MEGADETH Bassist David Ellefson What They Owe to METALLICA
MEGADETH bassist David Ellefson talks about the early days and METALLICA band. He also says how they missed the lead to the “Big Four” of 1980s thrash metal.
When we back to METALLICA‘s existence Dave Mustaine, who was the original lead guitarist of the band. But a few times later he was dismissed from the band by Lars Ulrich in 1983. The band was also replaced by EXODUS‘ old guitarist Kirk Hammett and Mustaine went on to found the MEGADETH and achieve worldwide success on his own band.
For this days, the band’s bassist David Ellefson spoke to the Detroit’s WRIF and says:
“Oh, of course. I mean, look, we are all just a branch of the METALLICA family tree. I mean, let’s face it. Especially MEGADETH, with Dave being there, and then me being a branch off of Dave with MEGADETH. So, I mean, look, we owe everything to METALLICA. Those guys broke down the doors for every one of us – ANTHRAX, SLAYER. Bands today – LAMB OF GOD, PANTERA – none of this would have happened without METALLICA being up there as the 800-pound gorilla just carving the path through the jungle that would have never let heavy metal in.
The stuff that they able to do and the size and the scope of which they were able to break those doors down, it changed all of our lives – as musicians, as fans, like everything. That’s why I think when they did the ‘Big Four’ concerts with us in 2010 and ’11, that was just such a great olive branch.”
David Ellefson added:
“As Scott Ian from ANTHRAX said, it’s like we’re all brothers of the same family, it’s just that one of our brothers went off and became Microsoft, and that was METALLICA. It’s, like, how the hell did you do that? That’s amazing. You changed the world. But the fact that they came back and, again, offered that olive branch to us and just said, ‘Hey, we were all in this together. Let’s celebrate what we did together so many years ago.’ And I think that speaks volumes to just how cool METALLICA is.”
Ellefson recently announced the MEGADETH‘s new album on the way in his latest interview. You can also buy Dave Mustaine‘s new book “Mustaine: A Heavy Metal Memoir” on here.