A fan posted on Reddit about Dave Mustaine’s interview with Shawn Ryan, “Like many others, I listened to Dave Mustaine’s latest interview – and once again, he turns a passing mention of Metallica into a platform for delusion. Yes, the host brought it up – it’s part of his story. But Dave always takes it too far.
Within literally the first three minutes, he’s “correcting” the intro to claim he’s sold 50 million records with Megadeth and a similar number with Metallica.
Really?
He was in Metallica for nine(!!) months – before they ever recorded an album. Contributing a few riffs to a handful of early songs doesn’t mean you get to parade around claiming credit for tens of millions of records. That’s not legacy – it’s sad, delusional fan fiction masquerading as relevance.”
David Ellefson was recently a guest on The Candid Mic with Fran Strine podcast. He talked about his last time playing with the band Megadeth, which started in 2010 and ended in 2021. He said that when he first came back in 2010, it was only supposed to be for one tour to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Rust in Peace album.
But the tour went well, so he stayed with the band for over 10 more years. This time, he wasn’t a co-owner of the band, he was just a hired musician. He said he was okay with that because being an owner also meant more stress and financial risks when things went wrong.
He said the Big Four tour which featured Megadeth, Metallica, Slayer, and Anthrax, was a very exciting time. Everyone in the bands was happy to be back, and the fans were excited too. Megadeth even won a Grammy during that time. Ellefson said he felt like he and Dave Mustaine had a good final chapter together. He said if they never play together again, that’s fine. If they do someday, he’s open to it. But he’s not waiting around — he just keeps moving forward with his life and music.
When asked if he had talked to Dave Mustaine since being kicked out of Megadeth in 2021 after private messages and videos were leaked online Ellefson said, “Nope, not one word.” He added that their friendship had already started falling apart in 2018. He tried to help write new music for the band, but his ideas kept getting removed. At some point, he felt unwanted and decided to move on.
