Dave Mustaine is featured in Rolling Stone magazine’s newest installment of “My Life In 15 Songs”, for which he selected songs that represented numerous turning points in his profession, from early METALLICA numbers to MEGADETH classics spanning the band’s whole three-decade-plus existence up to now.
One of the songs Mustaine picked was METALLICA’s “Ride The Lightning”, of which he said: “There’s certain riffs that you hear, and you just know who the songwriter is. And I’m not talking about just when I write. So there are certain parts of ‘Ride The Lightning’ and ‘Leper Messiah’ and the first album, all that stuff, you can tell little things that are similar with MEGADETH’s guitar playing ’cause you know there’s so much you can do with an instrument. I think they did great with it.
“I didn’t write all of the music in ‘Ride The Lightning’. Lars [Ulrich, METALLICA drummer] wrote the melodic intro, and then the next part I wrote and then the next part I wrote and then the next part and then it went back to his part and then it went back to my next three parts and then at that point… who’s keeping score?”
He continued: “I got over [METALLICA] using my songs a long time ago. You can obsess on shit like that or you can let it go, and nothing is gonna change it. You’ve got two great bands. We’re friends. Stuff happened. Fuck, I forgave [MEGADETH bassist] David] Ellefson after suing me for 18 and a half million dollars, I can forgive those guys for using my songs. And honestly if it hadn’t have been for that vehicle, what we started — and I mean we with a capital fucking W-E — you know, I think they did great. I’m really proud of them.”
Mustaine added: “By the time [MEGADETH] put out ‘Killing [Is My Business… and Business Is Good!]’ in 1985, I had moved on. But I had all this stuff in my mind, in my catalog that I didn’t get a chance to show those guys. We were progressing down a very simplistic road with that band. I can’t remember who said it, but someone very prominent, very smart said, ‘METALLICA is like to the RAMONES what MEGADETH are to THE CLASH.’ And I thought that’s probably one of the best things I’ve ever heard. I saw another comparison ‘METALLICA is IRON MAIDEN to MEGADETH is LED ZEPPELIN’ and I thought, ‘Hey that’s really a good way to look at it, too.’ Because we are a little bit more twisty and turny.”
Mustaine was a member of METALLICA for less than two years, from 1982 to 1983, earlier than being dismissed and replaced by Hammett.
Dave feuded with the members of METALLICA for more than twenty years before finally patching things up over the last few years. He has jammed along with his ex-bandmates on a number of occasions during “Big 4” shows and at METALLICA’s 30th-anniversary live shows in 2011.
Mustaine was not inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame with the band during the April 2009 ceremony at Cleveland, Ohio’s Public Auditorium.
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