MEGADETH frontman Dave Mustaine has recorded his own version of METALLICA's "Ride The Lightning" for the band's upcoming self-titled album, "Megadeth," saying the process of revisiting the song "really pushed" his vocal ability.
Mustaine co-wrote "Ride The Lightning" alongside METALLICA before his 1983 firing from the band, and previously helped write four songs on METALLICA's 1983 debut, "Kill 'Em All." Recording his own take on the title track more than four decades later, Mustaine described the move as an act of closure and respect toward his former bandmates. "This is about respect," he said. "I wanted to pay tribute to the band that I started in," adding that "the guitar playing in METALLICA changed the world."
The song was previewed live on April 26 in Bogotá, Colombia, ahead of its studio version arriving on "Megadeth," which the band has described as its final album. MEGADETH's rendition reworks the arrangement with a faster tempo and trades guitar solos between Mustaine and current guitarist Teemu Mäntysaari, while drummer Dirk Verbeuren handled the track's drum fills.
Mustaine spent less than two years in METALLICA, from 1981 to 1983, before being dismissed and going on to found MEGADETH, a band that became one of thrash metal's "Big Four" alongside METALLICA, SLAYER and ANTHRAX. The two camps' relationship has shifted over the decades, from open animosity in the 1980s and '90s to public reconciliation in more recent years, including onstage appearances together.
With "Megadeth" billed as the band's closing chapter, Mustaine's decision to include a MEGADETH version of "Ride The Lightning" reads as a deliberate bookend to a career that began, and is now ending, with unfinished business between him and his former band. No release date for the full album has been confirmed.