In a recent appearance on The Candid Mic With Fran Strine, David Ellefson spoke candidly about his second tenure with Megadeth, reflecting on the circumstances of his return in 2010 and his final exit in 2021.
“I said, ‘Look, I’ll come back for a month. Let me just get through this tour. We’ll see how it goes,’” Ellefson recalled about his return to the band in 2010 with a tour celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Rust In Peace album (via Blabbermouth). “And it went well. And I’d been there as the owner of the company. I was no longer an owner at this point. I was just a hired sideman musician, which, quite honestly, at that point, I was okay with.”
He explained that, after years of touring and business entanglements, taking a more hands-off role had its appeal. “As much as the owner can get a lot of the perks, I know the owner of the business gets paid last. And if things f*ck up or a show cancels or anything happens, guess what? Now you’re on the hook for all the bills, too. And that happened a lot over the years. So I was, like, ‘Well, let me just try… Let me keep it simple, keep it easy.”
Touring as part of the Big Four — Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth, and Anthrax — made it feel like a full-circle moment. “It was cool because I was back in Megadeth, Joey Belladonna was back in Anthrax, and Dave Lombardo was back in Slayer. Everybody was back home, and the excitement for each of our bands as well as all of our bands together was huge.”
That reunion would last over a decade. “For Megadeth, we got another 10 years, 11 years out of it, won a Grammy,” Ellefson said. “So I feel like a lot of our story together in Megadeth with me and Dave got to be completed as well. And if that means we never play together again — oh, well. It was a good couple of chapters. And if one day we do, well, then we’ll see where that goes.”
He emphasized that he didn’t wait around for the band to call again. “I think you don’t sit around and wait for those things. You just get on with it. You just get moving forward. And I certainly didn’t stop. I just kept going.”
When Fran Strine observed that Ellefson seems busier now than ever, he didn’t disagree. “Yeah. And I feel lighter, to be honest with you. I wake up, and every day is a day, like, ‘All right. What are we gonna do today?”
Asked directly if he’s spoken with Dave Mustaine since being dismissed in May 2021, Ellefson replied, “Nope. Not one word. No need to. After that? No, I don’t need to be your friend. I’ll move on.”
He suggested the relationship had been deteriorating long before the scandal. “The ending of that friendship was a long time in the making,” he said. “It really started in 2018… There was some stuff that I was just — and I was vocal about it. I stood up for what I felt was the right thing. And, of course, that was not well received… It was just about writing the new album, the next album that took five years to make.”
Every attempt to contribute to the writing, Ellefson said, was rejected. “Every time I would try to write and put something on it, it would get taken off. And it seemed very personal. And at some point it’s just kind of, like, ‘Look, dude, if you don’t want me here, f*ck it. I’ll move on.’ So I guess it took what it took, and what happened, happened. And then that was the moment to just sort of abolish it and make it all go away.”
He compared his 2021 departure to the one in the early 2000s, which had legal entanglements due to their shared business ownership. “The first time out the door, there was legal stuff to sort out between me and Dave, ’cause we were legally bound into — we were owners of a business and a corporation. So that’s not uncommon, to have that. And a lot of that was just so that I could get paid directly from all the sources, so that my money wouldn’t keep flowing through Megadeth. It was just so I could get paid directly from Capitol and Warner Brothers and everybody.”
Despite the difficulty, Ellefson said it was worth it. “It was worth going through that process, as sh*tty as it is. But because we settled it, it did allow at a later day for me to come back and go through all that again.”
He noted that his exit in 2021 was quieter for that reason. “That’s why I didn’t fight my way out the door, and I didn’t talk a bunch of smack. It was just kind of, like, ‘All right, well, look, if we can’t get along, just move on.’”
Ellefson added, “I’m the guy that I don’t close doors. I don’t slam it in people’s [faces and say], ‘F*ck you. That’s it. And you’ll never work in this town again.’ Because you’re mad in the moment. That’s all it is. Just move on. Just keep moving on.”
Looking back, he admits he didn’t expect the 2010 return, but it worked out. “It was in the front view, and it worked out great. It was glorious, it was huge, and we accomplished a lot of great stuff together.”
Still, he sees a shift in what Megadeth has become. “People always talk about the ’90s, the Rust In Peace era, where we were very much a group,” Ellefson said. “We worked together, we fought together, we won together. We scaled the mountains and won the battle together. It’s not that anymore. It’s the Dave show, and that’s the way they want it.”
He has no interest in undermining the legacy they built together. “As you can see, I’ve got a lot of other things I wanna say in my life and a lot of other things I wanna do in my life. And I always try to kind of angle it so that it speaks well back into Megadeth, rather than oppose it.”
“Why oppose what I’ve done? That’s like sh*tting on my own work. So it’s, like, hold that up in high regard, high esteem, because it is — we really did some great stuff together — and then just kind of move on from it. So, that way you’re not tarnishing your own past and your own work. It’s like, why fight with yourself?”
