During a recent episode of his Gimme Radio program “The Dave Mustaine Show,” MEGADETH mainman offered an update on the progress of the recording sessions for the band’s follow-up to 2016’s Dystopia album.
“Thankfully, my partner is coming back out to Nashville, and we’re gonna be commencing on some guitar tracks and solos and some ear candy to wrap all that up,” he said. “We’ve got probably about another… I’ve got one song left to sing, and then another song I’ve got one sentence that I’ve gotta finish.
“Other than that, all the vocals are done on this record, and it’ll be time to focus now on background vocals and the remaining stuff with solos and, as we say… I know I’ve said it so many times — ‘ear candy.’ For you guys that don’t know what that is, it’s just what it sounds like — it’s sticky, sappy, syrupy crap people put on records that help to — I don’t know — make the song sound better. When you’re thinking about AC/DC, you don’t usually think about percussion.”
During a February appearance on “The Dan Chan Show,” MEGADETH bassist David Ellefson has said that the new album is “almost done.”
He said: “The new MEGADETH album is almost done — rounding the corners into the ‘final final.’ It’s funny, ’cause we’d kind of been working on it for four years. Look, COVID, of course, last year changed the course of everything, and Dave [Mustaine, MEGADETH frontman] went through throat cancer treatments the year before that, 2019. So, there have been some diversions. But at the same time, the record’s always been being worked on.”
“It’s funny — my view is that it’s probably kind of been in the works similar to Dystopia; we’re almost on the exact same timeline of when it’s gonna be finished, mixed [and] delivered,” Ellefson continued. “And, of course, as the world keeps attempting to open and then was shutting back down again, especially with live music, you always wanna try to release things around touring opportunities and promotional opportunities. So the fact that we’ve been able to work diligently on it and not sort of be boxed into a tour that would then get canceled or postponed, it’s actually been good. In hindsight, it’s all working out just fine.”
When asked if he would agree with Mustaine‘s recent claim that the new MEGADETH album will probably end up being one of the top four records of the band’s career, Ellefson responded: “Yeah, I think so. I mean, look, these records go through these different phases. It’s hard to talk about something until it’s done. It’s, like, [you say] ‘These are the best cookies ever,’ and they haven’t been in the oven yet. In fact, it’s funny — my wife made some cookies from some gluten-free dough, and they tasted God-awful, the dough. I’m a big cookie-dough guy — that’s one of my faults. And [I thought], ‘These are terrible.’ And then she baked them, and they tasted amazing. So apparently the flour in its unbaked version was not good, but once it was baked, it was delicious. So as recent as this weekend, I had that experience.
“So, again, to sit here and talk about what’s it gonna be like… Dave and I used to always say ‘nothing’s final until it’s vinyl’ back in the old days. So when something’s a work in the progress, I’d rather not boast about it — I’d rather just let the music do the talking. With that said, I’m confident it’s gonna be great ’cause we don’t usually put things out unless they’re [as good as they can be].”
MEGADETH‘s rescheduled “Metal Tour of the Year” with LAMB OF GOD, plus special guests TRIVIUM and IN FLAMES should hopefully kick off later this year. Tickets and dates for the tour can be find here.
