Latest / Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast / PODCAST: Episode 904 - Megadeth's Final Album Reviewed and Deep Dive

Transcript

PODCAST: Episode 904 - Megadeth's Final Album Reviewed and Deep Dive · Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast

0:45
What's up everybody, Late night kefi here coming at you live
0:50
from a hotel room in Southern California.
0:53
I'll talk about why in a second Super sorry.
0:56
I've been able to do a live stream in a while just like
1:01
getting in the way. I've been super burned out for
1:04
those of you watching at home, and it's been tough.
1:08
It's been tough to start the year kind of fried.
1:10
I ended the year kind of fried. Overall was a good year and I'll
1:14
talk about some of the time. But what I am here to talk about
1:19
tonight as we do live streams and we're bringing them back
1:23
again. Look at this tiny microphone I
1:25
have this little microphone is the shit.
1:26
Look at this. We are going to review the brand
1:30
new Megadeth album, the self-titled farewell final album
1:34
from Megadeth. A lot of thoughts.
1:36
We were lucky enough to get the album early.
1:39
We have a review up at our site right now.
1:41
It goes cold man.com. It's one of the pin posts and
1:44
I'm here to do a companion live stream review of the new
1:49
negative. Now this is here, Mike is here.
1:53
Good to see you. Anybody that feels like tuning
1:56
in here late at night, I appreciate you.
2:00
I traveled all day to be here, which is wild and open.
2:08
The Internet holds up here because I'm not sure it will,
2:12
but it seems like it is. So yeah, thanks for being here.
2:16
And yeah, we're going to talk about the album.
2:18
If you watch this on a replay or you're curious about the album
2:20
before you buy it, here's your unbiased unburnished review.
2:24
Yes, we did get the album early to listen to.
2:27
I'm a huge mega net fan. I think that's obvious from my
2:30
history in music. I you know, I've been following
2:36
the band since I'm a teenager. Thank you.
2:39
I like my Aussie shirt too. I traveled all day and I sweated
2:42
through my long sleeve that I took off and it's hanging up to
2:46
dry right now. I'm very light.
2:47
I'm normally a crazy over Packer.
2:50
Mockus Doom is here. Thank you Shotsky for your
2:53
comment about my shirt. The best experience for this is
2:57
always YouTube, Facebook, Twitch, Instagram.
3:00
However, I love hanging out on TikTok with you all and anybody
3:03
who follows us, I will follow you back.
3:05
We do have a tip venue that we, you know, we like to share, but
3:10
again, I, you know, it's not mandatory.
3:14
I have been traveling all day. I'm super tired, but I work
3:17
really hard to get this out. I listened to the record 5 times
3:21
since the in the last 24 hours and I took notes and I have many
3:25
thoughts about this new mega dad.
3:27
What what 16 is here? What's up?
3:29
Good to see you. It's a band we've covered a lot
3:34
in the UK, but if you're around, hang out.
3:37
If not and you watch this on the replay or listen to this
3:41
wherever you check out live streams, that's cool too because
3:44
we like it. We appreciate it if you do.
3:50
And again, if you follow us, we will follow you back.
3:53
Just making sure that I'm on all the things here.
3:56
Let's see. Go, man.
4:03
There we go. All right, I'll start the 2nd.
4:07
I have a whole deck prepared. I did some.
4:10
I did a deep dive, even though I know the band intimately.
4:13
Well, one ounce of weed is here. Welcome back, friends.
4:17
I haven't seen you in a while. Some flower is also here.
4:20
Again, if anybody pops up, I will engage.
4:25
So I prepared a little a little deck.
4:28
Let's see if it works. There it is.
4:33
OK, I didn't really have time to even set up this room, so I just
4:38
kind of threw my camera. I have a brand new mobile pod,
4:43
like a little desktop tripod for travel.
4:45
It's lightweight. My main tripod is home, and I
4:49
have some lighting here. But I think tomorrow if I do,
4:53
I'm unsure yet. I usually do my Thursday show.
4:56
I'll talk about that in a second.
4:58
I think I'll set this room up a little differently, but I
5:00
literally just got off the plane, took a bus to Union
5:04
Station, LA and took the train to Amtrak down here to Anaheim,
5:10
and I'm hanging out. If you're down here or if you're
5:12
in the LA area or you're in Anaheim for Nam or Metal
5:17
Allegiance tonight, technically Thursday night, look me up.
5:22
Speaking of Metal Allegiance, we did a whole bunch of content and
5:26
great interviews. Super humbled to be able to
5:29
interview William Duvall of Alice In Chains, who sings on
5:31
the new Metal Allegiance song. He will be at the concert
5:33
tonight. I also interviewed Alex Skolnick
5:37
once again, our very first podcast interview ever was Alex
5:41
Skolnick. Our 900th podcast episode was
5:45
William Duvall. Skoll is nine O 3 pretty
5:50
amazing. So yeah, I'm getting I'm getting
5:54
texts from people and messages, which is hilarious.
5:58
But yes, I'm here until Friday afternoon.
6:01
So if you want to hang out LA area people get at me.
6:05
I might do some record shopping. And so I am here for the Metal
6:09
Allegiance show. And funny enough, and I will be
6:17
at the show, I'm super stoked. I might be doing some other
6:20
stuff tomorrow. So normally Thursday is my
6:22
regular live stream show. That might push it to Friday
6:28
morning, depending on how busy I get in the afternoon.
6:35
But it's also possible that we'll have nothing going on
6:38
tomorrow afternoon except food. And I will do my regular show.
6:41
So stay tuned to your social. Stay tuned to my socials.
6:44
Echoes called Kifi. Echoes called Meg and I will
6:47
update everybody what I'm going to go normally we go live every
6:49
Thursday we fail. Also my other podcast has a new
6:54
series we started DO got a really great response to the
6:57
first episode. The second episode is killer.
7:00
We did holy diver and now Lance in line shut that down in
7:03
glacial musical podcast. So yeah, here's a picture of me
7:10
with Snoopy. So I'm down here for the concert
7:13
not doing Nam, but I hope to do Nam in the future.
7:17
And you know, I just like to think like wherever we've gotten
7:22
to in 13 years, as goes cult, it's because of hard work and I
7:26
can't do this alone. There's actually a lot of people
7:28
that do this. I'm not just a solo.
7:31
YouTube. I didn't come along when YouTube
7:34
came along. I played music for 20 years.
7:37
I've been in bands. My first show ever, we covered
7:39
Megan Pantera, Metallica, you know, Suicidal Tendencies, other
7:44
things by my answer. So I've been around a long time.
7:48
I've been a journalist for almost 20 years.
7:49
I've interviewed thousands of bands, many of them multiple
7:53
times. Megadeth is one of those bands
7:55
that's really important to me. I've seen them the most, almost
7:57
not the most Metallica I've seen the most, but Megadeth is surely
8:01
in the top ten. Just a couple of last little
8:04
bits of news and minutia. If you're watching this tonight
8:08
and you're interested, we have two giveaways going on.
8:11
If you're in the Southeastern USA, we are giving away tickets
8:15
to the Swamp Survivors Tour with atolls and some grind course,
8:21
death metal grind course stuff. And you might dig it.
8:25
You just might dig it. So thanks for being here all
8:29
y'all. It's nice to see people pop up
8:33
and like stream feel free to like and share.
8:37
That helps us. We also have a tip menu.
8:40
Also, we are we have 7 more days, one more week on that tour
8:45
giveaway for a pair of tickets to the Swamp Survivors tour,
8:48
Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina.
8:51
But also we are giving away a bunch of books and we have this
8:56
is worldwide. These this giveaway for the
8:59
books Aussies 2 books on Slayer and some other books about metal
9:04
productivity and managing money from Metalhead's point of view.
9:09
We have a whole bunch of books we collected over the last year
9:11
and I love supporting my friends who are authors.
9:14
Joel Whitfield this year on Facebook.
9:15
Thanks brother, appreciate you. We've got some people on Twitch,
9:19
we've got some people all over the place and I'm grateful.
9:25
So you know the the book giveaway is free.
9:29
You don't have to buy anything. We just to enter to win, you
9:32
just sign up for our newsletter and you're entered to win.
9:36
The pin post on our website has all the details.
9:40
So also there's a tip menu if you're feeling tipsy.
9:44
We do not have corporate sponsorship.
9:46
We do sell some advertising. We have ads on our website.
9:49
Yes, we do some sponsors and things and we have more to
9:52
giveaways. I just got like pinged today for
9:54
a huge killer giveaway from the 80s band that I think you'll all
9:59
be pleasantly surprised at. We do a lot more than just metal
10:03
here it goes called, but metal and rock is where we live.
10:06
It's what we do. It's all it's what we have done
10:09
most of it's what we're best known for.
10:11
But we have a lot of fun stuff coming up this year. 26, hard to
10:15
believe it's 2026, but I started out, like I said, I've used live
10:19
streaming a lot in October, November and December.
10:23
I slowed down a lot due to some personal stuff, but I'm going to
10:27
ramp it back up before this month is out.
10:32
So yeah, if you feel feeling tipsy, feel free to tip us.
10:35
But with that out of the way, let's talk about Megadeth, Man,
10:38
Megadeth has been kind of brewing this album for a long
10:42
time. We knew they were in the studio
10:44
last summer. There was a lot of talk about
10:46
them not being it back to the beginning.
10:48
And then five months ago exactly, they started doing this
10:53
end is near countdown clock on their website.
10:56
And you know, I know that bands don't stay retired and a lot of
11:02
bands hung it up. I never thought that Black
11:04
Sabbath, unless he would play one final show, said his final
11:09
show. I happened to be wearing my old,
11:11
old school Aussie shirt with the back on it as I drink it.
11:20
Lacroix. Not my favorite seltzer, but
11:23
it'll get the jump done for tonight.
11:25
So you know, the end is near. People were speculating Marty
11:31
was coming back. They're going to do like another
11:33
Rust in Peace tour and basically in time for the 40th anniversary
11:39
of the first Megadeth release, they announced this farewell
11:43
tour, this farewell album and first album and tour.
11:47
So they were in the studio working on this.
11:51
That's probably why they were not at Back to the beginning,
11:58
you know, they were in the studio and they had committed to
12:00
that time frame. You know, it's we're not going
12:07
to get a lot of these. We're not going to get a lot of
12:09
being, you know, people die and pass away.
12:12
We've been suffering through that and a lot of bands are
12:15
forced to hang it up. But we found out recently that
12:17
Dave has medical issues. That is the reason he really
12:20
needs to kick it in, pack it in and how that condition worsens
12:25
or, you know, is managed is going to tell a great deal about
12:29
how long this farewell tour can be.
12:31
He says three to five years, but I'm not 100% sure he can even
12:36
play three to five years. You know, I'm not sure he can
12:40
hold up based on this condition he has.
12:43
We'll talk about in a minute, but I think it's also time
12:48
cancer scare. I mean, I saw Megan at 15 years
12:52
ago this year, this September at the big Four at Yankee Stadium
12:57
in the Bronx, NY, where I'm from, Megadeth, Metallica, you
13:02
know, Slayer, Megadeth, Anthrax. It was one of the greatest
13:06
nights of my life. It was one of the greatest shows
13:08
I've ever seen. And David just had neck surgery
13:11
right before this and he was in obvious pain, but he gutted it
13:14
out through this like 45 minute, hour long performance that was
13:18
incredible. You just have to give him a
13:21
tremendous amount of props for his, you know, tenacity that he
13:25
has always had. You know, thanks for being here,
13:31
Pastel flower and under the 5th. We appreciate you.
13:35
Feel free to like us and like the live follow us.
13:38
All that jazz and stuff helps. Money helps more.
13:41
We like tips, but you know, it's all good.
13:43
If you're on YouTube, you can on, especially if you're on
13:46
ghost cult man, you can buy us a super like or super thanks.
13:49
You can buy us a car, a car Poppy on Kofi, but Megan Evans,
13:53
one of the most important bands of my entire life.
13:55
I am not one of those Metallica fans that hated Megadeth.
13:57
I love Megan it Needless to say metal would be very different if
14:01
Dave Mustang did not exist. He very few people have had an
14:06
impact on three major bands of a genre of a sub genre of rock and
14:10
heavy metal Co founded metallic. You know, maybe not Co founded
14:14
Metallica, but he was is super important to the early work of
14:17
Metallica and even the later work of Metallica.
14:19
That's what we're going to talk about.
14:21
You know, Carrie King spent some time with Megadeth that
14:24
absolutely helped shape his approach in Slayer a bit.
14:28
And of course, Megadeth, you know, so we'll do Megadeth by
14:33
the numbers in a second. But I did want to take a second
14:36
to talk about this and I'm probably going to mispronounce
14:39
this. But so, you know, the cancer and
14:43
just the grind of the music business and his own personal
14:49
very public struggles about his time getting kicked out of
14:54
Metallica. He's got this Dupuitrans
14:59
contracture, which is an arthritic condition that makes
15:02
your hands, gives nerve damage to your hands and actually
15:07
constricts your hands over time and also back and neck problems.
15:11
So, I mean, you know, the fact that we even got this record is
15:16
almost a minor miracle, not unlike how Ozzy, you know,
15:21
haven't got it out to do those final albums.
15:24
Whatever you think about them, I'm fond of them.
15:26
But you know, nobody thinks these are the best, even though
15:28
they won Grammys and he got his flowers, which is super nice.
15:32
You know. Are they the best records of
15:34
Ozzy's career? No, but they it was nice to get
15:37
him back for a couple of things and have him be creative.
15:40
And we saw how much that did for him.
15:42
We'll talk more about that in the coming weeks.
15:46
But Megan F man, like, you know, Unfuck with a bull.
15:50
I know certain people don't like Megan.
15:52
Again, some Metallica fans don't like Megan.
15:55
FA lot of Metallica fans love Megan F.
15:56
Lars used to be like, I love Megan F.
15:58
My kids love Megan F I asked my kids to put on a Metallica
16:02
record and they brought P Sells to me.
16:04
Lars told that story. You know, we did get the big
16:07
four. There is some obviously a lot of
16:09
bitterness from Dave, but also like, you know, they even more
16:12
recently there was like maybe Dave and James would make an
16:16
album together texting each other and some shit happened
16:19
over a record store they released that didn't end up
16:21
coming out, you know, which is a bummer, absolute bummer.
16:26
I and again, I appreciate the handful of people that are
16:28
watching. I don't normally go on this
16:30
late, but I just felt like this is my opportunity to get this
16:34
thing done. I have a lot of busy kind of
16:36
next day and a half down here in Southern California for mental
16:40
allegiance tomorrow night. But if you see me and you've
16:43
never met me, come up to me. Give me a crisp high 5 and all
16:45
that jazz. So let's do some negative by the
16:47
numbers. I worked on this for a bit.
16:49
So I'm proud of this, you know, mega that's founded in 83 at
16:53
this point, the story of Dave Mustaine getting kicked out of
16:58
Metallica. When is my claiming you you're
17:00
getting on a bus is like watching the Batman origin story
17:04
of Batman's, you know, Bruce Wayne's parents getting killed,
17:09
Topman, Martha Wade. Why did you call Martha?
17:11
Why did you say Martha watching like Batman's parents get
17:16
killed? That's the same thing about
17:17
hearing this Mustaine story again.
17:18
I'm not trying to, you know, there's no taking Dave away from
17:23
Metallica history. There's no taking Dave away from
17:25
Threats metal history. He is one of the all time
17:28
greats. You know, Megadeth has maybe 3
17:32
absolute perfect albums in my opinion and could have had a
17:35
fourth. We can debate that at a future
17:38
time. But Megadeth by the numbers,
17:39
founded in 83, we know the story and I believe the first song
17:43
Dave wrote was actually Set the World to Fire, which ends up
17:46
coming out on their third album. So far so good.
17:49
So what? 17 studio albums, 2 EPS and six
17:54
live albums in 43 years. 41 years as it recorded.
17:59
Been 50 million in sales so far. Nothing to sneeze at.
18:04
Plus whatever Dave has earned from his contributions to
18:08
Metallica. So you know, Dave is not broke.
18:11
He's certainly done well for himself.
18:13
Did he make Metallica money? No, but no one else did either.
18:16
So, you know, I, I feel his pain and I understand about, you
18:21
know, what he considers an eternal slight every, you know
18:24
and all that. But he really shouldn't feel
18:27
ashamed of anything. He should be proud of everything
18:29
he's done. They did finally win a Grammy in
18:31
2017 for Dystopia, which was an interesting album.
18:35
It was the first album Chico Laurero.
18:37
It also featured Chris Anthem rod drums.
18:39
He didn't really tour with them after that.
18:41
They got took for Puranan. So Dystopia comes out in 2016.
18:45
They won the Grammy in January of 2017.
18:49
And again, man, Dave Mustaine has left an indelible mark on
18:52
metal. It's not up for debate.
18:56
It's not up for debate how much he has helped and influenced the
18:59
inspired metal. Ronald Peruvian percussion is
19:04
also tripping Spy on the Gram What's up panel.
19:08
So big Papa's here. Love it when you call me Big
19:10
Papa. So you know along a certain
19:15
timeline. There's a reason why Megadeth is
19:18
in the big four. They're one of the biggest
19:19
selling. I believe they have the second
19:21
most record sales of the of the thrash metal bands beside
19:25
Metallica, followed by Slayer and the Anthrax.
19:29
Although Anthrax had two platinum singles before they
19:31
ever had a platinum record, which is also interesting.
19:34
And you know that they've they've been a leader, a leader
19:40
of metal for many years, which, you know, I'm proud to be a fan
19:44
and we'll stay a fan. I know that Dave has rankled
19:47
some people with his, you know, personality and and some of his
19:51
deal, but you know, I think that he is wonderful and marvelous
19:55
and again, can't really take anything away from the guy.
20:00
So let's deep with with a little bit of mega death history under
20:03
our belts. And in case you were new and you
20:05
don't know. Mega that's importance.
20:08
They're hella important to the history of rock and metal on the
20:12
Mount Rushmore of metal. And not only are they the second
20:15
best selling thrash band, they're one of the like top 10
20:17
or 15 selling metal bands period.
20:22
You know, facts, no cap. So man, even this album artwork.
20:30
I'll talk for one second about this album artwork.
20:31
I have one more thing to discuss before we go into the track by
20:34
track. You know, this very similar to
20:41
when Megadeth came back in, you know, they, they did that.
20:49
You know that back in the day, they, you know, this like a like
20:56
a, you know, very interesting white cover.
20:59
Megadeth always used to wear the white shirts because Metallica
21:01
wore black and you know the Victoria Rattlehead on fire.
21:06
There was a period of time when they went away from Victoria
21:08
Rattlehead, which is crazy. The world needs a hero.
21:14
When they came back and then Dave injured his arm and then
21:21
they came back with The System Has Failed, which was supposed
21:23
to be a Dave's solo album, which is always super interesting to
21:27
me. That needs kind of a re
21:29
examination, but you know, just the the iconography of Victoria
21:37
putting on a suit and tie with a with a you know, a little
21:45
coronation there carnation there on his lapel on fire, common
21:50
chills, like really a metaphor for Dave himself.
21:53
So let's let's do a little bit of the track by track, You know,
21:58
so the album starts with tipping point.
21:59
And I will say that the singles are very top heavy on the
22:03
record. Some change of four is here.
22:05
Love your thesis here. What's up about some change?
22:09
Before we're talking, I'm going to do a deep dive right now on
22:11
the brand new mega record that is coming out this Friday.
22:15
We got to listen to it early as a music journalist.
22:18
We have a written review on our website, itgoescoldman.com.
22:21
And now I'm going to go track by track and I have notes on all
22:24
these. So I'm going to stay off camera
22:26
except on TikTok for a minute and then I'll come back at the
22:29
end. But you know, Tipping Points, a
22:32
killer opening track. I know some people were didn't
22:35
love it. Super speed metal, one of the
22:37
fastest mega that songs ever made.
22:39
There's a tremendous neoclassical lead guitar in
22:43
there by Timo Montessori and and Dave.
22:47
A lot of trading solos on this record, much more than even the
22:52
sick, the dying, the dead a few years ago.
22:55
And Dave, one of his things that I really love that he always did
22:59
is Dave does two things that are very they're not like the most,
23:03
you know now because he's been copied and imitated so much.
23:06
But like his especially for heavy metal and thrash metal,
23:09
Dave will play a different riff for the solo part, whether he's
23:12
soloing or not. He'll just play an actual an
23:15
actual different solo. Somebody is shitting on me in
23:20
the comments on on TikTok. What a surprise.
23:24
I'm here doing shit. You're home commenting on me
23:27
doing shit. But what I love that Dave does
23:29
is deconstructing riffs and playing different kinds of
23:32
riffs. So there's a super great coda
23:36
end of the song where they kind of break it down a little bit,
23:42
like a little funky breakdown. Not quite funky, but like a
23:44
little more heavy metal paced thing and then a fast, fast, you
23:49
know, exclamation point at the end.
23:50
I think Ticking Tipping Point's an excellent song.
23:53
I know people didn't love it as the first single, but I think
23:55
it's a grower. It's certainly a great album
23:57
opener. It's like one of the he wasn't
23:59
kidding when he said some of this stuff is going to be the
24:02
fastest stuff they've ever done. He was not lying.
24:07
Second track is Oops, Sorry is I don't care and people didn't
24:14
love the lyrics, but I'm going to tell you that what I really
24:16
love. Oh, nice corpse paint records.
24:20
What up brother be late night to you.
24:22
I'm here in Southern California in a hotel room doing this live
24:25
stream because I got the -23 1/2 hours ago and I've been
24:29
listening to it non-stop while I travel today and I prepared this
24:33
thing. Yeah, I ordered.
24:35
I ordered the and always thank you, Andrew.
24:41
I adore you. You're not supposed to have
24:42
favorites in this business, but I'm me and I'm gonna do me so I
24:46
adore you, bro. Thank you.
24:47
I was just thinking about my my trip to Vegas and when I walked
24:50
in you was really amazing last year.
24:52
I hope to have more than experiences this year.
24:56
Yeah, Yeah, brother. So yeah, I got, I got one
24:59
version the I ordered the version with the bonus track,
25:04
which I'll talk about at the end because I haven't heard that
25:06
they haven't sent that to us. But I don't care.
25:08
People didn't like the lyrics. I like pissed off angry Dave.
25:12
Like I want angry Dave. So I like that.
25:15
You know, certainly the sick, the dying, the dead is, you
25:17
know, got some snarky Dave isms, but I really like like, OK, is
25:22
it the it's not Chaucer. We're not doing Shakespeare
25:25
here. It's metal.
25:26
It's heavy metal. And Dave is a huge punk fan and
25:29
was a punk growing up. And I think I don't care is
25:33
actually, you know, musically probably a little bit better
25:35
than the lyrics. But I, I, Dave loves his
25:39
listicles. There's a few songs on here that
25:40
are lists and he loves his lists.
25:43
So I think I don't care. It's very solid.
25:46
Some people didn't care for it, no pun intended.
25:50
Hey God is the next track. Very interesting.
25:53
Kind of reminded me of Ashes in Your Mouth from Countdown to
25:57
Extinction. Like Dave obviously just, you
26:00
know, giving a lot of interviews, probably giving too
26:03
much away by talking personally about his, you know, history
26:07
with religion as a child. He's kind of abused religiously
26:11
as a child with his, you know, home life situations and and you
26:16
know, although you know, obviously he is very faithful
26:20
and I think Hey God is a very similar vibes to P cells.
26:24
There's a tremendous amount of as much as there's some fast,
26:27
fast, great technical threat shown here that Megadeth is
26:30
known for. I like the mid tempo songs on
26:34
here even more. And I will also say that the
26:37
songs that you haven't heard are actually the best songs on the
26:40
album. I know we've heard about, you
26:42
know, almost 45% of the album now, but like actually the best
26:47
songs haven't been are we're not singles in my opinion, but we'll
26:50
talk. Hey, God, good track.
26:55
Let there be shred. Another single.
26:57
Tremendous soloing, tremendous drums by Dirk Verburen and a
27:03
good bass by Dave Limenzo. You know, just very snotty and
27:07
angry and Dave kind of patting himself on the back.
27:12
As I said at the top of this video and and review that, you
27:17
know, Dave is taking a victory lap.
27:19
He, you know, absolutely has nothing to be ashamed of.
27:22
He's had a tremendous career and let there be shred.
27:25
It's kind of like, you know, like I picked up a guitar the
27:27
day I was born. Like obviously he did not.
27:29
But like, you know, kind of amazing that he would put that
27:33
into a song. Kind of reminded me the vibes of
27:36
the Get Threats documentary at the beginning when Dave was
27:39
talking about his thumbprints, fingerprints all over thrash
27:43
metal history. So a little bit more into the
27:47
puppet parade, the recent single that came out this week, kind of
27:50
stealth released the single the week of the album drop.
27:55
And yes, my colleague it goes called Morgan Y Evans.
27:58
They made a comment on social media about like, oh, it has
28:02
puppets in it, right. Like the like the puppet
28:05
metaphor has been done by Metallica.
28:06
It's their most famous song, Master of puppets.
28:08
But actually I think Puppet Parade really reminds me a lot
28:11
of Hooking Mouth, Angry Again and Architecture of Aggression.
28:17
He's really great. Mid tempo, grindy, phenomenal
28:20
riff. 90s songs really like a lot of this record is a love
28:24
letter to the best stuff you've ever heard from Megadeth,
28:27
especially Rusted Peace, especially Countdown to
28:30
Extinction, especially Euthanasia.
28:32
With a little bit of cryptic writings, like a little bit of
28:34
greatest hits on a flavor, like all the things that Dave is
28:38
known for, all the types of songs he's made.
28:40
There's like a little bit of that in every song here.
28:43
Puppet Parade is a really, really good song.
28:45
I actually really like this even more than the other singles in a
28:48
lot of ways. I'm moving along to another bad
28:52
day, another list song, another, you know, slice of life Dave,
28:57
you know, complaining about life, but clever, you know,
29:02
there's, there's cleverness to it.
29:03
It's not just like I'm bitching and moaning.
29:05
It's actually pretty interesting and it's relatable.
29:09
I think that's the reason why Dave is very endearing
29:11
historically is he's very relatable as a person, even if
29:15
you don't always agree with him or you don't always like
29:18
everything he says and does. Made to Kill.
29:21
Here's a series of songs. You know Dave.
29:24
I think we saw it with the Tipping Point video and some
29:28
other things in recent Megadeth history that Dave is a big fan
29:32
of military and military allegories and illusions and and
29:38
references. So Made to Kill, you know, seems
29:43
like on one hand is a reference to him and his guitar music, his
29:47
heavy metal, his thrash metal, but it's also, you know, a
29:50
soldier's mind. And I think it's actually a
29:52
pretty interesting song, if I have to say so myself.
29:57
I could see this being an additional single on the record.
30:00
Obey the Call. There's a bunch of these very
30:02
short titles, not very wordy as usual.
30:06
No ellipses on this record, unlike Dave's, You know, some of
30:10
his more fanciful records, like the last one, obey the call also
30:14
had could be considered religious, could be the call of
30:17
metal, could be his higher calling as a guitar player and
30:21
songwriter, and maybe even obey the call of What's to come next.
30:27
I will have some final thoughts at the end of this that some of
30:31
the record a little bit. I am War is another one another
30:34
military minded song, but also Dave's personal war against the
30:38
world can also reminds me a lot of the recent CRO Mags EP with
30:42
Harley just kind of talking about personal battles
30:47
comparatively to you know, war. I think this is a very solid
30:52
tune and both Made to Kill, Obey the Call and I Am I Am War
31:00
pretty mid tempo with great drums.
31:03
I can't say not everyone knows we're a huge Dirk Verburan fans.
31:07
If you listen to our podcast, Dirk has been doing our intros.
31:11
He gave us, you know, a recording of him doing an intro
31:13
for us. We have some new special ones
31:15
coming up soon. I Am War also has a little bit
31:20
of a riff that reminds me of Hanger 18 and also Obey the Call
31:25
also kind of sounds like Hanger 18 a little little bit.
31:27
And also a Secret Place, which I know a lot of people love that
31:31
song from Cryptic Writings. It's a it's a fan favorite.
31:35
They were playing it for years on tour, I've got to be honest.
31:39
So also, as we're getting toward the last end of the record, the
31:46
last note really should have been the last song on the
31:49
record, but it's not because of the Metallica cover.
31:53
We'll talk about at length in a second.
31:56
It starts out kind of with that cryptic writings.
32:01
Oh, the the world needs a hero. What was that instrumental
32:05
track? Silent scorn or when like these
32:10
like poetry, spoken word things. So kind of like when in the same
32:15
vibe as when the last note is talking about the end of his
32:20
career and he does talk about fate.
32:21
He does use the reference Fate the Black in that, so there's an
32:25
incredible Spanish guitar solo and also like trading solos.
32:31
It's the second longest song on the record beside the cover.
32:35
I really wish this had been the final song on the album.
32:38
Even with the cover, I get why to put the ride.
32:41
The Lightning is the bonus track and again I got the vinyl
32:45
version. That's the other bonus track
32:46
that it has not been sent out yet to Prince, but the last note
32:50
is immense. I hope that it's played live at
32:54
least once. And and that brings us to Ride
32:57
the Lightning which closes the album.
32:59
Much talked about cover of a song he Co wrote in Metallica.
33:05
It's crazy that this is the last song ever.
33:08
It's certainly interesting. I'm going to tell you that this
33:10
cover is absolutely inspired and inspiring.
33:15
So good. This cover is so good.
33:18
It is Megadeths fully Megadeth doing a Metallica song, Dave
33:23
doing Dave. He's absolutely not doing a
33:27
James imitation like people maybe you know you would other
33:32
someone else would clearly pay tribute to James's version, but
33:36
Dave did it Dave's way. There were a lots of subtle bits
33:40
that are truly Megadeth's version, similar to mechanics.
33:45
If you're a Megadeth, you love mechanics, you don't like 4
33:49
Horsemen lyrics to mechanics are terrible.
33:53
Vert musical mechanics might be a little rougher and harder, but
33:58
just absolutely a better a great cover.
34:02
I know a lot of people are going to go right to this song when
34:05
they listen to the record because it is just phenomenal.
34:10
It's a great cover and I think just the notion.
34:13
I still wish they that if this was their last record that this
34:19
Matt Talca song would not be the final song.
34:21
I understand the symmetry of it. So yeah, just phenomenal cover.
34:27
Most of this record is excellent.
34:29
I know people are looking to find faults and there's a lot of
34:33
Internet experts out there that actually don't know Dick about
34:37
music or don't know anything about critique or don't
34:39
understand. Like this guy's 64.
34:42
I like that he's pissed off and angry.
34:44
The world is pissed off and angry right now.
34:47
And I like that his state of mind is fire and fierceness.
34:51
That makes me happy. You know, we're not, again,
34:55
we're not, we're not writing the Great American novel.
34:58
He's a lyricist, No, and and no one in metal he ever has been.
35:03
Occasionally you get some brilliant lyrics and as I
35:07
mentioned, you know, I have some summary thoughts, but I do want
35:11
to call out our review on the site.
35:17
It's called meg.com. And I love this last line by our
35:21
writer Gabriel Cock in the UK. He's one of the best writers we
35:25
have and he always has been. There's no point pretending that
35:30
this will be ever be the best record in Dave's career.
35:34
You simply can't argue with the likes of Rust in Peace, Peace
35:36
Sells and Countdown. I mentioned those and everyone
35:39
knows it. But As for their output over the
35:41
last 25 years or so, this final marker absolutely stands as one
35:46
of the best. So I have to concur and say that
35:49
this is one of their This is the best mega record in this
35:53
century. You may have your favorites.
35:56
There's a couple that are clunkers for the most part.
36:02
You know, they have had a who's who of incredible talents come
36:07
through the band. I think Dirk is the most like
36:11
Dirk. Verbearing on drums is the most
36:14
like Garth Samuelson and Nick Menza of any drummer that has
36:18
ever played with the band, including Adler, who I love
36:21
tremendously from his time and Lamb of God.
36:25
And you know, Lumenzo's a very solid to good bassist.
36:29
He's a great singer. You know, his tone is a little
36:32
bright for me in general, but like I love Ellefson is the
36:37
bassist of Megadeth, But that's just me and Timo, man, I can't
36:41
say enough about him. He came in from winter sun, had
36:44
a unenviable task of replacing Tiko Lurairro.
36:48
He his stuff on here is fire, absolute fire that he was able
36:53
to come in and do this work with Stan shoulder to shoulder with
36:57
Dave. I know that Dave kind of keeps
36:59
everybody on a leash, but it feels like he let everybody out
37:03
of the gate a little bit. You know, he let them free a
37:06
little bit to to just contribute a little bit more and and that
37:09
level of musicianship is what you want from Megan.
37:11
So we gave this record on Gary gave this record on our website
37:15
review And hey, and I have to agree.
37:17
I think if you're a mega that die hard, you love everything
37:20
they did, even the bad things like risk and super Collider.
37:23
But I think it's it's clear to say this is one of the best
37:27
Megadeth records, certainly the best Megadeth record in this
37:29
century. It's you know, they won a Grammy
37:31
for dystopia. This is a much better record to
37:33
me than dystopia on a few levels, but dystopia is also
37:37
excellent and I love the sick, the dying, the dead.
37:39
I'm very grateful to a black to black records who I I didn't.
37:43
I started to talk about. I'll just close with saying that
37:47
the Black to Black label launching with Biohazard and
37:49
Megadeth and now signing Forbidden and Nuns slaughter and
37:53
and Crow Mags, they are going to be a label to watch this year.
37:58
You know, they really went hard signing that.
38:02
Frontiers SRL, the parent company of Black to Black,
38:04
actually released the last record.
38:06
So this has been pretty major for the metal world.
38:11
Sad that it's the last mega death record.
38:13
I hope Dave can get it, go out there and, you know, perform up
38:17
to his own tough, you know, capabilities in his own tough.
38:21
Criticism is an excellent Megadeth record.
38:24
Surely one. It's going to be one of the
38:26
thrash metal records of the year.
38:27
We just came off a pretty big year for thrash and we have new
38:31
records to look forward to from a bunch of bands in the genre,
38:35
new and old. But I'm really proud of Megadeth
38:37
for this and I really am appreciative of the opportunity
38:41
to get this record early, spend a bunch of time with it and jam
38:44
out to it. So, you know, hail negative.
38:48
And I'm just really thankful there is a bonus version only at
38:52
Target. I normally don't buy anything
38:54
from Target because they're vinyls tend to suck.
38:57
So I hope I didn't make a mistake.
38:58
If I did, I'll have to get another version as of course,
39:02
paint records mentioned on TikTok earlier, Andrew, But this
39:05
has another track and the opportunity to get like one more
39:09
track from this kind of sucked me in.
39:12
So bloodlust is a as yet unreleased track that is only
39:15
going to be on this special blood red vinyl version.
39:19
So I pre-ordered this and I'll let you know how that is too.
39:23
Maybe if it's good enough, I'll do a whole review on it.
39:27
It's possible, but you know, mega death man, I'm going to be
39:33
sad to see them go. I don't know.
39:35
Oh, lost one of my lights. I don't know that we're going to
39:37
get like farewell albums from bands like this any.
39:41
So I'm really thankful to have gotten this record.
39:45
So that's my review. I give it an 8 out of 10.
39:47
Our website review is also spoiler alert and eight out of
39:50
10. Go check the pin post at
39:52
ghostcalledmega.com. I am Kefi from
39:54
ghostcalledmega.com. I will hopefully be back
39:57
tomorrow or later today at this point as it is approaching 1:00
40:00
AM Pacific at the worst Friday morning.
40:05
You will see my face from this hotel room, perhaps in a
40:08
different angle room. Version but configuration.
40:12
Thanks for watching. Thanks for supporting us, I
40:14
really appreciate it. Stay fucking mental.
40:18
Hail negative. I'll see you soon.
40:20
Bye.