Megadeth is currently on the road in support of their latest self-titled album having embarked on what’s being billed as a lengthy farewell tour. The new record also features the band covering the Metallica classic, “Ride The Lightning,” which frontman Dave Mustaine helped co-write back in the early ‘80s.
In a new interview with Brazil’s Ibagenscast, Mustaine talked about why the band covered the tune and why he says many fans are calling it better than the original. “I’ve got a really good explanation for you. That was one of the songs that I wrote with James (Hetfield), and just like the other songs that I wrote, something happened when I left. Parts were changed, credits were assigned to other people, and I thought of all the songs, ‘Ride The Lightning’ showcased my guitar talents the best: the spider chord that I invented, the grunting chords. Those were things that bands weren’t doing. And it happens in ‘Ride The Lightning’.”
He continued: “I’ve always thought that James was an excellent guitar player, so when we set out to do the song, we figured we needed to do it as good or better than the original. And we figured, how are we gonna do that? Metallica’s an amazing group. So we sped it up just a little bit, made it a little bit more frantic, and then we kind of spiced up the solo a little bit. And then, at the end, there’s some drum fills that the Metallica guys had played, and I told (Megadeth drummer) Dirk (Verbeuren), I said, ‘Have fun there. Just have fun.’ So he did a drum fill at the end in the four spots that there’s drum fills. And I think that they’re really stunning drum fills. They may be similar to the original stuff, but I’m not sure how similar. And he recorded his parts, and I love it.”
Megadeth has performed the song on tour, and Mustaine shared how often he thinks the band will play it going forward. “Now it’s just a matter of us playing it live and when in the set it would be played and how many times do we wanna play it? I mean, we may not play it down here (in South America); we may only play it once down here. I don’t know. It has to be right, because the first time we play that, people are gonna record it and it’s gonna go around the world. And I don’t want a version of a song that we did that almost everyone says is better than the original, I don’t wanna go out there and play that song and have a little lack of confidence. I wanna go out there and own it. I wanna be the f*cking boss.”
Check out Megadeth’s live version of “Ride The Lightning” below.
