Megadeth frontman Dave Mustaine has opened up about his lengthy history with Metallica.
In a new interview with SiriusXM’s Front Row (as per Metal Injection) to promote Megadeth’s final studio album, Mustaine reflected on his band’s recent cover of Metallica’s “Ride the Lightning”.
“We were nearing the end of the record and we’ve had cover songs by other people, but never a version of a song that I’d done before, excluding what happened with ‘Mechanix’ back in album number one,” Mustaine explained.
Mustaine decided to take on the cover after some encouragement from management. “You’ve got to do it as good as they do it or better. So how do you do a song better than Metallica?” Mustaine noted.
Megadeth set about modernising the song, including reworking the solos, while Mustaine took a different approach from James Hetfield to the vocals.
“James and I have two very unique voices… I sang it a little bit more. I think James kind of had a more forceful delivery,” he said.
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According to Mustaine, fans reacted positively to their cover. “So far everybody that I’ve talked to really likes what we did… a lot of people noticed that we sped it up or beefed up the drums and solos, and they like it.”
Megadeth’s final album dropped earlier this month.
“There’s so many musicians that have come to the end of their career, whether accidental or intentional,” Mustaine explained upon the album’s announcement in August. “Most of them don’t get to go out on their own terms on top, and that’s where I’m at in my life right now. I have travelled the world and have made millions upon millions of fans and the hardest part of all of this is saying goodbye to them.”
Listen to the album and Metallica cover above.
