During a recent conversation with Metal Mayhem ROC, Shawn Drover, MEGADETH‘s drummer for ten years, shared his insights and experiences from his time with the band led by Dave Mustaine.
Drover said: “Well, yeah, what can I say? It was a great experience overall. I have nothing but good things to say about that whole experience. And I got to establish tons of great friendships with musicians in other bands over the years that I still have to this day. And you just learn a lot playing in a band that is that big. The whole experience, to me, was really positive and I learned quickly what to do and what not to do, what my job entails and all that kind of stuff.”
“Dave takes that camp very seriously — I would say almost military style with his execution,” he continued. “It’s always been like that. And I took that very seriously as well. So we were always on the same page in many ways. I just have so many career highlights, it would take an hour to go through them.”
During an interview with Canada’s The Metal Voice earlier this, Drover spoke about Dave Mustaine‘s image as one of the most contentious figures in the metal genre.
When questioned about why he believes the MEGADETH frontman is often depicted negatively, Shawn expressed: “I think some of it may be from his political viewpoints at any given time. You know how that goes — politics and religion can definitely rub people the wrong way. That’s certainly, I would say, maybe part of it. Which I never had any comment of any sort on any of that stuff.”
“Who knows? There’s always Monday-morning quarterbacks that talk s**t about something,” he continued. “And a lot of it gets thrown out of context. Something I’ll say on here I’m sure will be on a web site, saying, ‘Shawn said this.’ It’s just to create a headline. It’s clickbait, they call it. It’s just music, man.”
“I have nothing but good memories and good things to say about it,” Shawn added. “If it wasn’t for that band, we wouldn’t be talking today — I guarantee it… I have nothing but good things to say about that. So I’m very thankful.”
Towards the end of 2014, Drover left the group after a decade, as he wished to explore his personal musical passions. Soon after, guitarist Chris Broderick also exited the band, citing creative and musical disagreements as the reason.
