The Making of Countdown to Extinction by Megadeth

You take a mortal man and put him in control.

Watch him become a god.

Withology.

There you go.

That's tonight's.

Is this on?

It's on.

We're back.

We're back.

I didn't think we were going to do it.

Why?

Why not?

Well, because I was away all week.

And then you were away all weekend.

I was.

And then I thought, hmm, this one might not happen this week.

We might have to kick it back for a future week.

We've not.

Yeah, we've been really good, haven't we?

Yeah, we've been really excellent.

For our new listeners who've not got used to us yet,

which there are quite a lot, bizarrely.

We used to have.

We've been very good lately,

but we used to have a habit of just not doing things.

Oh, we'll do that next week.

We'll be fine.

No one will notice.

And they didn't, to be fair.

No, no.

No, but now they do.

They do.

It's worth talking that we are Riffology.

Riffology.

I'm Chris.

We did that at the same time.

That was magic.

So I'm Neil.

You're Chris.

And this week, it's Countdown to Extinction by Megadeth.

Yes.

As voted for by you.

On X.

On X, which is where we do our polls.

I like the polls.

I think that's a good thing.

That's a thing.

24.

Because we're not very good at deciding, are we?

No.

Well, no.

Yeah.

We have a talk.

And then we decide one.

And then by the end of the week, we've decided a different one.

I'm brilliant at deciding, but I'm also brilliant at changing my mind.

That's kind of where the problem.

You're so good at deciding, you do it a lot.

That's where the problem comes in, isn't it?

I have got the, we do this thing at work where it's, what's it called?

Firm Beliefs Weekly Held, I think it is.

So the idea is that you make your mind up based on what you've got.

And then if new evidence comes in, you change your mind.

And then when we were taught it, the trainer came in and he said,

the problem is, it sounds really easy.

He said, the hardest part is changing your mind.

And I'm like, I do that all the time.

I can't, how do you stop changing your mind?

That's what I want to know.

How do I just not change my mind?

I'm waiting for the day where you come in with a tattoo.

That's what I'm waiting for.

It's just not going to happen.

I went to a record store yesterday.

I've been in Norfolk.

Norwich, in particular, it's a city of, it's lovely.

It's a really, really cool place.

Got lost a little bit around some record stores, having a really great time.

And I got my youngest with me, who said,

you're only allowed to buy two records.

What month are we on?

Yeah, let's not go down the whole New Year's resolutions.

One vinyl a month, wasn't it?

It was one vinyl a month, we're way over that already.

And I saw Rage Against the Machine.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And I thought, oh, I've got to have that.

So I'll grab that.

And then as I was walking out, they had like the first five Black Sabbath records.

Oh, nice.

That was just, I don't know what.

As a pack?

No, just individual.

Well, that made it worse, wouldn't it, if it was a pack?

Oh, if it was, yeah.

They've got to do that, though, haven't they?

Surely, surely.

They've got to do like a bundle of those.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Anyway, for the Back to the Beginning thing in July.

Anyway, they had them.

That was just the hardest thing.

I was like, oh, I really like Master of Reality, but I like Volume 4, and I like Paranoid, and

I don't, I don't, I don't, I just, it was, yeah, phenomenal.

And I bought, I bought, I bought Volume 4.

Yeah.

Do you know why I bought Volume 4?

No.

Because it's the one I know least.

Oh, very good.

So there you go.

That's what I thought.

Anyway, we, yeah, we did our poll for this.

You chose the year 1992.

We picked between Faith No More, Stone Temple Pilots, with Core, Countdown to Extinction by

Megadeth, and Rage Against the Machine.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I thought Rage was going to get it.

Yeah.

It's, but the thing is, I think Countdown to Extinction is a bit like Megadeth's Black

Album.

Well, Rust, I think, Rust in Peace.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That was one before this.

Yeah.

Rust and Countdown to Extinction, to me, are, they're like, like, peak Megadeth popularity.

Those two albums are like, they're like the Black, you know, the Black Album from Metallica,

they're that kind of territory.

They're melodic.

Yeah.

Really accessible.

There's some beautiful melodies, incredible lyrics in both of those.

I think this, so Countdown, I think it's got some of the best lyrics.

I think it's something to say.

Yeah.

Mustaine's always got clever lyrics.

It's always got a kind of like, you know, clever lyric.

I think he's quite a clever guy, Dave Mustaine.

But I think his lyrics are, get overlooked a little bit.

Do you know what I mean?

But I think I've got a hot take about that.

Have you?

I have.

I have.

I'll tell you in a bit.

Not yet.

Oh, it's just teasing now.

You're on a flight.

You're totally teasing now.

Well, anyway, I was just going to say that the polls normally work really well for these

because, like, we, you're quite biased, aren't you?

You know, the things that you want to do.

Yeah.

Is that me?

Is it me personally?

No, I meant you.

I meant, like, the royal you.

Because they're a royal you.

I'm well biased, mate.

Well biased.

I really, really wanted to do Rage Against the Machine.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And the reason I want.

I thought we got.

I thought that.

I think we're going to have to next week now, aren't we?

Well, there's a story about that.

We're actually going to have to do Faith No More.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And I will.

Do you want me to tell you the story?

Should we do the story now?

Well, do you want to do your story?

What was my story?

Hot take.

Oh, no, no.

That can come later.

Because, yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's fine.

I can wait for that one.

So, I've been struggling to keep up with our socials a bit this week, if I'm honest.

Is that because they're so popular and so busy?

It sometimes gets a bit like that.

Yeah, sometimes it gets so.

Do you know things that are really popular?

It's like the scrambled album images that we do.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

They get really popular and stuff.

And then some of them is just like, yeah, some of them just get really, really busy.

They're really good social.

I think they're good.

They're good.

I think they're like, riffology socials are like the best pub quiz in the world.

They're good.

So, we did, like, here's a good example.

So, we did one, a poll, Journey's Escape album from 1981.

And we asked to choose your favorite song, Don't Stop Believing, Who's Crying Now, Open Arms, Stone in Love.

That had 46 people, people do voting on it.

That's good.

So, it's quite cool.

We have quite a lot of that kind of stuff.

Yeah.

We did our poll.

We did our poll.

So, Angel Dust, Faith Name More, Core, Stone Temple Pilots, Countdown to Extinction by Megadeth and Rage Against the Machine.

Yeah.

We had a note from Perdita McLeod.

If I've said that wrong, I'm really sorry.

That's a good name, that is.

And they asked for Angel Dust and said it was their favorite record and they were really sad that Countdown to Extinction won.

And I thought, actually, of all of those four, as much as Countdown to Extinction, it was, I'd say it's the biggest, probably Rage Against the Machine was sold more copies probably.

But I think that Angel Dust has probably got the best story.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because you've got Mike Patton being an absolute, do you know what I mean?

Just kind of sticking two fingers up at the record company.

And because we did the other one before, didn't we?

We did the real thing.

Was it the real thing?

No.

Which one did we do before?

Which Faith Name More album did we do already?

Yeah.

It was the real thing.

Yeah, yeah, it was.

Yeah, we did that one.

And it was brilliant.

Yeah, yeah.

If you'd like to go back and listen to it, then it was brilliant.

It's even better than this one, probably.

But anyway, yeah, so I kind of thought, actually, we should do next week, we should do that.

Yeah.

Why don't we do that?

And then do, because we said, I think for years,

even under different models of when we do podcasts, when it felt differently, we didn't do the

album themes quite so much.

We still wanted to do Rage, didn't we?

Yeah.

We've been saying that for a long time.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, we have done.

It's, again, Rage is an album that's grown on me over the years.

It seems it's one of those.

There are some albums that have kind of got like, I'm trying to think of good examples

of albums that have done this to me.

But like, one is Left Hand Path by Entombed, which I loved at the time.

And it's just got bigger and bigger and bigger.

It's like more important to me.

We used to play that a lot on the Dog House when we did that radio show.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I love a bit of Swedish Death.

But there are some albums like Rage Against the Machine is one of them.

Rust in Peace is another one of them.

Really?

And that came, yeah, yeah.

So the album before this one.

Ride the Lightning.

So Ride the Lightning was 1984.

Yeah.

And I would have been 10 then.

I picked up Metallica really with Master of Puppets.

And I knew Ride the Lightning.

Yeah.

But as I have got older, Ride the Lightning's the one I go, that's the one I grab.

Or if I think, oh, I really fancy some Metallica, that's the one I take off.

Even though it's got no bass.

Is that the one, no bass?

No, no, that's Unjustice.

Oh, Unjustice is no bass.

I quite like that as well, actually.

But there are some albums that are just, I don't know, they're like, they seem to have

grown in importance to me over the years.

Yeah.

Which, yeah, Black Sabbath too, like Master of Reality.

Yeah.

That's another one that's kind of grown on me over the, like, I was way too young for it

when it came out.

I think it came out in 71, before I was born, I think.

But it's, there's some albums that just grow in you over the years.

And Rage Against the Machine is definitely one of them that I don't think I listen to

much at the time.

The thing about this one is, this is the Megadeth album cover that I associate with Megadeth.

Oh, that's interesting.

If that makes sense.

So, like, when I think of Megadeth, this is the album cover I think of.

And I think it's because I used to buy, what would it have been?

Something like Kerrang!

Yeah.

Or Ultimate Guitar, Total Guitar, one of these sort of magazines.

Kerrang loved the Megadeth.

Yeah.

They loved Dave Mustaine.

I definitely bought those two magazines around the era where this album came out.

Because I was learning guitar, so I was starting to get into guitar bands.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And this had a full-page spread on it.

And I remember looking at that a lot, you know.

And I don't think I ever even listened to it in full, you know, or anything.

I didn't really know it very well.

But the album cover.

The album cover, the artwork, because it was in this magazine as a full-page spread.

It was something that really, really, really jumped out at me as something quite sick.

I don't know.

I don't know why.

You know, weird memories, things that you can remember.

It's bonkers.

Because I remember, so for me, this one, I remember my mate, Tony, buying it.

Yeah.

And he had the compact disc.

Yeah.

And so I'd run around with my TDK C90 and got a copy really quickly.

I'd never thought about the album cover.

No.

Only until we wrote them.

Because you would have written the track listing on the tape.

Yeah.

And you wouldn't have seen the album cover.

Yeah, no.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I just, it's really weird.

But back, I mean, I'm just trying to think.

Like, back at that age, I wouldn't know.

You know, I was, oh, what?

It's a, like, weird man.

You know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

A bit weird.

Yeah.

It was doing the blog.

Yeah.

When I wrote the blog for this, I kind of thought, what's the, what's the album?

Because it's a weird album cover.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So kind of, there's the man hanging there.

And there's, like, little skulls of animals and things on the floor.

And he's kind of in a cell.

And it was only, there's one of the interviews, I think, that you played.

And then there is, there's this conversation from Dave talking about, I think it came from Nick Menza, the idea.

But this concept that man, or that humans essentially would just kill everything around them until it's extinct.

And then the only thing left is...

It's the animal, the human.

Yeah, it's the human.

And that's what the album cover's about.

It's just kind of, you know, the man's killed everything.

There's nothing left.

Yeah.

It's just, it's just a, you know, kind of an old band.

Yeah.

Do you know what I mean?

And I, I quite like, like, Dave.

I always got the sense of it was almost like this sort of silently screaming into the abyss.

That's what I always felt.

He looks like he's screaming, doesn't he?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

There's that one, I'm trying to think, which is the way it's...

The silence, like, you know, just nothing coming out.

Well, there were, there was other album covers.

Is it Euthanasia, one of the babies?

Yeah, yeah.

They've always had these album covers that have been, I think, been really interesting, their album covers.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

They, they're often not, there's often a theme to them, but there's sometimes it's like not,

like Euthanasia, I think is, you know, kind of a, an easy one to connect.

I think he's definitely like a writer that uses the medium and the format of music to say stuff.

You know, like people just write songs for the sake of writing songs.

Yeah.

Like he's got, he's got some, there's a motive.

There's a motive behind the lyrics.

There's a motive behind...

He's had so many beefs with people, and I think that's kind of partly why.

Yeah.

Countdown to Extinction was written in a period where the anti-rock star was starting to become popular.

When Countdown came out, Nirvana was huge.

Def Lippard was huge.

So you had pop glam music and alternative music, and metal had pretty much eaten itself alive, and there was no more outlets for metal.

magazines were turning their backs on their bread and butter, and going after the anti-rock star, and I truly myself believe that that was in rebellion to Axl, because of what everything that he stood for and how he acted.

And, and I've heard that Kurt hated him, but I never heard it come out of his own mouth, but if you look at the period in 1992, when, when that record came out, it was the survival of the fittest, and we didn't know, should we go melodic, should we stay metal, should we go underground?

And just, you know, a friend of mine told me that he was in the Israeli Defense League, and the army there.

Uh, I mean, uh, the Israeli forces, and he said that when they got in the water, there's a lot of debris in the water, so sometimes you have to go under the wave, or you get hit with whatever debris is in the wave, and, and there's a saying that he said that, uh, cool code, which means every dog has its day, so I knew that if I continued to go under the waves, and just let them pass over me, that I would have my chance, and this was our first double platinum record.

Uh, he, he, he's very political.

Yeah.

And he did, I don't know whether, um, I don't know whether people can remember this, but he, there was a thing called Rock the Vote.

I do remember that.

Do you, like, in, this would have been in 92, I think.

Yeah, this rings a bell.

Around, around then, where the 20 to 24 year olds weren't voting in America.

Right, right, yeah.

And so they were getting loads of rock musicians to go out there and, and do it.

And he, like, Dave Mustaine was like a, you wouldn't have expected, you, that persona from Dave Mustaine, you totally wouldn't have expected that from him, you know, from the outside.

But he's always been super political.

Yeah, yeah.

And his views and perspectives and, and lyrics, incredibly political.

You know, the, um, euthanasia was about, uh, the youth not having a future and stuff, you know what I mean?

It's about that, you know, it, the, it was, I think, designed to antagonize people and get the PMRC excited because it had got babies dangling upside down on clothes pegs and stuff.

But ultimately, it was kind of, well, why should I work hard and do anything when there's, there's no jobs, there's nothing to, you know, there's nothing to do.

I'm, I'm just, I'm checking out.

I'm not, I'm not part of this anymore.

Yeah, yeah.

And even back to, like, P-Sells, you know, the lyrics, if there's a new way, I'll be the first in line, but it better work this time.

Yes.

It's full of that kind of, that kind of stuff, right?

And, um, the way we started the show, you know, that kind of, um, uh, you know, if, if, if you, if you give a man like ultimate power, you know, it corrupts and it's, I don't know.

I think he's, it's really insightful and he doesn't get enough credit.

I don't think for the lyrics that he writes.

I think they're really clever.

I, my person anyway, you know, I think they are, um, I just think, yeah, I think more and more.

I don't know if it, maybe not so much these days, but certainly, you know, during, during this, this, this real heyday of music, which was the sort of eighties, nineties, early two thousands, whatever.

Um, people use music as, as a way to express themselves and their viewpoints and their beliefs and their, you know, their kind of interpretations of the world and all that sort of stuff.

I'm not sure you get that.

You probably, it probably does exist, but certainly not in the mainstream, you know, you have to go digging probably for it.

Yeah, a little bit.

I think, um, yeah, no, I think you're probably right.

Uh, you know, I think, I think as well, you got, um, like, I didn't, so I was just trying to think of the comparison with Megadeth and Metallica.

Because there's, there's, there's, there's a story there in itself, isn't there, in that Dave Mustaine was a member of Metallica in the early days, they booted him or he left.

There's that lovely interview with him explaining about the fact that, um, they, they had, uh, I love, it's one of my favorite interviews, but it's, um, um, so it's Dave Mustaine talking about the whole thing with Metallica, uh, telling the story about how, how in their practice area they had stuff stolen.

Yeah.

So Dave got a dog.

So he's got this, like, this pit bull of a really vicious dog essentially.

And the dog put its paws on, um, um, uh, um, oh God, he, he, yeah, so the dog put his paws on, on like the, the cabs for the, for the guitars.

And then, and then James, uh, kicked the dog.

So Dave, uh, kicked, um, James would like, and, and, uh, Dave Mustaine was like a martial, into martial arts.

Yeah.

And so he punched him and then, and then, uh, James kicked him out of the band and that's that what it was.

That was basically, that was, that's how he, that's how he tells the story at that point.

And it's, um, I don't know, but I guess what I was getting, where I was getting to the parallels here was the, the, like the lyrics for Metallica.

So when they did Anjustice, it got a little bit, it got a little bit political, but prior to, I mean, prior to that they had Master of Puppets, which was about, um, you know, there's a lot of stuff about war.

They brought a lot of that stuff into Anjustice as well with one and a bunch of other things in there.

Um, but kind of, it didn't, they kind of fizzled out a little bit after that, after that, uh, allows, you know, I think there was this period of time where it was okay.

It was, it wasn't just okay.

That's kind of what people were doing.

It was, it was fashionable almost to kind of do that.

Um, but I have to, I do think that Dave Mustaine is really good at it.

I think he's very good at that.

Um, that storytelling.

Yeah.

Cause he's not kind of saying like, I, I, you know, you must vote like this.

It's just kind of, it was almost like plant the seed of an idea.

Breaking down what's wrong with the world.

I think he's really good at that.

You know, we talked about this with Alanis Morissette as well, that storytelling, you know,

you kind of get into the, um, that space where he's, where he's at that character that he's talking about in the song.

Yes.

And I think that's, I don't know, I think that's really, really quite cool.

Madness comes, madness goes, an insane place, one's insane moves.

Breaking them up, just breaking them in.

Quickest way out, quickest relief wins.

Never disclose, never betray.

Cease to speak or cease to breathe.

And when you kill a man, you're a mubler.

You kill many, and you're a conqueror.

Kill them all.

Ooh, oh, you're a guy.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury.

Have you reached a burden?

Yes, we have, your honor.

We find the defendant guilty on all counts for crimes against all humanity.

By virtue of the jury's decision, and the power vested in me by the state, I hereby sentence you to be incarcerated with no possibility of parole or life.

Life?

What do you mean life? I ain't got a life

Boy, your soul better belong to Jesus

Cause your ass belongs to me

Captive honor ain't no honor

Captive honor ain't no honor

No time for questions, no time for games

Start kicking ass, my taking down the names

Aloncet list, my sort of fuse

He is untouchable and guaranteed love

Captive honor ain't no honor

Captive honor ain't no honor

Inside the big house, his nightmare unfolds

Before he got there, his man pussy was sold

Black blanket walker, this tough guy's now a bitch

Prayin' for death, it can't be worse than that

Captive honor ain't no honor

Captive honor ain't no honor

Captive honor ain't no honor

guitar solo

guitar solo

Symphony of Destruction is the title of our first single coming off the album

and it's about taking a normal human being and you put him into a political state

into a position of authority and all of a sudden they become faultless, flawless

and they can dictate to you whether or not you're going to live in freedom

or you're going to be living within the confines of a penitentiary.

The new album is called Countdown to Extinction and what that's about is

the fact that we are slowly but surely eliminating all the different animal species

on the face of the planet and as we keep picking off these other life forms the only life form left will be man

and when it comes down to man hunting man he'll hunt woman first.

I'll probably get on to the hot take now.

Yeah. Oh yeah. I was excited about that. I've forgotten about it and now I'm back. I'm back in the room.

And it was the idea that when I was listening to this earlier.

Yeah.

I was listening going, the guitar's louder than the vocal.

It is, yeah. I think he's always been really self-conscious of his vocals.

Yeah.

Same for, exactly the same as James Hetfield.

Yeah.

James Hetfield, he used to track his voice, like, he used to do lots and lots of tracks of the vocal.

Almost like a masking thing.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And it was on the Black Album, the first time where Bob Rock stopped him from doing it.

That's the first time they stopped him from doing it.

But, yeah.

That's really interesting.

Really, really perceptive.

He does, you know, he does keep these vocals low.

Yeah.

I was, I was listening going, the guitar, the guitar is the lead instrument in this music.

The melody, isn't it?

Yeah, but even on the riffy ones, like, the guitar, the guitar is the instrument.

The guitar is the main focus of the song.

And what's interesting is that you go back and you think about, yeah, well, that's what,

that's what Dave Mustaine did.

He was a phenomenal guitar player.

And he was a guitar writer.

Almost virtuoso.

Yeah, yeah.

He was an incredible guitar player.

Yeah, absolutely.

So why wouldn't he?

Yeah.

If he's that good at guitar and he's that sort of, as you say, maybe self-conscious about

his voice, then why wouldn't you?

You know, why wouldn't that guitar be the sort of main, the main focus of the mix?

He was.

It was crazy, really.

You know, particularly when you're talking about the lyrical content and what you said

there about what he's got to say and all of those sorts of things.

That's really, that's, that's super interesting to me because you, you, you could run the risk

of missing it, missing it, missing the lyrical content because the focus isn't necessarily there.

I think they, like, if you look at the stuff, if you look at the, like those, those kind

of big albums, if you like, right?

So the first major release was Peace Sells, right?

That was the one that was, that kind of got their first, I think that was the first one

on a big label.

So they did a record before that, like Killing Is My Business and that, I forget, was that

on Combat?

It was on Combat Records, I think.

Right, yeah, yeah.

And then the rest came out on Capital.

So, again, like the original, original copies of, of that are, like, just super rare.

And so Peace Sells, when, when that came through, it's pretty fast.

Killing Is My Business was, was Killing Is My Business was super fast.

Yeah.

And then, and then Peace Sells was a little bit slower, but it was, you know, still a pretty

quick record and a lot of, like, really technical guitar playing.

And I think they, the, the guitar playing across all of the Megadeth records was, you

describe it as technical.

I mean, it is, it is really difficult to, to play.

Yeah.

You know, and it's not just like with Metallica, you get James Hetfield with that super, it's

super fast down picking.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But it's, it's not as technical.

It's not as, do you know what I mean?

There's, there's often more melody to the stuff that Metallica do.

Yeah.

But I think with Megadeth, they, it was like, it's like Dave was trying to outplay Metallica.

So it was like faster and faster.

But then we get to this point in the late eighties, like those 1990 records.

So we had Rust in Peace in 90, the Black Album in 91.

Yeah, of course.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And then we had Euthanasia, they're sorry, then Countdown to Extinction in 92 and then

Euthanasia in 94.

Yeah.

That, so you had Rust in Peace in 1990, which I think is probably my favourite.

That's the one, is it?

Megadeth record.

I really like it.

That's the one with Peace Cells on it, isn't it?

Yeah, so there's, so Peace Cells was 1986.

Sorry, so Peace Cells is the other record.

Yeah, Peace Cells was, that was the same year as Master of Puppets.

Right, yeah.

But yeah, so they, we had this kind of change, I think, in the late eighties.

Yeah.

Where the melody was coming in.

Yeah, yeah.

So, I mean, there's the melody, like the Peace Cells, it's got really melodic parts in there,

but they're, they're quite sparse.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And it's, it's about the speed and the aggression.

But then by the time you get into Rust in Peace in 1990, there's a lot of melody.

It's very technical, but there's lots of melodies.

It's like you mentioned, that it's where perhaps you might get a vocalist with the melody.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

With Megadeth, it's the guitar work.

And then Dave's voice is a bit gruff and, you know what I mean?

It's adding the, the weight or almost like a lot of the tracks have almost got this commentary

style to it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

That makes sense.

Do you know what I mean?

It's almost not being sung.

Yeah.

If that makes sense.

It's like, I don't know, it's like almost someone talking over like a, I don't know,

like a weird rap.

The, the bit, um, another bit that I wanted to talk about, which you, which I think we'll,

we'll jump on very nicely to, to something that you spoke about a little early before you

hit record.

Rust in Peace.

I only had like a month to learn all the material, write all my guitar solos and learn the entire

back catalog in like a month and then go into the studio and record it.

So that was just completely hellish for lack of a better word.

And this time, you know, I live with the band, we toured together and we just toured the

world and wrote all this stuff together.

And I had tons of time to prepare myself and it was a lot easier.

Hangar 18 was, was written after I joined the band, but most of my contributions on that

record was the solos.

You know, I really thought them out for myself.

And I had pressed on these slurks, blowing constantly.

My broken body in the rest, I wrapped around a tree.

I crosswalk, hit and run, the finish line for me.

People cluttering up, gotta take a look and see.

No escaping fate, you belong to me.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

No escaping fate, you belong to me.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

No escaping fate, you belong to me.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

By the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

Clinging on to life, by the skin of my teeth.

The one before, that was Rust in Peace.

Yeah.

You had to kind of like learn it.

Yeah.

So he wasn't really necessarily in the band fully.

Until the tour.

That's another.

Or until the recording.

And then for this.

Yeah.

He was like in the band doing this stuff.

I think this is the first record.

The first band record from Megadeth.

Yeah.

I think everything up to this point was essentially Dave.

And some other people.

Yeah.

And Dave Ellefson as well.

I think those two.

You know.

That's a good name.

Dave Ellefson.

Ellefson.

Ellefson.

Yeah.

I'd definitely be renamed to that.

That's a good name.

Chris Ellefson.

Yeah.

But I think.

Yeah.

Reading between the lines with this.

I think.

Although.

So.

Dave Mustaine and Dave Ellison.

I think.

You know.

Would work together.

But.

I think very much Dave Mustaine was the.

The driving force.

Yeah.

Right.

Countdown to Extinction was the first one where you'd got.

A band being a band.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And it wasn't just.

You know.

Dave.

Having his.

You know.

Having.

Dave and friends.

Yeah.

Actually.

A ton of the stuff.

Even up to.

I don't know.

I think.

Even up to Rust in Peace.

Yeah.

There's still stuff in here that.

That.

That Dave Mustaine.

Ideas Dave Mustaine had from way back.

when he was in Metallica.

Right.

Okay.

Oh really.

Wow.

So I think this stuff.

There's concepts in there that he was still kind of just.

Brain dumping almost.

Yeah.

All this stuff.

And I think.

Countdown to Extinction is the first one where you've got a whole band of people.

That are.

You know.

Acting as a band where they're.

Everyone's bringing ideas and.

And changing things.

And.

You know.

Even like the name of the album.

Do you know.

I mean.

All of this stuff is coming from.

From.

From different.

Yeah.

We're the only band on Capitol Records that is like us.

You know.

There aren't like a bunch of like.

Spinoff Megadeths.

And.

And a bunch of like.

Pseudo thrash bands.

Or anything like that.

I mean.

We're the only band of our.

Of our style.

You know.

I mean.

Out of.

Out of.

Our genre of music.

There's only about.

Three or four bands anyway.

That have been able to like.

Maintain.

You know.

I had a lot of stuff that I wanted to release.

But all that time.

I was still looking for bands to that.

I wanted to join you.

I didn't want to form a band of my own.

I wanted to join a band of.

People.

That I could play with.

On a musical level.

And.

That's really hard to do.

So in the meantime.

Instead of just sitting around.

I just released all the material.

That I was writing at the time.

And.

So it came out like that.

And at least.

I got a lot of guitar.

Out of my system.

You know.

There's definitely a lot of guitar.

On those records.

That's really weird.

And really strange.

It wouldn't fit into a band context.

So.

It'd be perfect to be on a solo.

Type of record.

For that kind of stuff.

But in Megadeth.

It's more of a challenge.

To make something.

That's going to fit.

Within the song.

Fit within the scheme of everything.

And just make it right.

For the unit.

And that's.

What I've always wanted to do.

I've never had the opportunity.

To do it.

Hmm.

Well.

The thing is.

Is like.

We had a three year hiatus.

Between so far so good.

So what.

And rest in peace.

And everybody knew.

Damn good and well.

What it was from.

You know.

We were like.

We were.

We were blotto man.

We were too.

We were too high.

All the.

Our partying.

Turned into excess.

And it just ruined us.

And it like.

You know.

It almost broke our band up.

And almost killed us.

You know.

Dave and I.

It's like.

That was bullshit.

So what we did.

Is we just.

We're totally up front about it.

And totally honest about it.

And we never preached at all.

Like.

You know.

You shouldn't do this.

We just like.

You know what.

We did that.

We went down that road.

And it sucked man.

It's a one way dead end street.

You know.

So it's like.

But the thing is.

Is like.

Last year on tour.

I mean.

Everybody.

Was asking us about.

Sobriety and skydiving.

You know.

And they were kind of.

Overlooking a lot of the music.

And they were.

We've like.

Put a real band together.

I mean.

To me.

That's like.

A personal triumph.

To just have a band.

Yeah.

Because it sucks.

To have to like.

Stop and regroup.

And then try to like.

Start up.

Doing that in like.

All the other previous albums.

Was literally.

Just Dave Mustaine.

No no.

I think.

I think.

This has grown from.

A good.

Good parallel for me.

Is that movement from.

The Foo Fighters being.

Dave doing the.

Yeah.

Dave role doing the Dave thing.

Yeah.

On that first record.

And then suddenly.

Okay.

We need to put a band.

But it's a progression.

Isn't it.

It's like.

Yeah.

100% Dave Mustaine.

Yeah.

And then.

And then like.

Peace cells.

Would have been.

You know.

Like.

80% Dave Mustaine.

Do you know what I mean?

And then.

And then by the time.

They're up to.

Countdown to extinction.

You've got contributions.

Yeah.

From everybody.

And it's a little bit more.

You know.

Of a.

Of a group thing.

But.

It's worth talking about.

The.

And if you want a bit of a giggle.

There is a Wikipedia page.

Called the list.

The list of Megadeth band members.

I.

You know.

This might be the longest.

Wikipedia page.

That exists.

In.

In the history of ever.

It's.

It's.

Crazy.

Yeah.

Absolutely crazy.

So.

Current members.

Dave Mustaine.

James Lomenzo.

Dirk Verburren.

And.

Timu.

Manciari.

And then we go into former members.

Of which.

There are.

I mean.

Just.

It's just.

Phenomenal.

It just.

It really is crazy.

Pages and pages.

Pages.

Yeah.

I just.

I just.

It's honestly.

Kerry King.

Was in Megadeth.

Do you know that?

Yeah.

No.

I didn't.

I did not know that.

And then.

But you get a bunch of people in there.

Like.

For example.

It was.

I didn't know that.

So.

He was in the band.

He was doing lovely YouTube videos.

About.

For the last tour.

I didn't know he'd left.

Hmm.

Um.

But he has.

Um.

And it is.

Just.

I mean.

No.

It's.

It's one of those things.

Trolling through.

The list of session musicians.

And.

Previous band members.

Um.

Uh.

I was going to say.

That's the bit for me.

Is that.

Is it about.

Is it about.

That he gets through band members.

As in like.

As in like.

Hiring and firing.

Or.

Is it.

More about.

I think he might be quite hard to work with.

I was going to say.

Is it more about.

Just getting collaborators in.

For a particular job.

And then they move on type thing.

Oh.

There's definitely some of that.

Yeah.

So.

Sammy Hagar.

Okay.

Okay.

Did guest vocals on.

Night Stalkers.

Which is.

Absolutely excellent.

Uh.

Christina.

Scabia.

Um.

Vocals.

For.

Um.

A Toot Le Monde.

Um.

When they.

When they redid that one.

Um.

I just.

I'm.

Honestly.

It's so difficult.

I'm just skimming through.

The list of like.

One thousand people.

Um.

I also.

I'm just looking for.

Recognized names.

Uh.

Yeah.

David Draymond.

Did vocals on Dance in the Rain.

There's a whole bunch of that.

Where they.

Where there are people.

That are just coming in.

To do guest vocals on albums.

Um.

But.

But that's not.

I mean.

You.

You just go and have to have a look at the.

I'm gonna.

I'm just showing Chris the timeline.

For the band.

It's just like.

Uh.

It's that complicated.

It's got a chart.

It is mad.

It's absolutely mad.

And again.

As people have joined.

And then left.

And then joined.

And then left.

And then come back in again.

Um.

Things on Wikipedia.

You have like a table.

And it says periods.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There are periods here.

So April to June 1983.

As fallen angels.

Um.

June 1983.

Then.

Uh.

Another lineup in June 1983.

Wow.

Then another lineup in June 1983.

Another lineup in July 1983.

Then summer 1983.

Then.

And it just goes on.

And on.

And on.

And on.

Um.

And it's.

It's bonkers.

The bit that I wanted to call out though.

While.

Why.

Why.

I would.

Or why I wanted to talk about it is.

Um.

There is a.

Lineup from February 1990.

Yeah.

To July 1998.

Oh really.

Which is this album.

Right.

And it's Dave Mustaine.

Dave Ellefson.

Nick Menza.

Marty Friedman.

And that was.

A stable.

Kind of thing.

I think this is my Megadeth.

This is the Megadeth.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And then.

So that came from.

That did Rust in Peace.

Uh.

Countdown to Extinction.

Um.

Then there was a whole bunch of stuff.

They'd like Angry Again.

And things like that.

Um.

They did a cover of Paranoid.

Um.

And then they did Cryptic Writings.

They did.

They did an album called Hidden Treasures as well.

Which is like a B-side.

Oh cool.

Yeah.

It's absolutely excellent.

So.

All of that material.

I really liked from.

From that.

Lineup.

Fantastic.

Um.

It's also worth talking about.

Um.

Production I think.

Yes.

So.

Produced by.

Max Norman.

Now.

That name.

Should sound familiar.

Yeah.

Ozzy's.

He was Ozzy's producer.

Right.

Um.

Now.

And I can't remember the details of this.

And it's not.

I didn't put it in the blog.

I don't remember reading about it.

But there is.

Like.

There's this.

There's this like.

set of.

Uh.

Scenarios.

Where.

Like.

Um.

Um.

Um.

So the.

Max Norman was an engineer.

Yeah.

And the producer that he worked for.

Uh.

Got fired.

Right.

And then his.

And then.

But it's like.

It's like that.

And then.

Ad.

Ad.

Ad.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's a bit like that.

Yeah.

But he's done.

He did.

Diary of a.

Diary of a Madman.

Bark at the moon.

Um.

He did a ton of.

Megadeth.

Uh.

Records as well.

Um.

Eddie Kramer was.

It was his engineer.

Um.

There's a.

There's a lovely story about him.

He was a bit.

Loud and brash.

And he clashed quite a lot with Dave Mustaine.

Right.

Dave wrote.

Uh.

Like a.

Sharpie sign.

For the recording studio.

That said.

Eddie.

Eddie's not allowed in.

When.

When they were.

Um.

They were recording.

I think it was.

They were fine.

But when they were.

Like being creative.

Yeah.

He didn't like him in the room.

Right.

So he just used to write this thing on this.

And like.

Eddie's not allowed.

Yeah.

And he wasn't allowed to come in the room.

Um.

But.

And the other thing with this album.

Actually.

While we're on that point.

Is.

I think this was one of the first ones they did.

were semi sober.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There's a big.

There's a big thing about.

About.

About.

Drugs.

Yeah.

In this era.

In particular.

There's a thing about.

When you're looking back.

And you're thinking about.

Um.

Motley Crue.

Mm-hmm.

These guys.

You know.

Even Slipknot.

And the way that they were speaking about.

About drugs.

And that.

You know.

There's.

There was this sort of like.

Urban culture of like.

If you're in a rock band.

Then you take drugs.

And that's really cool.

All these guys reflect and go.

We were really screwed up.

It's no big secret that.

That I have a problem with drugs and alcohol.

Um.

It's like.

You know.

People go to these places.

Where they stand up and say.

Hi.

My name is Dave.

And I'm an addict.

And an alcoholic.

And.

You know.

That's cool for me.

But I gotta tell the truth.

I'm a dope seeking missile.

You know.

And.

I'll find it.

Wherever it's at.

Before the last tour.

It was really tough for me.

To be around other people.

That were drinking.

And smoking.

And smoking pot.

And smoking hash.

And snorting coke.

Or doing heroin.

Or anything like that.

Because a lot of me.

There was a jealousy.

That I wanted to still be able to do that.

But I can't afford that luxury anymore.

I just can't.

I want to.

But I can't.

I still want to get loaded.

Yeah.

I mean.

Still get loaded.

I just know that.

If I do.

That it's not going to be worth it.

The temporary.

Feeling.

That I get off of being high.

Is going to be.

Nothing compared to how long.

I'll be miserable.

You know.

Because.

I mean.

I haven't done heroin.

Or coke.

In two years.

I haven't smoked pot.

In over two years.

I haven't taken any pills.

In over two years.

And it's.

It's like.

I mean.

I feel much better now.

You know.

I probably would feel good.

If I was stoned right now.

But then I'm sure.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's.

It's.

I think when we did.

Iowa.

Last week.

Uh.

One of the things that I hadn't realized.

It was only.

We're listening to Corey Taylor talking in the interviews.

It was using drugs to medicate.

Mm.

You know.

That he.

He describes that.

You know.

We.

We had this vision of everything that we hated.

Mm.

About people.

And that's what we were.

We were.

We were.

These kind of rich.

You know.

Music people.

We didn't want anything to do with that.

At all.

Right.

Our art was all about the art.

And about the music.

Wasn't about us.

Wasn't about being famous.

And then we turned into.

Mm.

These people that we hated.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And then.

And then to deal with that.

We were all like.

You know.

Very cool.

We could get our hands on.

We were doing that.

Because we just couldn't stand who we'd become.

No.

Yeah.

And it.

It was a fascinating story.

And I'm.

I.

It's got to be common.

Yeah.

Amongst tons of these people.

Like Dave Mustaine.

For example.

He.

He.

Talks about.

Yeah.

Politics and being.

Being a kid.

And essentially.

You know.

Just being angry about.

Everything in the world.

But.

But it was like.

Not fitting in.

And not belonging.

Yeah.

But coming from nothing.

Yeah.

And then all of a sudden.

Being like.

Super rich.

Yeah.

Super wealthy.

Yeah.

And having anything that you wanted.

And then you kind of almost turned into this kind of big fat cat.

Mm.

Person that you hated.

Do you know what I mean?

Not that many years before.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know.

Trying to deal with that.

The almost self-loathing.

What you.

You turned into this.

This caricature.

Caricature.

This person that you.

You.

Didn't.

You.

That you.

I.

I.

There's got to be.

An amount of that.

I think in.

Yeah.

In what happens.

You know.

In that.

In that.

Going from.

You know.

Obscurity.

To being a megastar.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Um.

Shall we.

Do some minor facts.

Let's do facts.

Um.

Let me get my.

Let me get the blog up.

So.

It was released on.

July 14th.

1992.

Countdown.

To extinction.

Um.

It's interesting.

It's interesting.

This one.

Still gets tagged as thrash metal.

Right.

I'm not sure.

No.

I'm not sure anything that came out from these bands.

Like this.

The Black Album.

Load.

Reload.

Yeah.

There's nothing thrash about those.

It's not thrashy.

It's not.

It's.

It's not.

Kill them all.

No.

Or.

Killing is my business.

I.

I don't know.

It's not.

Like if you look at what Exodus.

Mm.

We're doing.

Yeah.

They were thrash.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They were thrash in 1990.

Yeah.

I'm not sure.

I don't know what.

I don't know what I would describe this as.

No.

It's right.

Well it's just heavy rock isn't it?

It is.

I don't.

I don't.

I don't.

It's.

It's.

It's.

Incredibly commercial.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Shards.

People liked it.

You know.

People wore Megadeth t-shirts that didn't know who Megadeth were.

Didn't know the three songs.

They could not name three songs.

Um.

But it's.

It was an interesting period in.

Um.

In thrash.

There were thrash metal bands that were.

Making.

Um.

You know.

Like.

Commercial.

And Dave Mustaine talks about that.

You know.

Openly.

It's like.

I wanted to be bigger.

And Lars Ulrich talks about it.

Yeah.

Um.

You know.

And so.

I.

The way I think about this is.

It's like a.

It's like maturity.

So.

The.

First albums.

It was like all about playing as fast and aggressive as possible.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Listening to Dave Mustaine talking about the songwriting on those albums.

There's a lot of covers.

Yeah.

They did.

Nancy Sinatra cover.

These boots were.

Boots were made for walking.

The sex pistols cover.

Yeah.

Um.

And Dave talks about not really knowing how to write songs.

Yeah.

At that point.

By here.

Yeah.

They nailed.

They knew exactly.

Yeah.

They knew exactly how to write a song.

Yeah.

Exactly what needed to be in what place.

What.

Exactly what worked.

This.

Um.

Uh.

It's not like a dilution of thrash.

This is just them.

This is that songwriting evolution.

Yeah.

Of the.

Of the artist's sake.

You know.

I.

I don't get it man.

They've got videos of.

People in some of these other clips from these other bands.

And.

You know.

They get away with so much shit.

You know.

The demeaning and demoralizing of women.

Um.

You know.

Uh.

The.

The use of.

Of.

Um.

Fake weapons.

Although they're.

They're not real.

They certainly give the impression that they're real.

We did a song called Motocycle.

Right.

It was a long time ago.

Motocycle came out.

And I thought the video was really super cool.

Man.

It had this really cool.

Japanese movie.

Um.

I don't know if you remember when.

Mike Douglas did that movie.

Uh.

Black rain.

Okay.

This movie called black rain.

And it had a real underground.

Yakuza kind of feeling.

You know.

There was kind of a tonality with the filming that made it really cool.

So.

We filmed in this club that belonged to the hell's angels.

It was their original club up in L.A.

Where all of the significant members would go to.

And it was Sonny Barger's place.

Sonny is the head of the hell's angels.

So.

And then.

We had this.

Um.

Um.

Erotic dance crew.

Is what they were called.

They were not.

Porno.

At all.

So.

These girls came.

And they're dancing.

You know.

And they've got their tops.

Have a little cut here.

So you can see a little bit of cleavage.

That's it.

Right.

They banned the video.

They said it was.

Too much.

Suggestive footage of the women.

And they said that.

It was pornographic.

And that they would let me.

Use the video.

But that I had to chop the shit out of it.

And that was right after they did the same thing with the.

To live on video because that was on the record before that.

If you remember.

We had had that record come out.

And that was banned.

Um.

And so.

Began the.

Beginning of the end with us.

And with MTV.

With all the banning and stuff.

Now.

They just think.

It's.

It's a joke between us and.

And MTV.

And I'm sad.

Because we used to be.

Uh.

Their darlings.

They used to use my track.

Uh.

Peace sells for who's buying as their.

Music clip for MTV news.

I don't know.

It would stop right there.

Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun.

If it would have went.

Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun.

I would have got paid for that.

You know that?

They cut me off by one.

Freaking.

Fuck.

Of a note.

I think that.

Uh.

To a degree.

I've been brought up with.

Old.

Seventies.

Humor.

And.

You know.

George Carlin.

Kinison.

You know.

Andrew Dice Clay.

A lot of guys that were really.

Really.

Um.

Crossing over the.

Safety line.

A lot.

You know.

These were guys that had no idea of.

Coloring inside of the lines.

And.

I would listen to their comedy.

And.

I would.

Incorporate that a little bit.

Into what I was saying on stage.

Runtime.

Forty seven minutes.

Twenty six.

Quite short.

Quite short.

Quite long for a thrash album.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Then that tells you it's not a thrash album.

Number of tracks.

Eleven.

Um.

In the interviews that I.

Uh.

Watched for this.

He.

Dave talks about them recording like.

Fourteen or so songs.

Yeah.

And.

Knowing that they needed.

Songs for B sides.

And stuff like that.

I think.

There's a maturity.

Listening to them talking about.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The planning for this album.

Which I don't think.

No.

They just.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Produced by Max Norman.

And Dave Mustaine.

Um.

Uh.

Yeah.

It's.

Uh.

It's.

It's interesting.

Dave Mustaine.

Talks about this record.

As being timely.

And timeless.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And.

I never really understood.

What he meant.

But I kind of get it.

Yeah.

Now.

There is.

You.

You can.

You can place this album.

Yeah.

In time.

Yeah.

Right.

Where it was.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Um.

So.

Uh.

Again.

The trend at the time.

Was being driven.

Very much.

By.

So Motley Crue.

Did Dr. Feelgood.

In.

Um.

With.

With Bob Rock.

Super popular record.

And then.

Lots of people followed that.

Metallica followed it.

Megadeth followed it.

And that's where this kind of commercial.

Uh.

Commercial stuff came from.

Um.

Classic lineup.

Dave Mustaine.

Marty Friedman.

Dave Ellefson.

And Nick Menza.

Um.

The title countdown to extinction.

Was inspired by drummer Nick Menza.

Who was moved by a time magazine article.

Discussing the impact of human activity on endangered species.

Uh.

Uh.

Cover art was designed by Hugh Syme.

Um.

Which shows the man and decay.

And the.

The only thing left is.

Uh.

Is.

Uh.

Human.

And there's nothing left to destroy.

Um.

Uh.

Uh.

We talked about.

Produced by Max Norman.

Did Rust in Peace.

Yeah.

Um.

Uh.

It was.

Recorded from January 6th.

To April 28th.

So it's not.

That long.

No.

In the studio.

No.

You hear sometimes these albums taking.

Forever.

Yeah.

But I think.

I think partly because they were not.

Um.

Well they were a bit more sober.

For this switch.

Um.

And it also sounds like there were perhaps.

The bulk of the songs were written before they went in.

I sort of sense that's how this band works.

I know some bands go in and they're kind of making it up as they go.

Figure it out.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Whereas it seems like perhaps.

In this instance.

Dave Mustaine would bring.

Would bring the songs.

They'd learn it.

I think they're quite old fashioned.

The demo driven aren't they?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Anthrax did that too.

Yeah.

And Metallica do that.

Where they'll go and do the demo.

And then.

Yeah.

And then.

You know.

Take that in and deal with.

Deal with the things.

Um.

Mixed on an SSL 4000.

Uh.

Standard mics and stuff that we.

We've come to.

Uh.

To go know from.

From this kind of era.

Um.

Jackson guitars.

I think Dave Mustaine's that classic.

Kind of V-shaped.

Jackson guitar.

Which you kind of always.

Always see him with.

Um.

Talked about this before.

But lots of runnings with Eddie Kramer.

Where.

Uh.

Famously didn't get on with Dave Mustaine.

Particularly well.

Um.

Commercials.

Um.

If we look at some of these.

So.

Peace sells.

But who's buying.

Uh.

These are numbers from the US.

But 1.1 million.

In 86.

So far.

So good.

So what.

That was the first.

Megadeth album I bought.

Yeah.

And I loved the cover.

Of it.

I thought it was excellent.

Um.

Has some of my favorite.

Metallica.

Megadeth songs on there.

Again.

1.1 million.

Rust in Peace.

1.2 million.

In Asia.

1.3.

Countdown to Extinction was 2.5.

Right.

So.

Significantly more than you.

It sold quite a lot more.

It sold a lot more worldwide as well.

Yeah.

It was very popular outside of the US.

There were quite a few of the singles that didn't chart in the US but did in the UK.

That's interesting.

Um.

I got something.

I put a note in here somewhere.

Um.

Skin of my teeth did not chart in the US but uh.

Was popular in the UK.

Um.

Um.

And you saw that quite a lot with Megadeth.

They were hugely popular in Japan.

Yeah.

Um.

Where they perhaps were not.

Or tracks and albums and things that were not so popular in the US.

Um.

Other albums that were released in 1992.

Dirt by Alice in Chains.

Vulgar Display of Power by Pantera.

Mm.

Angel Dust by Faith No More.

600,000 copies.

Really?

That sold.

Um.

Dirt by Alice in Chains sold 5 million.

Mm.

And then Core by Stone Temple Pilots was 8 million.

Wow.

Wow.

Huge records.

Big kind of old rock.

Yeah.

Like we had grunge.

Yeah.

But then that like grunge kind of.

It's like a pimple wasn't it?

Kind of this grunge thing that happened.

But then you had this big thick dirty old rock thing that kind of.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But that's interesting.

Although those numbers are high.

That's not an album that you'd perceive as being.

No.

The Stone Temple Pilots one.

You know that's kind of been.

No.

It's not necessarily like one that people talk about now.

No it's not is it?

In the same way that they talk about this or they talk about rage or whatever.

No.

that's really interesting maybe they should yeah we're gonna bring let's bring it back

we're gonna bring it back um lead single was symphony of destruction um

derby rock house they would play like hair metal and stuff and then and then when this came on

you wouldn't the thrash was starting so they would play this and then it would just get heavier and

heavier yeah it would have and then you would end up with like you know 10 or 15 minutes where they

would play stuff like this and then it would get really heavy um so single skin of my teeth symphony

of destruction foreclosure of a dream sweating bullets um and like i say not all of them charted

in the us so it's really weird uh and like um yeah you're not always familiar with some of these things

i you just assume that singles get released at the same place everywhere but they didn't well they did

but kind of um uh did did different performed differently yeah um so yeah uh uh so influences

for the album uh dave mustaine was very political at this point so socio-political lots of the

interviews is talking about politics at the time um he's very obsessed with um i'll say very obsessed with

very uh into what was happening with the youth he felt that the economy he felt that the politicians

of the time were self-serving and were not looking after the country in the best interest of the youth

that were there and he felt that they were being disadvantaged so there's lots of stuff about that

on the albums a lot of the lyrics are about that um also global events so the gulf war

uh and uh environmental yeah yeah things as well so tons of of lyrical content and incredibly good i

think this is for me this is peak megadeth lyrics on on catland um uh bands that quoted megadeth i've

been probably loads of bands really but uh trivium lamb of god avenge sevenfold it's that technical

guitar yeah it's like yeah super yeah very interesting yeah i perceive all three of those as heavier

sounding but actually with that with the same essence yeah melodic guitar based essence it is

is that it's that it's that yeah they're super technical um guitar melodies i think um 1992 stuff

that happened in that year the maastricht treaty um which laid the groundwork for the european union

united states presidential election that resulted in bill clinton's victory over george w bush that's what

dave was trying to do with that kind of rock your vote trying to get kids out to vote yeah yeah

um uh there were always an interesting one as well i hadn't um i've missed this as we're talking that

while they were recording this album there were the los angeles riots yeah um following one of the

interviews did cover cover that i don't i don't think i've kept it in but yeah it's following it was

after the death of rodney king where the police officers were acquitted so they were kind of you know

not guilty um and then in la that just the rights were terrible um but they there was a curfew

so they couldn't recall you know you you only see oh we have lots of these um uh interviews where the

band will talk about like turning up late yeah oh you get in the studio at two o'clock recording by

four or five o'clock still doing stuff at three four five in the morning and then you go home and

you know what i mean and then and then um for this there was a as a curfew at dark so when it got

dark they were kicked out and they had to go let's go home um and dave mustane says that that it gave

them this this structure they couldn't rail against that structure and it was so you know the rights

were so severe and so significant that you know you you were not gonna you know get caught out by it

um uh what else to be oh um uh it debuted at number two on the billboard 200 um by billy ray cyrus

yes yeah could not shift that um the title track won the humane society's genesis award for raising

awareness of animal wow that's cool yeah which i thought was really interested um so it's almost

an activism thing as well through music a little bit isn't it carcass do that as well yeah kind of

they were they were big into animal rights as well they've got i've got a lovely carcass t-shirt where

the heart is made out of vegetables it sounds it sounds shitter than it is it's really good it's really

it's one of my favorite t-shirts um uh uh uh what else oh your reviews um the reviews are really

interesting but uh uh so uh sputnik music gave it four out of five rolling stone to the masterpiece

of technical melodic thrash i'd never thought of that melodic thrash yeah that's exactly what it is

yes it's melodic thrash yeah yeah so i get it it's still got the kind of the down it's driven

isn't it it is got some stuff on it but yeah it's melodic um after this they went on to do

uh euthanasia this this lineup did all the all the best stuff i think um and that is it for

facts i didn't have that many facts on this one uh i should have um i should have uh counted how

many people have been in megadeth that would have been a great question yeah how many people question

yeah how many people have been in megadeth there we go too many to count there's just loads um but

that's i you know this is a great album i really like this i think if you are new to megadeth

this is a good start point yeah so lindsey by the time you get to this part you'll have heard a little

bit of megadeth this is as good as it gets if you don't like this probably not going to like the rest

but if you do like this yeah oh there you go yeah they're boots yeah they're fantastic i think such a

tight band incredible live i've seen them a couple of times live megadeth and they're always just

incredible yeah um they they are uh and like i was really enjoying kiko if you go on to youtube uh just

before they went out on the last tour kiko was doing like tons of backstage stuff about the stack

and about how he gets the guitar tone and they were in like this like what looked like a hanger yeah um

and he's he's just basically playing with tone yeah just playing with guitar tone to get this so they've

got their touring stack uh set up in like uh um i don't know is it just just looks like a big cow

shed yeah but it's just this basically big empty building yeah um and he's just kind of wandering

around with this massive long it didn't even look like it was wireless to me like a massive long cable

yeah and he was just wandering around just tweaking tone to get what what he wanted out of it um it was

yeah it's such a tight band really really really really good

hello me meet the real me and my misfits wave life a dark black past is my most valued possession

hindsight is always 20 20 but looking back it's still a bit fuzzy speak of mutually assured destruction

nice story

so i'm in trouble for the things i haven't got to yet i'm jumping at the bit and my palms are getting wet

exploding minds hello me it's me again you can subdue but never tame me it gives me a migraine

headache sinking down to your level yeah just keep on thinking it's my fault and stay an inch or two at a kicking

i'm in the distance mankind has got to know his limitations

i'm in the distance i'm listening bloodstains on my hands and i don't know where i've been

i'm in trouble for the things i haven't gotten yet i'm sharpening the ass and my palms are getting wet

I'm not getting wet, it's wet, it's wet

You're not getting wet, you're not getting wet

You're not getting wet, you're not getting wet

Well me, it's nice talking to myself

A credit to dementia

Someday you too will know my pain

And smile, it's black tooth grin

If the war is inside my head

Won't take a day off, I'll be dead

My icy fingers claw your back

Here I come again

Feeling paranoid to envy of a friend

Anxiety's attacking me, my hair is getting thin

Feeling claustrophobic like the walls are closing in

Bloodstains on my hands and I don't know where I've been

Once you've committed me

Committed me

Now you've wedded me

When I'm in validity

But your stupidity

I'm tapping into the pit

Once you're turning the axe

Well here I come again

I don't know what we do next, shall we...

Well we said, we said we did Faith No More

Oh we did, yeah

Angel Dust

Yeah, yeah, yeah

That's really good

I...

Yeah, no I'm looking forward to doing that

Yeah

I like Mike Patton and I like Faith No More

Angel Dust I just didn't like

It was one of those albums that I just really didn't like at all

And it's only been...

I don't know, like going back to it probably over the last ten years

Yeah, we found it again

Yeah, and I don't...

It's still not a...

Still not their favourite record

And I like some of his weird stuff

I like Mr. Bungle

Yeah, yeah, yeah

And some of his weirder stuff

But yeah, this one is...

It's like a bit...

It's a bit up and downy

It's a bit weird

It's like...

Do you know what I mean?

They're like...

Yeah, it's a weird one

I know loads of people that love this album

But yeah, I'm looking forward to digging into this one

Yeah, yeah

Love you, bye

Love you, bye

have a good look