The masters of metal, Megadeth, are back with their thirteenth studio album titled – wait for it – TH1RT3EN. Despite the MXit spelling of the album title (it’s still a hundred times better than Loutallica’s pathetically named – and wrist-gnawingly boring – Lulu), this new sonic offering crushes with the same sort of venom as Megadeth releases of the past – maybe it’s also because TH1RT3EN consists of older material, which Dave Mustaine had written eons ago.
Drummer Shawn Drover explains why the band decided to revisit the vault. “What happened with this was we were talking about ideas for the new record, and Dave [Mustaine] brought up the idea of “What do you think about us doing Millennium of the Blind and New World Order?”; they were recorded as demos years ago and were released on the Youthanasia remaster, just as a couple of bonus songs that were laying around in the vault somewhere. I really had to back for it because I think the songs kick ass and were never really recorded properly. I thought if we go in there and re-record the songs and make them sound killer, a lot of fans will dig it, because – obviously they’re fans of our songs – but they’re really good songs as well. And I thought it was a unique idea for us to do something like that, as it’s not something we’ve really done a whole lot, to be honest. Those songs kick ass; that’s the long and short of it; we’d never try re-record a couple of songs that suck, you know what I mean?”
Surprise! There’s no surprise!
Indisputably, the Megadeth army will agree the band have never written songs that suck, but what about the new material? Did the band decide to surprise their fan base by doing something completely left-field? “I don’t think so. We’re not trying to reinvent the wheel here. I think we recorded another batch of metal tunes, knowing what our fans and ourselves ultimately want to hear,” Drover says. “There’s a mix on the record: there’s fast tunes, there’s some slower tunes, there’s mid-tempo tunes. It’s a good collection of heavy metal songs. That’s really it. We never really go into studio with any preconceived notions of what we’re trying to do; we just know we got to write a bunch of new metal songs, or, in this case, a couple of old metal songs [which] were included on the record. I don’t think there’s anything on there really that is that musically different that fans are going to go, ‘Oh my God, why’d they record that kind of music?’ At the end of the day, they’re all metal songs.”
Unlucky 13
Mustaine has been very vocal about how the number 13 started appearing everywhere and the odd occurrences around the recording of the album, which included car problems, stuff disappearing and even an employee of his going to jail. Undoubtedly, this added to the mystique and allure of the album’s title being a traditionally unlucky number, but Drover says that nothing weird occurred until after he finished recording his drum parts, which were recorded first, prompting many to believe it could’ve all just been a publicity stunt instigated by Mustaine himself. “I had nothing but positive experiences with this record. It was an extremely fun record and seamless; just a real good time all along,” Drover says. “But after I left, Dave mentioned that 13 kept popping up in weird places and a couple things that happened in studio and whatever. But nothing bad happened to me. I’m also not superstitious at all.”
Om major label to independent?
Megadeth might be sticking to what they know in terms of how they write their tunes, but they could likely be changing their business approach in the future, because TH1RT3EN is the band’s final album on their current record label, Roadrunner Records. Mustaine has been quoted as saying that the band might be going the independent route, but Drover insists that the future is uncertain. “No, we haven’t sat down at all about that. We’re in the “now” right now. We’re focused on this record, and the subsequent world tour that we’re going to do way into 2012 – and God knows how long we’re gonna be on tour for this record – we usually go out for about a year-and-a-half for any record we do, so we haven’t really sat down and thought about anything beyond this tour that’s coming up.”
Drover also dives into the controversial issue of piracy, and how it will likely shape the band’s final decision. “Who knows what can happen two years from now? Maybe some kind of new format will come out, or they’ll resolve this whole crazy issue of definitive piracy, which is continuing to cripple the industry. The problem is that too many people are stealing the music that it has affected every facet of the industry: recording budget, touring budget, bands getting dropped because they’ve only sold x amounts of records…With that said, some bands are taking it upon themselves to release it on their own. Whether we’ll do that or not, I have no idea, to be honest with you.”
Megadeth in South Africa?
Albums aside, Drover is excited that the band will be on the road for a year-and-a-half, which will also see them headline the returning Gigantour in 2012 and a subsequent world tour. “For me, it’s always fun to go somewhere new. We’ve never been down to South Africa, have we?” Nope, Shawn, we don’t recall Megadeth ever having played in South Africa. “Right. Obviously it would be great to come down and see where you guys are at, but that’s something I have no control over. That’s part of the business aspect of it with promoters down in South Africa and that whole kind of thing – that’s something I’m not even involved in. Ultimately, I think that would be a great thing if we could go down there, but we’ll just have to see what happens. But that’s always the fun thing for me just to explore and go to different, new countries we haven’t been to before. Hopefully that’ll happen with you guys as well.”
Who knows, maybe the thirteenth time will be a charm for the local audiences to see the thrashers live and kicking. It’s about bloody time that Mustaine and his merry men get down here!
For more information on Megadeth
Connect with Muse