Megadeth
Megadeth is an American thrash metal band formed in Los Angeles in 1983 by vocalist/guitarist Dave Mustaine. Known for their technically complex guitar work and musicianship, Megadeth is one of the "big four" of American thrash metal along with Metallica, Anthrax, and Slayer,[3] responsible for the genre's development and popularization. Their music features complex arrangements and fast rhythm sections, dual lead guitars, and lyrical themes of war, politics, religion, death, and personal relationships.
"Megadeath" redirects here. For a definition of the term "megadeath", see the Wiktionary entry megadeath.
Megadeth
In 1985, Megadeth released their debut album, Killing Is My Business... and Business Is Good!, on the independent record label Combat Records, to moderate success. It caught the attention of bigger labels, which led to Megadeth signing with Capitol Records. Their first major-label album, Peace Sells... but Who's Buying?, was released in 1986 and was a major hit with the underground metal scene. Band members' substance abuse issues and personal disputes had brought Megadeth negative publicity during the late 1980s. Nonetheless, the band went on to release a number of platinum-selling albums, including So Far, So Good... So What! (1988), Rust in Peace (1990), and Countdown to Extinction (1992). These albums, along with worldwide tours, brought them public recognition. Megadeth's most recent album, The Sick, the Dying... and the Dead!, was released in 2022.
Megadeth has undergone multiple lineup changes throughout its 41-year career, with Mustaine being the sole consistent member of the band. The band temporarily disbanded in 2002 when Mustaine suffered an arm injury and re-established in 2003 without longtime bassist David Ellefson, who had taken legal action against Mustaine. Ellefson settled out of court and rejoined the band in 2010, but was fired in 2021 amid allegations of sexual misconduct. Megadeth's current lineup includes Mustaine, bassist James LoMenzo, guitarist Teemu Mäntysaari and drummer Dirk Verbeuren.
Megadeth earned platinum certifications in the United States for five of its sixteen studio albums,[4] and has received twelve Grammy nominations. Megadeth won its first Grammy Award in 2017 for the song "Dystopia" in the Best Metal Performance category.[5] The band's mascot, Vic Rattlehead, regularly appears on album artwork and live shows. Megadeth has hosted its own music festival, Gigantour, several times since July 2005, and held its first MegaCruise in October 2019.
As of 2023, the band sold more than 50 million copies of their albums worldwide.[6]
Artistry[edit]
Influences and style[edit]
Traditional heavy metal bands such as UFO, Black Sabbath, Budgie, Judas Priest[322] new wave of British heavy metal (NWOBHM) bands such as Raven,[323] Motörhead, Iron Maiden, Diamond Head, and Venom, and punk rock bands such as the Sex Pistols and Ramones had a significant influence on Megadeth's sound.[324] Hard rock bands such as AC/DC,[325] Queen,[326] and Led Zeppelin,[327] as well as German acts like Scorpions[328] and Accept,[329] were also influential on the group's guitar style. Although the music has roots in punk,[330] university professor Jason Bivins wrote that Megadeth followed the basic blueprint of Motörhead and Iron Maiden. He described the style as a mix of "the instrumental virtuosity of the NWOBHM with the speed and aggression of hardcore punk", while also drawing lyrical inspiration from the horror-themed punk band Misfits.[331] Mustaine has also listed albums by the Beatles and David Bowie as recordings that influenced him.[332]
Mustaine is the band's primary songwriter. He develops songs starting with a particular riff that, with modifications, becomes the central part of the song.[333] He has said that song fragments are composed separately, and then the band makes a compact structure from them.[334] Drummer Shawn Drover stated that Mustaine had saved many riffs over the years and that some recent material is based on those demo recordings.[335] Ellefson stated that the band constantly creates new material, and that making a recording begins with exchanging ideas after which the band enters the studio and discusses the concept, direction, artwork, and song titles.[336] The lyrics are usually written after the music is arranged.[337] Discussing the band's lyrics, Mustaine said that many of the themes are derived from literature, such as the novels of George Orwell.[338]
The music of Megadeth and its underground metal contemporaries from the 1980s featured harsh vocals, double bass drum patterns, staccato riffing, power chords, tremolo picking, and screeching lead guitar work; albums from this period were produced on low budgets.[339] After forming Megadeth, Mustaine followed the thrash metal style of his previous band, Metallica, with more emphasis on speed and intensity.[340] When asked to describe Megadeth's guitar style, Mustaine answered: "When you go to a show and see a guitar player who just stands there, that's a guitar player. A thrash guitar player is a guy who plays like he wants to beat the guitar's guts out."[46] Most of the songs are recorded in standard guitar tuning as Mustaine believes it to provide a superior melody to alternative methods of tuning.[341]
In 2017, David Ellefson talked in an interview about how the band recently started to use a lower tuning saying: "it's just natural with age, for singers it can be a struggle, so rather than quit, than not play, how do you work it around? Well, let's drop the guitars, let's find a way to work around it."[342]
During the band's early days, Mustaine was the rhythm guitarist, while Chris Poland played lead. Poland performed only on Megadeth's first two albums at the time of the book's release; (he would go on to play on the 2004 album The System Has Failed); music journalists Pete Prown and Harvey P. Newquist credit him with making the music more colorful because of his jazz influences.[19] According to former Metal Maniacs editor Jeff Wagner, the band's songwriting techniques peaked with the fourth album, Rust in Peace, which he described as a "flurry of precision and fluidity, making good on Megadeth's claim to being the world's state-of-the-art speed metal band".[343] Musicologist Glenn Pillsbury stated the guitar work on the album was a mixture of Mustaine's "controlled chaos" and the "technical brilliance" of Marty Friedman.[77] Studio efforts released in the mid- and late 1990s featured songs with compact structures and less complicated riffing.[344]
Megadeth's lyrics often focus on death, war, politics, and religion.[345] The lyricism centers on nihilistic themes, but occasionally deals with topics such as alienation and social problems.[90] The earliest releases featured themes such as occultism, graphic violence, and Satanism.[37][346] Nuclear warfare and government conspiracy were preoccupations on albums such as Rust in Peace and Countdown to Extinction.[81] During Megadeth's commercial peak, Mustaine elaborated on more personal themes such as addiction and intimate relationships. For the lyrics on Cryptic Writings, Mustaine said that he wanted to write songs that had more appeal to a wider audience.[347] The title of United Abominations is a satiric play on the name of the United Nations; Mustaine criticized the organization's ineffectiveness on a number of songs on that album.[348]
Legacy[edit]
Having sold more than 50 million units worldwide, Megadeth is one of the few bands from the 1980s American underground metal scene to have achieved mass commercial success.[6] Along with contemporaries Metallica, Slayer, and Anthrax, Megadeth is regarded as one of the core founding groups of thrash metal.[349] These bands are often referred to as the "big four" of thrash metal,[350] responsible for the genre's development and popularization. Loudwire ranked Megadeth the third best thrash metal band of all time, praising the group's "provoking lyrics and mind-warping virtuosity".[351] CMJ New Music Report called the band's debut album a seminal release and a representative of "the golden age of speed metal".[352] Billboard called the band's second album Peace Sells... but Who's Buying? a "landmark of the thrash movement" whose lyrics it found still relevant.[353] MTV also recognized the band as an influential metal act, highlighting the technical aspect of the early albums.[354]
Megadeth is considered one of the most musically influential groups that originated in the 1980s. As part of the early American thrash metal movement, the band's music was a direct influence on death metal.[339] Sociologist Keith Kahn-Harris wrote that the mainstream success of Megadeth was one of the reasons for the expansion of extreme metal to countries where it had previously been unknown.[355] The band's sound and album artwork influenced a number of thrash metal bands in the 21st century,[356] including Toxic Holocaust and Warbringer.[335][357] According to Nielsen SoundScan, Megadeth has sold 9.2 million copies of its albums in the United States between 1991 and 2014.[358]
Current members
Studio albums
