my god, f***’, and I watched the guy jump off the bridge, and this was real.
“So I watched this guy jump off the bridge, and the feeling I got watching him jump off the bridge was utter shock and terror, so that immediately influenced me, and I thought, ‘I’m going to write a song about that’.
“And I wrote it, and it didn’t turn out the way that I thought it was going to, and Teemu (Mantysaari, Megadeth guitarist) didn’t like it, and… I don’t think he would have said anything about it, but his expression was enough, so that’s why I changed it to
“I just figured, here we are, we’re at a fork in the road, and I’ve always said that when I can’t do my job any more, I’m going to stop, and we’re kind of at the point where I need to make a decision, and I wanted the fans to know.”
Mustaine says he wants his fans to know the band’s farewell tour, which is expected to be a two-year victory lap of the world, may be their last chance to see them, admitting that he had missed out on opportunities to see Led Zeppelin and UFO before they split.
The singer says he eventually saw the Robert Plant-led band when they reunited in 2007 as part of a tribute to Atlantic Records founder Ahmet Ertegun, but says it was “not the same”.
His message to fans who are thinking about going is: “I would check and see where we’re playing, because it might be the last time we’re playing there, but we do plan on hitting up all of our friends and our fans, because you got to do this the right way. I do very much love our fans and want to do the right thing with them.”
Mustaine says the part of being in a band he will miss the most is pulling up at the venue for a gig with his bandmates and “talking and looking out the window and goofing around”.
“You walk in and you see all your friends that are back in the backstage area, and if you’re doing a festival, you pull up and you see all the busses and all the trucks, and you can’t help but get excited,” he explains with passion.
“The thing about me is, I get excited because I get to be part of that, I don’t have to stay on the other side of the barricade, or I don’t have to be pushed back by a security guy.”
With excitement in his voice as he speaks about music, it is clear Mustaine has some reservations about retiring, but when asked whether he thought the band would be a lifelong thing when he founded it in 1983, he appears relieved.
Mustaine says: “Thank you for proving my point about retiring because of what you said, ‘do I think I’ll still be doing this when I’m 60?’, see, that’s the whole thing, when I was starting out, I didn’t think I would be doing this at 60, because I didn’t think I’d live to be 60…
“I don’t remember anybody back when I was that young, that was that old, that I liked, there were a lot of bands that were older, but they just didn’t have the fire, and I still got the mojo, I still have the fire, it’s the pain that comes along with it.
“It’s annoying and hurting, so I’m going to make the best of it these next couple years, and I’m going to sing my ass off and play hard out.”
- Megadeth’s self-titled final studio album is out now
