On September 14, 2011 at Yankee Stadium in New York City, the Big Four of thrash got together and played what ultimately became its last show as a quartet of bands (so far). The Big Four show featuring Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer, and Anthrax, was almost in jeopardy. Megadeth came pretty close to not playing the show. Two days prior to the show, Dave Mustaine underwent emergency surgery for stenosis caused by "years of headbanging" and absolutely under no circumstances could headbang during the show. He very much considered cancelling one of the biggest gigs of his career.
So what the hell made Mustaine push through the pain and play the show? Well, according to Mustaine himself in an interview with The Jasta Show, it's because Metallica's manager called him a pussy if he wasn't going to do it.
"When I did the 'Big Four' concert at Yankee Stadium and had my neck in a neck brace riding on a golf cart to the stage, I had tape all over the stage that said, 'Don't headbang,'" Mustaine said (hear audio below). "I would have died if I headbanged that night because I was in an emergency surgery room two days before, ready to have my neck operated on. And I called up my manager, Mark Adelman, at the time, and I said, 'Look, I played with Metallica, Anthrax and Slayerbefore, I've played New York before, I've played a baseball stadium before, so none of this is new to me. And I have to cancel because I need emergency surgery.'
So, allegedly, Adelman tells this to Metallica's management — whatever the guy with the name of a penis, whatever his name is… It was Dick or Peter or something… Peter! So [Peter] said I was a pussy. And so I went, 'Okay. All right. Wrap me up. I'm going to New York.' So they gave me a bunch of injections in my neck and put me in a neck brace and I flew out there and I played the concert and I came back. And I figured, nobody else knows about this except for him, and who's the real pussy now?"
The moral of the story is if you want Dave Mustaine to do anything, just call him a pussy.
It's interesting how Dave's answer varies from the answer he gave the day of the show in 2011 to a Rolling Stone reporter, saying at the time that God was getting him through the show:
"I was in a hospital [Tuesday] morning, so I'm going home to get [neck] surgery right after this. It's pretty bad. If I move wrong tonight, I could be paralyzed."
"We called yesterday and said I couldn't make [the gig]. And then I thought about it and I thought, 'You know what? I trust God and I know He's got me in His hands. I know that He hasn't brought me this far through all this adversity and done all this reconciliation with all the [other] bands [the bill] and us all getting along this well to have the finale show [of the 'Big Four' tour] here in the States stopped. And I just thought, either God's everything or it's nothing, and I believe in Him, so that's why I'm here."
It seems that Mustaine has fell out of favor with the Metallica camp. A few days ago, he called out Lars Ulrich for allegedly trying to get a writing credit on the Metallica No Life Til Leather demo songs, something that Mustaine refused to agree to.
https://soundcloud.com/jameyjasta/episode-310-dave-mustaine
[via Blabbermouth]
