Dave Mustaine is just all over the place promoting his autobiography Mustaine: A Heavy Metal Memoir (our review here / audio reading here) and it has lead to some interesting quotes, including one in a recent interview with hipster rag Vice, when discussing the often-bashed album Risk:
When you started Megadeth you claimed to have a distinct vision of what a heavy metal band should look like—long hair, leather, studs, muscles—and through 23 lineup changes you’ve more or less stuck with that vision, but do you still feel the same way? Specifically about the long hair thing.
I think if you’re honest with your fans then whatever the initial ideas you had when you set out will have room to grow. If you’re not and you try to do a Spinal Tap Mark II kind of thing it doesn’t work–it backfires. There’s been a lot of bands that have done that. We came close to making a serious career-ending mistake with Risk. I like that record, and a lot of other people do too, but our hardcore fans don’t. They prefer more the heavier, faster stuff. Because the album said “Megadeth” they expected a certain type of thing and it wasn’t what they expected.
Well, the reason I ask is because another band you were in previously, Metallica, when they cut all their hair off, that was the beginning of the end—at least so far as their hardcore fans were concerned. If you had you stayed in the band would you have cut your hair and gone down that road?
If I was still in the band and it was a band decision, I’m sure I would have.
All I remember about Risk, was the music video for Crush 'Em, which featured WCW star Bill Goldberg, and MI Livecast favorite JCVD. The song was part of the Universal Soilder II soundtrack. I remember the video premiered on an episode of WCW Thunder, and even as a kid who was not too familiar with Megadeth, I remember thinking "Ewwww". Do we all agree that Risk sorta sucked?
