Megadeth frontman Dave Mustaine is one of metal’s most opinionated figures. But when Metal Hammer sat down with him in 2013 to talk about his band’s new album, Super Collider, we found metal’s greatest motormouth in unexpectedly approachable form.
Dave Mustaine is happy. Alarmingly happy. Today finds him warm, enthusiastic, gracious. He’s sounding wise and reasonable and being as generous as he can with his time. He’s practically demanding that Hammer and all our families and friends come and hang out with him at every single show on their UK tour. And it’s really fucking weird. Disarming, even.
“I’m totally at peace right now,” he says, with only the slightest hint of glee that comes when someone’s ‘found Christianity’. “I’m at so much peace it’s bizarre. I don’t think I’ve ever really known true peace until right now. Or certainly these past months. In the back of everyone’s minds we always live with fear – fear of losing something, or not gaining something or, in my case, fear of looking bad in front of your friends. But recently I’ve really been trying to live as I really am. And I think our new album reflects that. There’s no mythology about me now, no complicated lyrical meanings. It’s just me.”
You think you know Dave . We all do. He’s the guy who’s famous for shredding, scowling and providing provocative opinions about any subject thrown his way. Google his name and you’ll find a plethora of clips of Dave being pissed off across three decades, his bottom lip petulantly protruding, a flicker of rage in his eyes. Dave Mustaine: the man who formed Megadeth out of revenge at being jettisoned from Metallica. Dave Mustaine: metal’s biggest megalomaniac and sometime mouthpiece for Conservative America. The man who has previously carried more demons than most guitarists have plectrums. A Jehovah’s Witness upbringing. Drink, drugs, feuds. Alcoholics Anonymous. Conspiracy theories. Near-death experiences. Seventeen trips to rehab. Politically incorrect shit-stirring.
Even before he converted to Christianity in 2004 and became the poster boy for that small pool of rock musicians who reject the liberalism of the music industry in favour of that ‘God, guns and government’ ethos, as written in the American constitution that’s remained unchanged since 1787, he was ruffling feathers. In the 80s when Megadeth were enjoying their first rush of success, he was a man mythologised. But where his thrash contemporaries Metallica and Slayer achieved a kind of stately grandeur by the new millennium, Dave was ranting and raving more than ever. Most of it about how America was going to Hell in a hand-cart.
Yet here he is not saying anything remotely bat-shit crazy about how gay marriage is wrong and Barack Obama isn’t a real American and dinosaurs are silly and guns are brilliant and mankind was created by God out of sweet ’n’ sour spare rib one afternoon in 1956. And while he’s no Dalai Lama, today Dave Mustaine is a different man – different even from the Mustaine who Hammer interviewed a mere six months ago.
Today, as Megadeth prepare to release their 14th album, Super Collider, he seems to have toned down the mania. The album might easily be called ‘Best Behaviour’ or ‘Charm Offensive’. The reasons may be practical though: late in his career, the frontman has just landed his own label imprint at Universal Records – something that brings a degree of wealth and power – and also because he’s made a promise to the rest of his bandmates to keep his crackpot theories on lockdown. It is as if an intervention has been staged to prevent any further bell-endery. He’s still slightly out there, mind. Still speaks in the quote-heavy tone of someone who has been in and out of rehab – and church. And he is still, as he recently told Conservative conspiracist broadcaster Alex Jones, “writing songs about how the peasants are unhappy in the valley – me being one of them”.
There are a few surprises on Super Collider. Slide guitars, a bit of a Southern country vibe. Even a banjo. On a Megadeth album.
“Ah, but it’s not a banjo, it’s a ganjo, which is a six-string banjo with the neck of a guitar. But, yes, I think you need to surprise people now and again. It wouldn’t be a Megadeth record if we didn’t. Everything went surprisingly great making this record – Dave [Ellefson, Megadeth bassist, with whom Mustaine fell out] was back, and the other guys were playing like motherfuckers. And then this thing happened where Universal gave me my own label imprint, Tradecraft. If I didn’t know what an orgasm felt like before, then I sure did now…”
So you’re in a ‘good place’ now?
“Someone asked me recently when I first realised I had ‘made it’. I said, ‘Six months ago.’ My arm got so messed up in 2002 that it scrambled my head. I wondered if I was ever going to get my A-game back as a player. My hand went numb, I had to have an operation on my neck… I felt like a hole in a doughnut. I felt like a non-person without purpose and wasn’t sure I would ever play again. It was such a weird time.”
What type of subject do the new songs cover?
“My mother died instantly and it was really hard because so much gets left unsaid and that’s why I wrote A Tout Le Monde [from Youthanasia]. After that my mother-in-law became a surrogate mother to me. She was great. But then she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and it was so painful for us all. It was like watching an ice sculpture melt, and so I wrote Forget To Remember which about my love for a family member. That’s an example of one song but the point is, in the past when we were banging records out one after another it got harder and harder to find things to write about. Now we have time to live our lives between albums and reflect a little and despite the subject of some of the songs, we are in a good place and there’s some fun stuff on there, too.”
Do you still feel like ‘the peasant guy’?
“Maybe I’m delusional but I feel like a normal guy. I think I’m more like our fans than they realise. My Mom was a maid and I grew up poor so I’m fairly in touch with reality – and with most people who listen to hard rock and metal. And metal fans are still stigmatised, too. So I try and write lyrics with meaning, rather than standard metal lyrics. Bless the hearts of other songwriters for trying, but they don’t always help our cause. All you can do is write what you feel at the time. I’ve been revisiting my own lyrics recently as we just celebrated the 20th anniversary of Countdown To Extinction and it got me looking further back. Like, would I use the word ‘sleaze’ as I did back on Loved To Deth in 1985 if I knew the future me would read it? Maybe. Maybe not. What I do know is rock’n’roll could have claimed me a long time ago if I hadn’t changed my ways. I did die once, but for some crazy reason the big guy kept me around for another concert.”
Did nearly dying have any bearing on your becoming a born again Christian years later?
“No. [long pause] I mean, I’d say it might have something to do with it but that’s kind of a personal thing for me. I try not to push it on anybody. It’s like the old saying ‘There is nothing worse than a newly sober drunk’ because all they want to do is tell you not to drink and, actually, not everybody has a drink problem. When my faith changed I wanted to say to people, well you know, look back 25 years to the song Peace Sells and tell me what the first line is: ‘What do you mean I don’t believe in God? / I talk to him every day.’. Because we all kind of believe in God to a certain degree.”
Well, not necessarily…
“Yeah, I know agnostics and atheists would question that but I think we all somehow fundamentally believe in the existence of good and evil. When I was 15, living on my own, trying to hustle money for rent, it was hard. But I somehow pulled it off. Are you familiar with the saying ‘There’s no atheist in a fox-hole’? Basically when you’re all alone you trend to reach out for any help you can get. Even at 15 I was asking questions. There were a lot of weird coincidences.”
What type of coincidences?
“Well, I just realised that maybe it wasn’t ‘God’ as such, but someone was watching out for me – like a kind of guardian angel-type trip? You don’t lead the life I’ve had and survive it without someone out there helping you.”
Your willingness to discuss these things – religion, politics – is possibly why people always want to read a Dave Mustaine interview.
“Yeah, and that’s probably one of my major problems, too. I have a big mouth. But when you love somebody you want to share stuff, and I feel like a have this great ongoing relationships with Megadeth’s fanbase. Whatever’s been going on with me and my life I’ve shared it and people possibly respect that because with me what you see is what you get. I can’t dress myself up as something I’m not. I’m not going to show up painted blue. I’m not going to put on, you know, a rubber suit with tits on it.”
Perish the thought. Is there a tiny part of you that enjoys provocation, though?
“No, I don’t say things to get a reaction. The stuff that I write about is important to me. Some of the subjects on Peace Sells… are still relevant, particularly environmental issues. And the personal stuff is relevant. I’ve written songs about loss and pain – everyone goes through that so, no, I’m not being provocative. We actually have fun songs too. If you’re pissed-off, the title track on Super Collider or Symphony Of Destruction might make you feel better.”
Your mischievous sense of humour and interview rhetoric seems like it has always bordered on the self-destructive.
“Yeah, and it doesn’t translate well does it? Probably the biggest thing that has harmed my career is being misunderstood but is it better to be understood or to understand? I understand much more now so I’m less inclined to be preaching or complaining about being misquoted now. There’s another rock star guy in our genre who I won’t name, who used to make journalists sign all sorts of documents and he’d have to clear the interview before it went out – come on, is that an interview or a 12-step statement? It’s paranoia about how you’re going to appear in print. I’m not like that. There are people who love me and people who don’t, but everyone’s entitled. I have love in my heart for both. I don’t get mad about the people who dislike me. You can get obsessed with that. It used to be that if I was in a room after a show and nine out of 10 people liked me, I’d spend the entire night drinking and trying to convince the one other guy to like me too. Now I think: why? Who cares? Someone doesn’t like? Tough shit for me.”
The internet is like a worldwide manifestation of that scenario. Do you Google yourself much?
“No, I don’t… well, I did back in the beginning when it was like, ‘Wow, my name has brought up 60million websites!’ There’s a lot of propaganda out there; there are people whose sole purpose in life is to make others miserable. I don’t mean just me, but politicians or whoever. It’s not necessary and it’s not kind. Journalism has changed, too. When we were younger, me and the Metallica guys would buy the British metal press and it was like manna from heaven to us. But in the 90s something changed, I withdrew from reading the press a bit because it seemed like writers started to take the piss out of existing bands for no reason. Things got harsh.”
But that’s surely part of the nature of how we respond to art – to praise but also to criticise?
“Yeah, I guess that’s human nature. People get into bands but then when they get big it’s all like, ‘Ah, those guys sold out, man…’ I’m not one of those people. I remember when I first discovered AC/DC I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. Looking back, how many get to have that experience today – where you put the music on, your pupils dilate and you just know nothing is going to be the same again? The magic may have faded slightly, not because of the bands but the way it’s delivered. Man, the music business has changed so much. I remember one time a few years back in Europe I heard this label girl saying, ‘We’ve got some plastic in.’ And I said, ‘What’s plastic?’ and she said, ‘Oh, that’s what we call bands.’ I was like, really, we’ve been relegated to being called ‘plastic’ now. What happened to the days of the press and label guys jumping on the tourbus with us and getting the real story? I cherish those early days of my career but it’s never going to be that way again. Culturally there’s been a big shift but you’ll just have to trust me on this one.”
I’m actually of the age where I have experienced the music business pre-internet, too.
“Oh, so you know what I’m talking about, bro. But don’t you agree that things were so cool when you could get a great picture disc or trade tapes at swap meets? And journalists would go on tour and hang out to get the legitimate biopic – to tell the fan what a band is really like. Because people don’t always want to hear a musician selling themselves in interviews all the time. They want to know what it’s like being you. Ha ha ha! What’s it like when a girl throws a bra and it hooks on your guitar while you’re trying to solo She Wolf, y’know? That’s the stuff I like talking to bands about. Back then you could go to a listening party and drink beer and hear a band’s new album. Now it’s: here’s an email link, listen to the record, now piss off.”
The old way certainly was more fun.
“Yeah, we had a listening party at Universal yesterday and people had fun. I want to do things the old-fashioned way: sitting down with journalists, having a beer. Let’s go back to what made metal cool in the first place. I’m at the point in my career where things feel fun again. This is definitely the most enjoyable time to be in Megadeth. Ever.”
The last time you spoke to Hammer it was the week of the US election and you said the US government was behind a recent spate of shootings, and that America was becoming “a Nazi country”. You’ve also spoken about your dislike of Obama. How has America changed for you since Obama won a second term?
“Well, the American people have spoken and they’ve chosen a new president and whatever happens now, they asked for it. This is part of the beauty of the democratic process. But I’ve promised my band guys that I wouldn’t go out on tangents posturing about my possible future as the President of the United States. Ha ha ha! So I’m going to sidestep all that for a bit…”
Your lyrics are often overtly political…
“The lyrics on Super Collider tell the story of what I’ve believed since I was a teenager. I don’t think things have changed much – not in just America, but the whole planet. We need help in learning how to treat people how we want to be treated ourselves. The cool thing about metal is that, for some strange reason, when I’m with a group of metal fans I feel safer than when I’m with a bunch of people who are ‘normal’ out on the street. I’m more comfortable outside a metal show than in a crowd outside a supermarket because I’m with my own kind. You share a common ground and you know someone’s not going to go wacko on you because you’re wearing the wrong jersey – or because, politically, you’re for or against something.”
That’s true. You rarely see trouble at a metal or punk show. But I have received a few kickings for walking down the wrong street…
“Thank you for proving my point.”
What do you do when you’re not touring or recording?
“I have a beautiful Aston Martin Vanquish that I love to drive. I drive my daughter to school while listening to music, then I correspond with fans and prepare for the next tour.”
What is your biggest vice these days?
“Hot Tamales. They’re these cinnamon-flavoured jelly candies. I’m addicted to them.”
Times really have changed. Who is your favourite band of all time?
“A toss-up between Acca Dacca and Zeppelin.”
The old Dave Mustaine would have said Megadeth.
“Oh, well, my favourite band to be in? Megadeth. Definitely.”
Do you have any pets?
“My wife and daughter have Chihuahuas. We’ve got a miniature horse and two massive horses, too. I also have tarantulas that were named after me. A scientist discovered a new breed in the Arizona desert and named it after me.”
‘Dave The Spider’?
“No, man. I think it’s Aphonopelma Davemustainei or something. It’s insane!”
What’s the biggest misnomer about you?
“That I’m unapproachable.”
You seem fairly approachable today. This interview came with a warning, though: be careful, he might walk out.
“I am approachable! But I have a terrible reputation. There was a guy who used to manage me, and when we had a falling out I think he started rumours about me being difficult. But we became friends again, and reconciled. And that was all part of a process or reconciliation, including with Metallica and Ellefson, too. And do you know what? When that happened my injured arm and injured thumb started working again. Crazy, huh?”
And you think these events are linked in some way?
“Well, let’s just say that being open-minded enough to reconcile with those guys has brought new happiness and that might be a part of it. It’s about mentally letting go. Hell, we all hold grudges, but the question is, in life, how long do you keep holding on to all that old anger for?”
Originally published in Metal Hammer 244, April 2013
