MEGADETH bassist David Ellefson recently spoke to Ultimate-Guitar.com’s Robert Gray about the progress of the songwriting sessions for the band’s next studio album, tentatively due in late 2011 via Roadrunner Records. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.
On how much new material has been accumulated at this stage of the songwriting process:
Ellefson: “There’s some ideas that we’re now starting to individually compose. We’re starting to put some things together, but the actual getting together in the studio to really get things started for the next record as far as all of us being in a room with a producer and all that, that is something we’re gonna start [in January].”
On how the new songs are sounding:
Ellefson: “We’re at a stage where we’re just compiling ideas — riffs, lyrics, things like that. Those early ideas often turn many corners and take many new twists before they’re finalized on the final album. The seeds of the ideas I think are great, and I think they’re really heavy and they’re powerful. I don’t think MEGADETH fans will be disappointed at all. If the final outcome of what I’m hearing at this point with these seeds of ideas, if these come to fruition like they should, I think we’re gonna have ourselves a smoking record. . . . I think, more than the actual material, though… because again, at this point everybody has some individual ideas or some collective ideas that are at least established… More than anything though, I think we’re excited about it because we’ve had such a great year of reconnecting. There’ve been some huge successes with the ‘Rust In Peace’ tour and the ‘Big Four’ DVD, and just coming off of that, it’s an exciting time for us to start and carve out the next chapter of MEGADETH.”
On whether his return to MEGADETH after an eight-year hiatus will add a different flavor to proceedings:
Ellefson: “I think so. I think what’s nice to a large degree is that Dave [Mustaine] was really the primary writer, if not the only writer, of the past few MEGADETH records, and I think when a band works together as a unit, regardless of who writes it, there tends to be a different flavor and a different style. I think that one of the cool things about where the band is right now as a unit is that it isn’t only… Obviously, Shawn Drover [drums] now has been there for awhile, so he’s got some experience. He knows how MEGADETH writes, records and operates; he knows how Dave writes, he understands Dave‘s compositional style, and as well, Shawn has started to contribute some of his own material, like on ‘Head Crusher’ from the [2009] ‘Endgame’ record. Now it’s kinda cool, though, because there’s now me and Dave who both can go back to the seed of MEGADETH, to the origins of it. I think that there’s a really cool chemistry right now with Dave and I being back together. I think our playing has a certain style, and adds a certain tonal quality to MEGADETH. There’s a really cool mixture of all the ingredients right now in the kitchen to really whip up something pretty tasty.”
On how the next MEGADETH album will compare to “Endgame”:
Ellefson: “This much I do know. I’m sure that after playing the ‘Rust In Peace’ album for the last year, that that will definitely have an influence on the sound of MEGADETH moving forward.”
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