Interview: Dave Mustaine of Megadeth

Photo by Ryan Chang

When Megadeth released their debut album, Killing Is My Business…And Business Is Good! in 1985, then followed it with Peace Sells…But Who’s Buying? the next year, the band became instantly acclaimed as one of the world’s foremost thrash metal acts. It’s a reputation that frontman (and sole constant member) Dave Mustaine has helped the band maintain ever since. There are no signs of slowing down, either: in 2022, Megadeth released their sixteenth studio album, The Sick, The Dying…and the Dead!, then did extensive tours across Latin America and Europe. This month, they’re playing shows across North America (dates and locations listed below) with special opening acts Mudvayne and All That Remains. During a recent phone call with The Big Takeover, Mustaine discusses Megadeth’s evolving approach to their performances, plans for new music, and how he is determined to give back by mentoring up-&-coming artists.

How did you know it was the right time for Megadeth to do this latest tour of North America?

DAVE MUSTAINE: This is kind of the culmination of the campaign for The Dying and the Dead. We’re getting ready psychologically, and all the other things that go in it, to make the new record. We’re planning on putting ideas together at the end of this year, or by the beginning of next year. I’m super excited because our lineup right now is one of the best we’ve ever had. It’s as exciting as the Rust in Peace [1990] lineup was for me. And all the players that I have right now are really, really good players and we feel like a band. It’s just great – the energy we have onstage, the songs selections that we’ve been able to choose now. You know, trying to encourage people that you’re playing with to go and learn new songs should be fun, and we were stuck with the same set list for years and years due to one or more of us just not wanting to learn new songs. The other thing that goes with us being stuck in a certain set list is, we were playing along to certain production onstage – we had decided a few years ago to try and use video – and [It’s also] picking songs that I can sing because my voice had been ruined, and that’s a big thing, too. [Mustaine successfully underwent treatment for throat cancer that had been diagnosed in 2019.] I would never want to blame any of the Megadeth alumni for anything that I couldn’t do, but the video part, too, added an additional problem to everything being flexible with the set list. So we chucked that idea and went back to being just a thrash band and playing our songs from all throughout our catalog, not just the hits. We must play certain songs, like “Holy Wars,” like “Peace Sells,” like “Symphony [of Destruction],” and we should play songs like “Trust” and “Tornado [of Souls],” but there’s been something really liberating, too, with going back and adding songs people haven’t heard in forever because their eyes get big and you see them grabbing their friends next to them or high fiving their buddy or hugging their girlfriends. They just get super excited because they’re hearing a song that they have never heard [performed live]. A lot of our fans are teenagers, and a lot of these records were made before these new fans were even born. So this is all a righteous experience for them.

How is touring impacting the way you’re writing songs for the next album?

DAVE MUSTAINE: [My bandmates] have made it real fun for me to want to play again. The only time we really have for us to do a rehearsal is in the jam room, which is backstage. Because when we get to the venue, the first thing we want to do is get the soundcheck out of the way, and we try and do the soundcheck in an hour. I do that because I want the special guests to be able to go do their soundcheck. Not a line check, not go out and set their stuff up, not anything that would make them feel like they were insignificant.

That’s a generous thing for a headliner to do for the other artists on the bill – it doesn’t always happen that way.

DAVE MUSTAINE: Yeah, well, Dave Mustaine’s such an asshole, isn’t he? [laughs] Ask any of the bands that tour with me. I do that every time. Four o’clock, the stage is yours for an hour. Five o’clock we stop for dinner, and if there’s any time left after that, it’s theirs again. If there’s three bands, sometimes it’ll be sound check for the special guests and line check for the opening band, but they get to keep the stage until doors are open after dinner. I try and make up for all of the bad things people say about me. Some of them are true, but a lot of them are not. I think when it’s time to do a concert, any of my history and any of my personal stuff doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t interfere with a younger band being able to go out and do their job and show people what they can do, because at the end of the day, this is their shot, for many of them.

Do you ever give advice to opening bands to help them avoid some of the pitfalls that you’ve encountered?

DAVE MUSTAINE: Mostly if they ask. I don’t give free advice because that’s kind of like playing God. If they ask me I’ll say stuff. Or if there’s something I really like that they’re doing, I’ll talk to them about it and say, “I really like this.” I remember * Stone Temple Pilots* when they first came out, they had that record Core [in 1992]. I heard that first record and I thought, “Shit, these guys are good!” So we took them out [on tour]. First show, I watched them and they didn’t do very good. I went up them and I said, “Guys, can you give me your set list?” And I looked at all their songs, and I made a proper set list, so they had a super hot opening. And the only other thing I told [lead singer] Scott Weiland, “What is this song right here?” And he goes, “Oh, it’s an instrumental.” I said, “So why are you standing out on the stage? During that part, go off to the side of the stage. Let the musicians who are doing an instrumental be showcased. You’re the frontman. People are going to look at you almost all night anyway.” So that was the only advice I ever gave them.

Well, it obviously worked!

DAVE MUSTAINE: Yeah, it did! You know what happened? I was so mad at myself for doing that because that tour only went on about another week because after that, we got word that they had exploded and they were leaving the tour to go on a bigger tour. I thought, “Fuck, Dave, you shouldn’t have said anything!” [laughs]

When you were starting out in the Los Angeles music scene, did you have any inkling that you would have the kind of career that you’ve ended up having?

DAVE MUSTAINE: In my heart, I had hoped that I could continue playing for as long as I live. The question was, how long was I going to live? We were all in this [L.A.] scene at the time that everybody was living super fast and dangerous. People like [Motley Crue lead singer] Vince Neil getting in a car crash and the drummer for Hanoi Rocks losing his life, that whole period around then – everybody was just dangerous. We had to get away from that. All I wanted to do was just play my guitar. I didn’t want to hang. I was not one of those guys that would go over to people’s houses and party all night. If I was doing anything, I would do it by myself in the house and play guitar. Not that I was alone in my house, but you know. For me, I didn’t have a Plan B. And I didn’t want to have a Plan B because my Plan A was all that mattered. And I wasn’t going to take no for an answer. Growing up homeless, growing up a poor kid, that does something to you. So yeah, being a poor kid and going from house to house to house, and wearing hand-me-down clothes all the time, and living in a car for as long as I did, that changed me. And that’s what I think drove me to want to be successful because I didn’t want to be that guy. I didn’t want to be stuck in a situation of being homeless and living in a car. I was not going to settle for that. So that’s why I worked as hard as I did. Some people will say I was callous with the [Megadeth] lineup changes and stuff like that, but with every one of the lineup changes we had, there was a really legitimate reason that we made a change.

All of the changes you’ve navigated with this band seem to have worked, because you have songs that have remained popular for decades now. But when you have to play those all the time, how do you avoid getting burned out on them?

DAVE MUSTAINE: Because I know deep down in my heart there’s always someone there for the first time, and that’s the greatest thing ever!