band : Megadeth

[Anthony Flack]

Countdown to Extinction was the last one of theirs I ever listened to. I listened to it and went "nope". But maybe it's aged better than I gave it credit for two decades ago. Or maybe you just needed to be eight years old and at Disneyland for that one.

Peace Sells is the last album with Gar Samuelson and Chris Poland. It shows a lot of their British metal influences I think - at times it sounds distinctly like Sabbath, Iron Maiden or Motorhead. Motorhead works rather well for them.

Rust In Peace is their epic prog metal masterpiece, their ...And Justice For All. Long songs. Intricate, complex, fiddly. First album with Nick Menza and Marty Friedland. Widdly widdly guitar solos as far as the eye can see. If you don't like this then you're listening to the wrong band.

Countdown to Extinction it seemed was meant to be their Black Album and Symphony of Destruction was meant to be their Enter Sandman, I guess. Radio songs.

[prowler]

i still think CTE had more bite than the Black Album. just a track like Ashes in Your Mouth is way more evil than any 90s metallica.

[emmanuelle cunt]

I still can't get over the vocals but even without this whenever I try to listen to them I feel like dunno, too metal with not enough of the cool bits to keep me in. And then dude starts to sign and I'm off. That soundcheck stuff is seriously good, though.

[Anthony Flack]

Dave Mustaine's voice is the reason why it seemed so futile for them to try to follow Metallica onto the radio. James Hetfield has a voice built for dadrock, and a band that was growing increasingly inclined towards chugging mid-tempo beats, blooze solos and big Bryan Adams rock ballads. Megadeth were not that band.

[prowler]

even so, it's pretty cool how far they did manage to push it

phpBB [media]

it's easy to underestimate since they were always a step or two behind jaymz&co, but their 90s stuff did have plenty of mainstream success. i'll always have way too much time for all pre-Risk megadeth

[Anthony Flack]

even so, it's pretty cool how far they did manage to push it

As well they might, too. With Metallica becoming so big and Dave Mustaine being a founding member of that band.

Mustaine apparently claimed he taught Hetfield everything he knows on the guitar, which might be a gross exaggeration but to hear them both playing it does seem apparent who was learning from who.

That Letterman performance sounds like some kind of horrible fusion with Lynyrd Skynyrd though.

[Dave N.]

The new mix/master of Killing Is My Business... is worth a listen. More clarity in the rhythmic aspects. You can hear everything Gar does loud and clear, and the riffage isn't muddy. Turns out it was a really great album! Given the new mix, I prefer it to any of the other "Big Four" debuts. Certainly the most peculiar of them.

Curious to hear the opinion of anyone who was on the fence about the album all along.

[brephophagist]

The run of albums from Peace Sells to Rust in Peace is justifiably well-regarded. If Dave Mustaine's lyrics and vocals were not present in Megadeth at all, and all their output were instrumental or just had some kind of cro-magnon grunting going on, I would put them up there with Metallica.

Crap, WF5

[askii]

The new mix/master of Killing Is My Business... is worth a listen. More clarity in the rhythmic aspects. You can hear everything Gar does loud and clear, and the riffage isn't muddy. Turns out it was a really great album! Given the new mix, I prefer it to any of the other "Big Four" debuts. Certainly the most peculiar of them.

Curious to hear the opinion of anyone who was on the fence about the album all along.

I thought they already did this a few years back? I must be misremembering, unless this is another remix/remaster. Either way, I'm listening now (YouTube caveats apply). Was always on the fence about this album during my peak thrash years, and haven't tried too hard to re-evaluate since. The Final Kill version is certainly more transparent and "correctly" mixed, and Gar and Dave Jr. do sound nice, but I dunno. The third-generation-boombox-cassette aesthetic gave the original a sort of claustrophobic "soul", not unlike a lot of primitive black metal. (Same goes for the original vs. reissue artwork, come to think of it.) They (no doubt unintentionally) perfected that recording ethos on So Far, So Bad It's Good... So What!, which sounds like it was recorded on a boombox in an aircraft hangar in Area 51, but is somehow as great as it is objectively terrible.

Kill 'Em All is the only Big Four debut I can really get behind, but Killing is My Business is definitely the weirdest. The cartoonish lyrics and imagery sink it for me. For some reason Metallica's Euro-speed-metal juvenilia is more charming and infectious, plus Hetfield's guitar tone, and those riffs... To be fair, Mustaine wrote several of them, but 'The Four Horsemen' blows 'The Mechanix' away.

Mustaine's lyrics and vocals were a key part of what made their great albums great. Mustaine's, uhh...dubious artistic direction is mostly what made everything after Countdown to Extinction crap (though his politics haven't helped).

[Anthony Flack]

My friends all say/Dave you're crazy anyway

[askii]

OMG, I never realized how hilarious some of these lyrics are. (Well, except for 'The Mechanix'.)

Dave Mustaine wrote:

And this was all you got so don these broken wings
Sands of time run out, bells of Hades ring
Is this a nightmare to un-hallow thy name
Smell of brimstone dancing in the flames
No help now as you fulfill his task
Chief of evil has got you by the ass
Set free to sit upon the throne
Just a dream, you're weeping all alone

Chief of evil has got you by the ass!

Thank you, Dave Mustaine. I really needed a laugh after this terrible day.

[askii]

My friends all say/Dave you're crazy anyway

Isn't it "mental"?

[Anthony Flack]

Yup, you're right. Misquotin'

[numberthirty]

Since this might have come in under the radar...

[askii]

Yup, you're right. Misquotin'

Even better than "mental" is "Hey!".

[numberthirty]

OMG, I never realized how hilarious some of these lyrics are. (Well, except for 'The Mechanix'.)

Dave Mustaine wrote:

And this was all you got so don these broken wings
Sands of time run out, bells of Hades ring
Is this a nightmare to un-hallow thy name
Smell of brimstone dancing in the flames
No help now as you fulfill his task
Chief of evil has got you by the ass
Set free to sit upon the throne
Just a dream, you're weeping all alone

Chief of evil has got you by the ass!

Thank you, Dave Mustaine. I really needed a laugh after this terrible day.

A friend and I used to have this joke that you weren't either...

- Ice T singing the lyrics you wrote for "The Winner Loses"

or

- Dave Mustaine talking lyrics and tracking vocals in this clip...



Then, you are really just dicking around.

[askii]

Thanks, hadn't watched that in ages.

The Megadeth segment in The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: one of these things is not like the others, one of these things doesn't belong...

[prowler]

hey you wimps, megadeth's classic stuff is nothing without dave's kooky voice

[projectMalamute]

hey you wimps, megadeth's classic stuff is nothing without dave's kooky voice

For real. Outside of the first couple albums I'm not even a Megadeth fan, but if you are going to listen to thrash metal dodgy vocals are part of the deal. Try Vio-lence some time.

[Pure L]

2018 remasters are way better!! Thanks for pointing those out!!