David Ellefson shared insights into SLAYER guitarist Kerry King‘s time in MEGADETH on the Disturbing the Priest Podcast.
Kerry King briefly served as the second guitar player in MEGADETH in 1984, during the band’s early days. Ellefson explained that they were looking for a second guitar player for live gigs and King was referred to them.
“When Kerry came in, he was my age – so he was kind of in the right age group,” Ellefson said. “His skills were a little more polished, and he really ‘got’ Dave. He saw Dave play with SAXON at the Whisky or something with METALLICA opening for them, and Kerry said it – that changed his life. It changed his musical arc, his whole career, and his guitar playing. He loved it – he loved being in a band with Dave.”
He also mentioned that King‘s ability to replicate Mustaine‘s riffs note for note impressed the band.
“He could just recite these riffs right back,” Ellefson said. “Dave would show him something, and he’d f**kin’ play it right back. I was like, ‘Jesus, man.’ This was cool. Because with my bass playing, we created a sound, we created a style – as bands should. Bands create something together. You create and carve out sort of a path forward.”
Ellefson recalls how he had also developed as a bassist around the same time. “I came into town teed up, ready to go, my chops were good, my musical sensibilities were good, I studied, I practiced, my gear was together, I had a good head on my shoulders to do it. Getting with Dave, it was like, ‘OK, this is the direction.’ And that’s what we did. So, it was it was fun to be part of the ‘next thing.’ That was exciting.”
In a last year’s interview with Metal Hammer, Kerry reminisced fondly of his first time seeing METALLICA take the stage – an experience which left him awestruck.
“They were great at that point,” King says. “They were ahead of us by at least 16 months to a year. They were doing originals and we were still doing covers. I think we opened for METALLICA with Mustaine, I can’t recall, but I know me and Dave [Lombardo, SLAYER drummer] definitely saw them in a club and we were blown away by Mustaine.
“Still to this day, he’s a f**king great guitar player,” Kerry continued. “It was very awesome, it wasn’t big clubs, you could see from anywhere, and I was very enamoured with seeing Mustaine play these insane leads and James [Hetfield] playing these insane rhythms and barking out these lyrics.
“It was way more extreme than what I thought metal was or could be, it was like another arm of it, so to speak. We all came out around the same time, but METALLICA certainly influenced me.”
