Bang Your Head by David Konow

Author:David Konow [Konow, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-56560-0
Publisher: Crown Publishing Group
Published: 2002-03-14T05:00:00+00:00

After getting kicked out of Metallica in 1983, Dave Mustaine was driven by an intense hatred toward his former bandmates. He vowed to “kick Metallica's ass” with his new band, and formed Megadeth in 1983 with that promise in mind. Even Lars Ulrich acknowledged that after Dave was fired that he would in all likelihood land on his feet. “I thought Metallica would have gone further with Dave,” says Ron Quintana. “Time has proven me wrong. If Metallica only could have contained him.…”

When Mustaine was putting Megadeth together, he hired lead guitarist Chris Poland and drummer Gar Samuelson, both jazz musicians. Neither musician had ever heard any of the speed metal bands that were starting to become popular, and Dave hated the jazz music they loved (he often threw their cassettes out the window of the tour bus). Megadeth's lineup was rounded out by bassist Dave Ellefson, whom everyone called Junior. While the band would change lineups many times, the two Daves remained the core members.

Even with their jazz backgrounds, Poland and Samuelson realized that speed metal was not easy music to play. At the end of every gig, Poland's arm felt stiff as a board from all the fast double picking required of speed metal rhythms. Mustaine's riffs were unorthodox, and Poland initially had a hard time learning his style. But it was Samuelson's drumming that really opened up Megadeth's sound, making the music swing. Megadeth incorporated jazz chops into their music and played in weird time signatures, but never to the point where the listener became lost in a blur of technique. Putting two jazz players in Megadeth is what made their music unique. “It was a wonderful accident, that band,” says Poland.

The name Megadeth was taken from a 1982 speech made by Senator Alan Cranston in which he spoke about nuclear disarmament, and it was a fitting name. With enough nuclear weapons to destroy the earth hundreds of times, Cold War paranoia was at its peak in the mid-1980s. The name was misspelled on purpose, probably because spelling it Megadeath was thought to be too generic or typical. The whole point of the band, and bands like Metallica, was to go against the clichés that had dominated metal for years.

Megadeth also sported “Choose Deth” stickers on their guitars. In the mid-1980s, when Megadeth were starting to take off, the pop group Wham! was extremely popular, and lead singer George Michael wore shirts that read “Choose Life.” In part, it was Megadeth's reaction to Wham!'s upbeat pop. “I said, man, get anybody to choose life except that guy,” says Poland. It was also a statement about the band's growing dependence on heroin.

Megadeth was first signed to a small independent label named Combat, which snatched up every speed metal band it could, from Dark Angel to the Crumbsuckers. Megadeth's first album, Killing Is My Business … and Business Is Good! was released in 1985. The songs were good, but the al-bum's production was terrible. Mustaine would later say that the band spent a lot of the studio budget on heroin.

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