Welcome to the chuck shoe podcast and thank you for checking out this little show mine If you're a first time listener, I'm sure you're not here for me, you're probably here for the man, the legend himself, Dave Ellison from Megadeth. Not only one of the biggest metal bands ever, but I would even say maybe one of the biggest rock bands ever. Megadeth sold over 38 million records worldwide. Dave is obviously most well known for being the bass player with
Megadeth. But he does have a lot of other projects going on, at least three of which involve my second guest, Mr. Drew for ta who was the guitarist and bang Tango. And I have to say I've been doing this podcast for about 17 months. And I think drew is probably the kindest, most selfless guest I've ever had the pleasure of having on my show, maybe one of the nicest people I've just ever met in my whole life. And so, Drew and Dave, they have a new book that comes out on December 18. It's
called Rockstar hitmen. And they have also been found footage horror movie coming out, called dwellers and also an album coming out with my past guests, Vinny Dombroski from sponge, and Mike Heller from Fear Factory. That project is called lucid. And that should be coming out soon as well. So we're gonna get to all these projects. We're gonna talk about mega bang Tango, and so much more. Lots of great stuff here. Make sure to check it out. Enjoy. Welcome true 48 to the check shoe
podcast. So tell me about how you got into music I think because you're younger, but and you're listening to like older kind of bands like bang Tango and stuff like that. You got into it because of your older brother who's 11 years older. Is that correct?
It's absolutely correct. Yeah. My older brother George. And we had growing up, I was just, I got older sister too. Damn. She's seven years older. And I just remember I was born in 87. So like, early 90s. They always had Headbangers ball on empty. Yeah. You know, so I kind of like pretty much Ricky react when was like, my babysitter, you know? And so every Saturday videos, you know, yeah, exactly. Yeah. Bang Tango they used to tape it to so I
used to watch the reruns. And I was just like, uh, you know, I just had no choice but to like it. Because you know, that's what they watch.
Yeah. So you grew up with that music. And then eventually, you ended up going to a bank Tango concert. And tell me the story. How you met the singer. You had a camera in your hand? Were you just recording for fun? Are you recording for the venue? But you had a camera in your hand and the singer came up to you? And let you tell the rest of the story?
Yeah, yeah, it was a place I was bartending at the Southside of Chicago called Mike's loving music. And it was on my off day. And prior to that, my boss was like, Hey, we're gonna have band Tango player. I think I remember being Tango. Yeah. And he was like, yeah, you know, she's like, you should bring a camera and shoot some video and all that, you know, we could, you know, promote the venue and everything and all that. So yeah. Cool. So and I remember Joe from
beautiful creatures. Sure. I know, it was a big fan of that band, too. And
you cut out.
And so I, I'm just by the door all timid. I was in my early 20s. And still kind of shy that he saw me had long hair, and he just kind of sought us over. And he's like, like, my job to stay impression. Hey, man, you look cool. In order to find some weed, I was like, I was like, No, no, no, man. I don't sorry. What's that in your hand? And it was a camera guy. That's it's called a camera.
And, and he was like, Whoa, we're recording an album in Chicago in two weeks, you should come out and do like a studio documentaries. And that's how I ended up here. But it's still just everything unfolded from there. And it started off as like a studio documentary for their album pistol whipped in the bible
belt. And did you play on that album as well? Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, I played a little bit on the song live life. And I do like backing vocals on a song called boombox fans.
Did you know Did you play guitar before doing that? And you played you played guitar before this? Or did you just learn for that? Oh, yeah. Okay.
Yeah, I've been I play guitar since I was like, like, 12 or 13. Okay. But this is like, this is probably like, five years before I joined the band.
Sure. Sure. And,
and, but yeah, that was I was in the studio every single day. And ironically, it was at Johnny keys group masters in Chicago, and big studio and upstairs from where we were, Johnny cave was mixing the ven new Megadeth album 13. So that all these years later, you're right in with Dave doing all this stuff. Yeah,
but you didn't see him at that time. Right. You wouldn't meet him too late it right.
No, yeah. Right. Right. Many years later, but, but it was it was thinking about it now. It was kind of cool. Yeah. So Yeah, then go ahead.
No, I just gotta say, so you ended up doing this documentary, kind of without having like a lot of training or I'd never done anything like that before, but they let you do it. And they kind of gave you free rein to do it how you wanted to do it. And apparently Well, actually, I watched it a few years ago when it came out on YouTube attack life is the name. There's like some good guest spots and a D Snyder's in it. And some other Ricky rathmines, I believe is in as well. Now, what is the stuff
though that? Is there anything that that was on the cutting room floor that you couldn't put in the movie that you could give? Maybe you could talk about it now? You know, it's been a few years, like nobody cares about it. Now? Is there any dirt or crazy wild times that you couldn't show?
Absolutely.
So much so. So give me something Give me one thing that was like, well, I couldn't put this in. But you have to say names if that makes it easier to tell the story.
Okay, I'll go God. I'll throw some random words out there. Okay. Thank Tango. Okay. The band recording in the first band recording of the first album. A first night at the studio. college town. young females.
Okay. And we did so far aisles. Ping Pong.
Broken plate glass window. Oh. I think this is a story that Howard Benson told that I had I had to take out Oh, really? Yeah, it's, uh,
it was incriminating, or was it just too crude? Or is it
nothing that wasn't probably shown in the dirt? You know? But yeah, where it's yet where it said in the movie, it was way early on. Okay. And it just came up. It's like with it being bad early and to learn about that stuff. You really ended up like not liking the original band that much off the bat. So Oh, better to leave it out all together. Sure. And
times were different in the 80s. You know, this. I'm sure this was all I hope it was all consensual and stuff. But, you know, it's kind of it was a different time back then. People were a little more free and loose and
exactly, right. Yeah. Every now everybody's getting Weinstein now. And I'm really surprised the Sunset Strip fans haven't been, you know,
caught up in that. Well, yeah. And then, you know, some of it was, uh, was males male on male Weinstein kind of thing like Janie lane from Warrens. There's a story about him being molested by an older musician, like, basically drugged and raped and that's kind of scary stuff. So I mean, I think that kind of thing. If it's girl or boy, that's clearly I think that's always been wrong. I don't think there was ever a fine line there. It's just one of those things where
people didn't talk about it. And that's one thing I would say. The me too is a good thing. Because then these kind of things are people are getting caught for this kind of crap. So
yeah, exactly. I mean, I mean, even with like the actors to like Corey Feldman and all that and ground and everything. It's it's it gets so dark and weird when you start looking into that stuff, man. Like, it's it's nuts.
Yeah. So, back to bang Tango, though. So now, you know, you join in joining the band, obviously, and you're not in the band anymore. But assuming you're still friends with those guys. Is there anything happening in that camp? I mean, I know that we're going to do a tour. Obviously, that was cut short because of the Coronavirus is there, like maybe a new record with the original lineup in the works, or
I can't speak for him, but I do love every single member of that band. And I had a great time playing with them, you know, and it's it's amazing that I ended up joining the band because I finished the movie and everybody really like everybody, like everybody in the band approved. Even Jolla stay at one
point. But then, you know, lately just to kind of looking back on it and saying that it was like a lapse of judgment from his drinking days, but he should keep you know, it was kind of bummed me out, you know, because he really, really got it and really, really enjoyed. It's a very it's not a fluff piece movie. You know, it's surely
brutally honest. And I screamed at once in Chicago started going off on a tangent but it's been at once in Chicago with the ven current lineup there this is right before he joined the band to those Jolla state lanterra Kimmy Russell and Roland Roland Robertson you know in Chicago big screaming first time Jolla stay ever he wouldn't do so I made sure to sit like near him so I could watch his reactions.
And as the movie is playing on the big screen, and Joe is on the screen talking saying you know, things about other original band members and all that Jolla stays like you know, watching it he stands up point at the screen and goes it didn't say that as he's saying
that is funny.
And then then afterwards all that get the best was toward the end. I was like oh god Joe Joe hates this movie so much. He's never going to talk to be again and toward the end. He gets up watch Torbay looks at me goes Okay, can I swear on here?
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Fuck yeah.
Okay, Fuck yes, though he toward the end of the book. It starts to get heated between him and Mark Knight. Yes. And enough he walks toward me and he goes through. Are you some kind of fucking asshole or something man and he storms out. And I started chasing? He's like my Oh no. And I'm like, hey, wait, you gotta finish the movie. And he gets to the to the exit. And he turns around it goes, hi, gotcha is
that is a shitty move. That's, that's, that's pretty funny, actually. But then I would have been. Yeah, that's hilarious. That's really funny.
Um, so yeah, after I after the movie, he took me aside, he said, Drew, you know, I really needed to see that sometimes the truth hurts. And I really appreciate you. And so I could actually see my career from a different point of view. So yeah, that evening, he got it. But since then, he just kind of, he needs a bit self conscious. I think about it, because he doesn't drink anymore, and that he was drinking all the time they've been made. So that's totally
understandable. Yeah. And I'm really proud of then ended up joining the band. And that's a whole nother story for sure.
But yeah, what is it? Yeah, a crunchy noise. Is that you? What does it mean? Like a crunching? Where's your mic?
Oh, I got it right here.
Okay. All right. I don't know. I was just trying to figure out what that was driving me nuts. So anyway, so yeah, so you're in bang Tango, and then you were the guitarist for Chuck Mosley, who is the former singer faith no more. And you are, you're his guitarist, and now you're actually making a documentary about him. And that's not out yet. That's coming out in 2021. Right. That's probably gonna come out like 2024 to be honest with you. Oh, really? Yeah.
I mean, yeah, I haven't talked about it much. But we have, man. A lot of people are still grieving over Chuck, you know, he was a, it's such a unfortunate situation. I mean, the way he he passed away and all that and everything loved him very much and, and his family still kind of on the fence about being involved and all that and everything. And I've been in touch with the
faith, no more guys. And they're, they're into being involved, you know, but it's still, you know, they I think some more time needs to pass, you know, because he left a lot of people in very awkward situations, personally, and professionally, and all that and everything but, but I think it will see the light of day one day, I've got the band through the I've got one interview so
far. And it's an amazing interview with Matt Wallace, their producer, and he did the interview right after Chuck passed, actually, it was a very emotional interview. And it's it's that good fight, release, and by itself, count as a movie. It's a great interview. But yeah, I love shrek very much really was very fortunate to play with him to get to know him. And I know that. He says that's a great dude.
Yeah, so you got that project. And you you wrote a book. I have not read your book yet. But it's called dark, depressing and hilarious. Is that mostly about your time with bang Tango or also with Chuck Mosley or?
Yeah, yeah, it's actually I wrote the book as almost as like a goof, because that was like, everybody was coming out with these autobiographies. And I was like, see if I could do one, you know, and I ended up writing three days.
And how the hell do you have the energy to do you to make books? Yeah. I mean, I look at a guy like you. And so there's a funny part. So I'm looking at all the stuff you're doing. I'm like, oh, he wrote a book. He made a movie. He plays in a band. He's got he's got another book coming out. He's got another Music Project. I look at all the stuff you do on like, oh, he must have like, some sort of trust fund or his wife works and you have a day job to How the hell do you do all this stuff?
It's funny, I wrote the book at the day job.
And, okay,
but yeah, get a regular like nine to five day job Monday through Friday, I refurbished computers, okay for living. And I love it.
So you're able to write books while you while you do that?
Yeah, and that was that a previous job actually. Okay. That job shocked that was I get asked to read a book, but does a job man now though I absolutely love. It's called cascade asset management. And it's a it's a wonderful place. Very small kind of company, that it's amazing. But yeah, so the book has kind of just fell out of me. And I was, and it's got a very fun kind of self deprecating sense of humor about it. Okay. We have all people writing an autobiography. I have
no business doing that. But people seem to get a kick out of it, though. Like, it's like, they get it. They get the whole angle of it, you know? Sure.
For sure.
I never really I never really took myself too seriously doing this stuff. Because like, I mean, it's, but I end the book was actually a way for me, like saying like, Okay, I'm done with this stuff. Did the bank Tango thing play with Chuck and all that that's just walk away. And then, you know, here I am two years later with another movie, another book. And another album. Yeah, you
got a lot of projects. You know, this is interesting to you were at you were doing a movie, which I forget which one it was. But on the set of the movie and I saw the clip that's on YouTube, you propose to your wife, and it's such an odd clip because you're talking you're talking your buddy about jerky. That's what it was. Yeah, it was the the crystal one and you're talking to your buddy about like jerking
off or something. And then all of a sudden, you turn to Your now wife and you propose to her and she must have thought like, Is this like some sort of Adler? Does she know that it was real right away of man?
Well that was a it was while we were shooting a scene and the thing the director became a good friend of mine leading up to me being in the movie and I orchestrated the whole thing for him to hire my girlfriend at the time to be like a featured extra that interacts with my character okay movie and so that the first day of shooting at the end of the day, it's like 430 in the morning all she had to do was sit there turn around and react to my character talking about
that together. It's like you know, even jerk off or something like that except my character says
yeah, the other guy
and end of the plane was wants to turn around and do it for the last take me to pop the question. And she had she was totally caught off guard because I earned just Google and and it was written to the clips up on YouTube
right? Yes. That's crazy.
Yeah, yeah, the movie. I say check it out. It's it's the most romantic necrophilia story you'll ever
see. How do you you can watch it on Amazon Prime or?
Yeah. Oh, absolutely. Okay, Amazon Prime, you could you could order the blu ray from diabolik DVD comm you can order the Blu Ray Blu ray from the director directly as well. Okay. It's it's a cool movie, the first like hour and a half second regular movies and it goes straight to hell.
Hi, David. Welcome to the show. Horror brothers. How are you? Yeah, so we're just using a story about him proposing to his wife on a movie set. I'm sure you know that story.
I do. a horror movie.
Yeah,
yeah. Yeah, her name is Krista and the Yeah, just totally caught her off guard at like the end of the day of shooting 430 in the morning. We're all miserable and tired and
Carrie marriage indeed.
Yeah. So absolutely. So tell me the story how you two met because I think was 2016 rocklahoma. Now are a lot of the bigger bands like Megadeth aren't a lot of a lot of times they're sequestered from the smaller opening bands. So how did how did you guys get how did you drew How did you get access to David I guess is my question.
I snuck in. No, no, no. Actually, I've actually believe in out bang Tango was one of the big bands that day we opened up the mainstage Yeah. Okay. So it was so we were all in the same backstage area. So it's bang Tango Papi evil 6am mega death is disturbing the Rob Zombie. Our trailer paying Daigo trailer is right next to disturb streaming. I remember that was just kind of hanging out, you know, in front of our trailer. And just like I had no business
being here, all man. And then I saw Dave coming out of the golf. I always hear how nice of a guy is and I've always been a huge mega fan. So went up and said hey, and then we just hit it off. And at that time, I was talking to Tom he's got his business partner. And, and so there's a cool connection there too. And so from there, we just kind of kept in touch.
Okay,
lots of did some work with the label or like video stuff and everything and the hit the road with Tom he started a lot promoting the labels and, and all that in there.
Yeah. So I know you guys have a lot of projects, you have a book and an album coming out. I want to get to that. But if we could just go back in time a little bit. Obviously, I'm a huge Megadeth fan is probably every kid that grew up in the 90s was and so I have a few mega questions if we could go that route for a little bit and then we'll get back to the new stuff that you guys are working on.
Cool. Is that okay? So yeah, so I'm just curious, like, David, David, you move to LA and your was your mission to go there to be like a rock star cuz you came from Minnesota. And you just happen to live at the same apartment complex as Dave Mustaine
Yeah. 100% on both questions. Okay. Yeah, I mean, and again, but Dave, you know, Metallica was not a Komal was not recorded back there. I met Dave about six weeks after he was let go out of Metallica. And he had moved to this apartment there on Sycamore
Avenue in Hollywood. And that was the address that I had would move to in fact, I was thinking about, you know, it didn't until I could get sort of landed plugged in and and kind of learn LA, I was thinking I was considering going to Musicians Institute, the base Institute of Technology. So a, they'd sent like a list of apartments, you know, to kind of choose from in the area. So back when I was still living in Minnesota, I picked that one on on Sycamore.
And it turns out there was a woman who managed the apartment. She's from a little town called Mountain Lake, Minnesota about 30 minutes from where I grew up. So you know, kind of made the hometown connection. Okay, we kind of know someone from Minnesota, maybe we can trust her. You know, so, it's funny because I've read the Ellison
family history. In fact, I've amended it, it was actually sort of a download that we offered as the VIP presale purchases on the book that Tom and I wrote last year called more life with that. And as I read through it, you know, over the years, you know, most of the elephants went to California at some point you came over from way to Minnesota where they landed in the 1800s. The farm it's still in our family was was founded there.
And and many of the aunts, uncles, even my dad's all made some journey and or lived in California at some point in time during the 20th century. So I never quite got my dad, he really wanted me to go out there. He liked it. He was not a musician. He didn't get the music business, but he saw that I was serious about what I did. And, you know, he, he let me follow my path. And you know, he supported me in doing that. And, yeah, so I move in, I meet Dave
lives upstairs. And I could tell right away Dave was definitely meant to be a rock star. It's the way he carried himself and his very ballsy attitude, you know, basically willing to fight anyone at any over you know, if you stood in the way of his of his path of what he wanted to do.
That's awesome.
And I'm lucky because you know, I was not that guy. I was very much again a mild mannered guy from soda and we were taught very differently right grew up you know, the if you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all
that kind of thing. Well, Dave showed me a very different path and rock and roll you know that rock and roll was you know, with real rock stars, you know, with whether you're Lemmy Nikki Sixx, Gene Simmons, Axl Rose, Dave Mustaine, you know, those are this is a different era, you know, a different time When, when, you know, when when, you know, you said a lot with and through your music and and Dave had a very different life than me growing up. And so it was
kind of interesting. The Yin to the Yang, have two guys named Dave, who would meet an apartment on Sycamore and Hollywood and start this band called mega death and yeah, our diff our differences brought about how special the thing really was, you know? Yeah, we didn't have to be the same. It was our differences that that that created the interest still to this day. The fans love this, this kind of absolutely dynamic between the two of us,
right? So in those early days, I know Megadeth would go through a lot of lineup changes. But even before the first album, you guys audition like 15 drummers and you spent six months looking for a singer before you settled on having Dave Mustaine just be the singer kind of reminds me of your Seinfeld fan. But like on the show Seinfeld, he's always dating all these different girls.... And then later in the season, he decides that he finally meets the girl the girl
has been looking for. He's in love with himself and so it's kinda like Dave Mustaine he's like it's me. I've been what I've been looking for but but for those six months, was there any names that that would stand out that would go on to those drummers or singers that you guys audition that would go on to other bands that were that were no
no, not really. And I love your Seinfeld analogy, and I'm a big Seinfeld fan. Yes. And actually, it was not Dave's idea to be the singer. It was actually my idea.
Okay....interesting.
It's funny how it happened because so we didn't we didn't originally have a drummer named Dijon Carruthers, and he was our drummer. As I met Dave, he had a set a singer named Laura Kane that he was working with, Dave was writing everything and he had another kid he was kind of trying to teach how to play the bass, this guy named Matt Kissel-Steen, but that he was intention was this band would be called Fallen
Angel. And so when me and my Minnesota brood showed up, me and my friend Greg Hanovitz and my buddy, Brad Schmidt and his friend Brent. They lived in an apartment right next door to Dave me, Greg lived in the apartment right underneath Dave. And in fact, it's funny I remember in reading "More Life with Death", Brad, I had Brad chime in on the book and he reminded me that like Dave's BC Rich that he had from Metallica was actually out of BC Rich getting some work done on it. So
he didn't have a guitar. So he was borrowing his roommate Tracy had, I think, a Gibson an Epiphone or something that he would write stuff on. And he would actually ask Brad next door if he could borrow his Gibson Explorer from time to time to to write So Dave didn't even have a guitar. He was....
David... Metallica, I mean, he was, really kind of down to nothing rebuilding and but there was again, we rally around Dave, obviously, there was something very special there, and the first lyric he had was a song called Megadeth, which later got retitled "Set the World A Fire". And, Greg and I were in bands together growing up in the Midwest. I mean, we we've known each other since like, fifth grade or something. And we're always in bands
together. So Greg, he goes, dude, we got an F. We met Dave that first night. He goes, dude, we got to we got to play with that guy. That guy's awesome. And I said, Yeah, I know. And so Greg started playing with him first kind of as the second guitar player. And then once Greg was in there he goes, he told Dave, he goes, dude, get a ditch Matt, the bass guitar... Get Ellefson in here. Like he's a real bass player. He knows
what he's doing. And so I we sat around and jammed a little bit one day and Dave's like yeah, okay, he's good player and I think the main thing with Dave is being willing to do what Dave wants you to do. I mean, that really is the marching orders in and I got that right away so very clearly and Dave clearly had a path he had a sound obviously he had success with this yet to be known band Metallica Of course, people knew of them on there, they had a record, they just signed their
deal with Megaforce. And we're cutting "Kill 'Em All" at that time. But they weren't the big sensation we know them to be now but they definitely everybody loved them. And they were cool. And Dave was playing me that "No Life to Leather" demo, and I loved it. I thought it was great. And so I got it. I mean, I got that, I signed on to the vision right away from the
beginning. And I guess that's probably the reason I'm here all these years later is is I was willing to put in the work I was willing to put in the time, suit up, show up, dress up, speak up, and just get on board with it. So it's been that journey.
Yeah. Because how did you stick with him through all those times when there was all these lineup changes in the 80s? And 90s? I mean, you stuck with him for so why he never tried to fire you? Or do you just knew how to
No, no,I don't know. No. I mean, like, we'd certainly had some disagreements, and but we never came to blows. That happens in some bands, that usually that's the end, but we never did. And I'm sure there's times you wanted to punch me and things in there. But I was like, because again, we're not only were we forming this band, we were basically growing, I was 18, he was 21, we're growing up together. So in a lot of ways, he was an older brother. And of course, he had street smarts, he
knew the ins and outs of LA. And yet my sort of softer disposition often kind of brought common sense and reasonableness to Dave at times you know what I mean? So we both brought something to the table. But again, this was definitely Dave's vision. And again, I knew like get on board with this, like, Don't fight this, you can offer your, you know, your input on it, but you know, follow the the narrative, if you will and I think that's the main thing is, is that's what it's like in
Megadeth. And if and I think the people that either I never used it as a stepping stone for a solo career or any of that kind of crap. And there were some people over the years that have done that, and they're no longer here. And I very much believed in what we were creating. I to me, a band is a gang, it's your family, it's your tribe, it's who you are as a as an as a person. It's, your home base, I left my family of origin back in Minnesota to start a new family out in LA and that became
negative. And, you have each other's backs financially creatively, as you're dating chicks getting screwed over by chicks, signing leases, breaking lease, getting thrown out of apartments, getting on drugs, getting strung out on drugs,
going Hurry up, getting clean. I mean, everything that goes into that, I mean, we know Dave and I grew up together, I mean, we really did and now here we are, all these years later, we've we've grown up together we've gone through the good times a bunch of bad times, we raised our families around each other, so there's there's a lot to the story. It absolutely no one's in a band who play some songs.
Absolutely. Yeah. And it's interesting during the research, I didn't realize dimebag Darrell almost joined Megadeth and slash at the at the peak of Guns and Roses career I you know, this is just recently I'm hearing learning about this, but he was jamming with you guys. And he was a big fan of Megadeth. And he was you guys are smoking crack because it sounds like a crack that idea that he was gonna leave Guns and Roses. Not that Megadeth isn't
amazing, too. But he was actually considering leaving that band for Megadeth as
As a friend of Slash I would never let him leave Guns and Roses. And in fact, I think we even talked about that as like, there's no fucking way you're leaving Guns n Roses. Yeah, it was funny. They had just come home from Australia. And so it was late 88. Dave, we're off the road from the "So Far, So Good, So What" tour. We were writing the new material that would become Rust In Peace. Jeff Young was asked to leave the band. So we were down to me, Dave and Chuck
Behler. And yeah, I mean, look, the discussion started about guitar players. I told Dave I just hung out with the guys in Panthera. And we knew it wasn't called Dimebag. It was called Diamond Darrell.
Right, Glam...
He was in all the guitar magazines. He was definitely heralded as a rising star. So we reached over to him but he said he goes look with me comes my brother Vinnie. And of course we didn't need a drummer. And you know, thank God it didn't happen because the world got Pantera.
Yeah, amazing.
The generation behind Megadeth and Metallica and the Big Four was was the
Panthera movement. And we reached out to Jeff waters of Annihilator Jeff you know now that it was really starting to blow up pretty big and now Jeff and I are dear friends and we have many chats and fun laughs about hey, what what that would have been like, Yeah, but a lot of my friends I tell him I said, Look, I love you, dude, you're a great musician, but you wouldn't last and mega death for more than one chorus production trust me, you know, and especially even as the recent drummer thing
went around a couple years ago, I was like, Look, dude, you're a great drummer, you know, you know, you're not meant to be in this band, you know? Yeah, cuz I just know my friends and I know how the dynamic is, you know, and like I say, friends, don't let friends join mega def. It's just not, you know, it's, it's you because you've really got you've really got to put the professional foot forward, you know, and like, like Kiko, I did not know Kiko, I had just played
with him in November of 2014. By January 2015, it was just back down to me and Dave again, rebuilding the band management and he Dave called me one day said, Man, I saw this guy Kiko online, I think he'd be a good fit. I said, Hey, I know, I just jammed with him. I literally just got his phone number and his email. So I hit him. And I said, hey, guess what your numbers up. You want to join Megadeth? You know, and, you know, and and so that's how
things happen. Usually, you know, usually you're sort of chosen, you know, it's, it's never like, Hey, can I put my name in the hat? That's not usually how these gigs happen. Okay, metal allegiance. We would do that, too. We would, you know, me and Maggie and Portland Skolnick. We would choose the people that we felt were right for it. It was never sort of blind submissions. as famous as our friends are. Hey, man, can I sing on your record to be like,
Yeah, I don't know that. I don't know if there's the right place for you. You know what I mean? So you know, usually when you're creating it, it usually the call comes from this way out that way. And, you know, same with dirt, dirt revere and Chris Adler had had recommended him when the transition need to happen, and we did not know Dirk. So bringing Dirk in there was no, again, there was no kind
of past friendship. It was a brand new relationship starting with First of all, you got to be fucking badass and nail the gig. And if you can nail the gig, then we'll see if we can hang and if we can hang Hey, then you can then you can be a full time member the man Yeah, there's kind of a process for sure. The news that talked about that when you joined Metallica, you know, he got the gig and they got to sort of hazing him for a year. Right?
Yeah.
Hey, let's let your your like sort of in the trial phase for a while to make sure we can hang with you. Because that's the other part of being in a band is you know, can we hang with you on the road? Or, you know, are you going to be that guy where your your socks stink and your breath smells? And you know, you leave your frickin pizza on the couch to the bus every night like,
yeah, now how does that work with hanging with a band now? Because you're 30 years sober. Congratulations on that. But like, how does that work? You know, like, if you're hanging out with Drew or Vinnie with your new band, would you do you require them to not have booze around you or
the alcoholic I'm the one that reacts strangely to alcohol and cocaine and heroin and drugs. Right? So it's me, it when it's when it goes in my body that the problem happens in my life. So if you want to put it in your body rock on, by all means,
but that doesn't tempt you if it's backstage or anything,
it's not a temptation. I mean, look, I take the daily measures needed to make sure that I you know, am in spiritually fit and mentally and physically fit to not have that, you know, come into my body anymore. Mm hmm. Look, we're in the entertainment business. Anybody who are in the entertainment business, you could be a frickin lawyer or a plumber or, you know, roofing houses, there's going to be booze around, you know, yeah, so it's about being your own mental
defense has to be there. It's funny because you know, everything that will kill you is literally within an arm's reach of view by your own hand. Like no one ever dumped booze and narrow and in me, right that's true by my own hand so it's it's never you that got me loaded it was me that got me loaded. Okay. I think coming to understand that is like okay, my my addiction is not conditional. It's not or it's not sort of
outwardly conditional. It's in really condition so make sure the inner the inner self is right and and, you know, again, for three decades I've been debt problem seems to have been removed from That's awesome.
I had a question. I always wonder this like, in 92 when you guys did Countdown to Extinction, such a great album, probably the most the one that sold the most
One of my favorites.
Absolutely. Yeah, I think a lot of people's But was there a conscious decision to dump the mascot Vic for the cover? I know he was on the back with the countdown thing, but you know, what was the theory behind that? Were you kind of trying to do a different kind of look for the band at that point?
There you know, again, that was a major intentional step into the mainstream. Now again, the mainstream was heavy metal was now in the mainstream and very popular of course, you know, Headbangers Ball, Metallica was blowing up, Queensryche, I mean, .... It was our moment for sure.... to step into that spotlight. And we didn't want to
Yeah, the abacus, that was cool... get rid of Vic at all because he was the mascot. But we also we hired Hugh Sign out of Canada to do the artwork for that record and also for Youthanasia... And so he presented an idea of the levitating old man and the, you know, in the jail cell and everything. So he presented that idea. We didn't go to him and say, Hey, we need you to incorporate our mascot into his... at least not tha
I remember. So that's why I th nk on the back, we talked ab ut Vic, but the abacus doing he count. Ye
So there was a narrative there with Vic, but it wasn't going to be the presence on the cover. And you know, with with the rest in peace campaign, we did not only the cover of that, but we did the Hanger 18 stuff we did the Nuclear Vic, we had all these Yeah, pretty powerful graphic images, you know?
Absolutely.
Rather than just try to keep one upping that. Let's turn a corner and try something a little bit different.
Yeah. And then the euthanasia album, another great album, so many good. I could spend an entire episode on each one of these albums, but I just start to get one question on some of them. But the song The Killing road, is that's one of my favorite Megadeth songs. It wasn't ever talk of releasing that as a single or trying to license it for movie or TV shows. I feel like it'd be great for like a movie or so or TV show.
Look, you're probably right. I mean, it's funny because now, I mean, look at the iPhone commercial this last year last year, you know, they use last rites loved to death off site, you know, track one album, one, you know, so who knew that? Obviously, somebody inside of Apple was a fan of that one.
That's awesome,
though, you know, who knows these? You know, these these people that that? Do you know, the musical direction for these productions? I mean, who knows? If there's a fan in there, hey, maybe it'll be you one day, you'll get a gig working for Sony picture and you'll
want to put killing? Oh, I would definitely put mega songs on a lot of different things. So awesome.
I don't think it was ever talked about as a single we did play it. And in fact, we we've have played it even more recently. Oh, good. Yeah. added in the set. When we've kind of reached for a deep cut. It's fun song to play. It's cool. The riff is fun.
Yeah, so what Sorry, I want to go through each album, but we don't have time. So I'll just move forward in 2002, you left Megadeth or Megadeth, disbanded, whatever, however you want to say it, you wouldn't work for PVS. And so what does it talk about the transition of going from plane in a metal band to working in the corporate world I didn't even know until I did the research that you left Magda for like eight or nine years or whatever
they had called up. There was a situation that was kind of transpiring in 2001 and saw it kind of common and Dave, Dave called me up one day in February of 2002, and said, Hey, I quit Megadeth. And, you know, which essentially means the band is over, you know, and we didn't dissolve our business interest for a couple years later, but you know, which is what the legal stuff was around. And but it Yeah, it's that moment where you go, like, you're pedaling around, gone.
Now, this is really big. It's cool. It's working well, and it squares for me had been almost 20 years of my life. And then one day, that's it, it's over and followed by Oh shit, how am I gonna raise my family? How am I gonna pay my mortgage, you know, all the realities that
come with that. And I think on one point, we we needed the brake, you know, we've been pushing and pushing, we've gone through so many transitions, bandmember managers, people in our ear about, you know, if you just change the logo, then you
won't be so metal. And if you just change your songs, then the radio will accept you, you know, so all these things, you know, and every great artist has gone through that your kiss or Peter Frampton, Judas Priest, I don't care who you are, you've gone through that those transitions and, and part of it is because of the things outside of you. And the culture outside of you
is also changing. You know, not only are you sort of changing as you grow up, but Seattle music, new metal, you know, FM, you know, the disturbed Godsmack kind of FM, heavy metal guys were coming onto the scene there is there's a lot of changes going down, you know, so how do you sort of stay competitive? How do you stay in that realm yet, you know, you change too much. And then your fans who actually made you who you are now their past, and they hate
you, you know what I mean? So there's all these different little calculated decisions you have to make when you're sort of running your, your band, the creative, the business, all that. So on one hand, it was it was kind of a breath of fresh air. I never felt like my time and Megadeth was done. I was kind of felt like it was a little bit of just maybe a little internal brawl between us. And you know, we would come around and again, it did, of
course in 2010. But in those eight years, and Megadeth only work, I think maybe five of those years. I think Dave started in 2004 and put out a record in 2005. So we put out three records in that time that I didn't perform But during that time, you know i i did i called everybody as a money Connor
O'Brien. We got connected at Roadrunner Records. Talk to the people at Ben, actually, the people at Fender here, reached out to me about a position there and I called a friend of mine who used to work for St. Louis music who had ampeg crates and Alvarez brands. And he had hired Ken Hensley. God rest his soul who just passed away. He had hired Ken Hensley from Uriah heep, who was a very famous musician and an EP band did very well. He hired Ken to run his artist relations for ampeg back
in the 80s and 90s. So I said, Tony, I, you're not gonna believe it. But Megadeth is overy. Everybody. everybody's like, what they'll happen, you know, he's like, Well, you know, it's that moment. So he, he said, he goes, listen, I got something I'm doing with PDM. I'm consulting with them on some stuff. And I might actually have an artist relations position for you kind of like I did with Hensley. I said, Dude, I'd be great. And I was actually using PV products, I was using PV bass
amps and stuff. And so that's how that happened. And I watched Ken Hensley, I watched how he had done it with ampeg. And he was my role model, quite honestly. And so I just got in the trenches and and, you know, change my shirt that said, Megadeth, to the one that said, PV, and you know, and I just, I got on board with it. And I went to college, I got my business degree, which always wanted to do. And I and I just, you know, I changed some years of my life.
But what's funny is a little band called f5 developed around me, and that to me, was a clear evidence that my playing days were not over.
Gotcha,
bass player, right, according Rs, that that was not done that this that this thing with PV is great school. But it's it's a, it's a season. Sure. And I did I did for seven years, I ran the whole global artist relations. I think we did a lot of great stuff, great artists, you know, brought people like Kid Rock Band and slipknot. Nickelback, and you know, big, the big players at
that time. Absolutely. Yeah. And it was kind of cool, because they were all big Megadeth fans, you know, them, even big Christian artists, I got to see men Megadeth really impacted a lot more people than I guess I probably had realized, you know, so it was, it was a lot of fun. I learned a lot, I learned a lot about just kind of servanthood you know, we're in a business where we stand in the spotlight and everybody Anders does,
right. And on the other side of it, I learned this is probably worth being from Minnesota helped was Hey, you know, this is about serving them, you know, and I got to, you know, be able to help them and oftentimes even offer some of my own experience and absolutely about, you know, the path to and in rock stardom. And so, yeah, it was it was great. I really appreciated that. Well, I learned a lot about business manufacturing.
And it's funny, it was right at a time 2002 when I started working on PBS right as everything was moving to China, you know, to watch that whole China's in them all the shit that we're bitching about now, don't make anything in America. I was there at the downbeat of when it was happening. And the music industry is a microcosm of you know, in automotive and Boeing sure stuff but no, PV is a big player was a big player in that day so I got to watch in a Hartley PV oh my gosh, you know,
I have such respect for him. And here's his company he had built by himself in Mississippi, this big monolith organization and just watching it just fragments away because things he had in order to stay competitive. He had to move stuff to China. And it just it changed how our how our biz our new instruments are
made. Now most of them are made overseas a lot of them and so it was a really interesting time Eddie Van Halen of course was at at PB at that time and the first trade show I worked at Nam Eddie. I met Danny at that time and so yeah, it was very cool. Yeah. made a lot of Yeah,
see had that kind of break. And then you guys get back together. You made some more albums. You won a Grammy. That's pretty exciting. And then now I hear that you are working on a new Megadeth album. Can you tell us anything about the album when it's coming out a song title a lyric, a theme and artwork, special guests. Anything? Give me something?
No. There's nothing I can tell you.
It's all secret. It's locked down.
It's not even that it's a secret. It's not done yet. So I can't tell you you know, like when something's done is when it's best to talk about it. Okay, and you're talking about evidence, hard facts as opposed to Well, I
think it might Yeah, fair enough. Well, let's let's move into the since I know we're getting short on time. Let's talk about the projects that you do have done because you got the two of you have a few different things going on. So the first thing is the book, Rockstar Hitman, which it's a it's an interesting Sina idea. It's about these right here. There we go. So yeah, it's about spies traveling the world in the rock band who are also hitting it right this and it's called
the characters sledge. The sleds Chronicles what
the character actually actually drew came, Drake came up with that. It's funny, the idea came to me when I was on tour last year in November, like literally a year ago in South America is in Brazil. And the idea came to me, I hit drew right away, I thought I need an accomplice on this one. And, and so we started lining out the characters and getting the story. And I think probably it's interesting, cuz I've written several books, non nonfiction, how to books,
memoirs, and stuff. And I think probably the, a couple of things with this, writing fiction. And I always wanted to write fiction, I'm a fan of it. And and I know, Drew is a horror thriller kind of writer, so I knew he'd be good to pull in, you know, to be a partner on this. But I think a couple things. One, as you develop a character, you ask yourself, Is this character going to be here
just for a moment? Or are they going to be in this for a long time, and knowing that this is going to be a book series that there's going to be several in a series, it's like this the character stay in the series that they read? Did they disappear for a bit and appear back later? So I think those are some of the fun things me and drew get to work on. Because it's kind of like an album. You make the album, it's done.
Unless it's a concept album, you know, you know, Pink Floyd the wall, part two, you know, you kind of create it and it's done. And you move on Well, with the book, and especially with this particular one, we intentionally set out to make it a series. That's why it's called the
sledge Chronicles. Sure, because chronicling his journey as he goes through this Rockstar lifestyle, and drew and I both, you know, being in bands, and having experienced, you know, the rock star lifestyle, we can write a little bit from our own, you know, personal history, yet, it's clearly fictional. And I think the other thing about it, too, is sort of the point of view that we wrote it from, because most books are usually written sort of by a third
person. And then the characters way in in quotations, you know, sledge said, come over here and Sally data, you know, End of quote, you know, what we decided to do with this was to write it actually from sledges perspective, like it's him talking. So it's almost like him writing his own memoir, his own autobiographical memoir, and and that really opened up a different some very clever angles that I've not seen, quite honestly, it's in a lot of other books.
Do you think that you would try to make it into a movie at some point?
Well, we could drink Drew's the filmmaker. So I mean, he, we, you know, we didn't talk about that we said, you know, right, you know, we started the lesson book company.
Okay, um, and as a way, kind of, like we started off in films to put out dwellers and then anything else comes after that, you know, we started the lesson book company, because we also have some, some memoirs, I think, the Chris Paul memoir, we're gonna put out that, and I'm actually quite a handful of our Rockstar buddies are now hitting us up to, oh, I have an outlet to put these books out. So we're going to do that as
well. But you know, but to also be able to put out fictional and all kinds of different stuff, it doesn't even have to be music related stuff. And by having the book company, obviously would feed very easily over into the film company. And of course, EMP record label we can do soundtracks and all kinds of perfect
Yeah. And so the other movie you have coming out is called dwellers and it's like a found footage horror movie. And you guys are you guys direct drew directs edits, right stars in it, and you're doing a lot of those things as well.
Yeah, that's Yeah, that's Drew's thing. Mad monster convention in February 20. in Charlotte, North Carolina is where we're gonna premiere the film. Okay. So yeah, so it's, it's, it's, it's cool. Me and Tom Hayes are making a couple little cameos in it. But yeah, that's Drew's baby, man. And I loved it. I thought the idea of it was was very hip and cool. And
So and then that's all drew Yeah. And then then the other thing you guys have together is the band Lucid, which I just had Vinnie on my show last week from Sponge, but it's also got the Mike Heller, who's the drummer from Fear Factory, so I heard one song, but how would you guys describe the music? Like how would you describe it to people?
Well, it's interesting we writing the book. This Let's face it, 2020 was a year of Hey, fuck it, why not? Anything Goes what what to write on the song? Sure. You want to plan a song? Sure. You know what I mean? It's why not?
Well, yeah, you want to do the Chuck Shute podcast here when
Drew sent me a track and said hey, can you throw a bass in here and then of course I was writing a new Ellefson solo record at the time. So my studio ears were on I was plugged in ready to go send it over played on it was like yeah, this is freaking cool, man. I wasn't really I've
seen Drew play. I know his Bang Tango history and the other stuff he's done but this was really cool stuff that spoke to me and and then he called me up and he said, Hey, Vinn is going to come in and lay it and write some vocals and lyrics and lay some tracks and it turned into a thing and then we thought, you know what? Why don't have like sort of a soundtrack to the book? And quite honestly, this this actually is a photo of Vinnie, perfect name and Niklas
likeness to sled. So he is, I mean, we've kind of, tweaked it a little bit. But it's, uh, yeah. So Vin is part of the part of the book. We maybe should just call it the Vinny Chronicles, I don't know, Chronicle, okay.
And a couple a couple of the songs tie into the book too.
They do and they did an awesome job. Like, I'll hear these clever little ways that Vinnie writes I love him. I mean, I love sponge great... he's such a rockstar. He's just a cool guy. And he writes such great lyrics, very trippy lyrics. He's a type of lyricist I've never worked with before. So it's fun with that... and
Drew is a great guitar player. I mean really great there.. and Mike Keller he's good friends with Dirk Vermeeren and so Dirk's like awww dude, Mike's awesome they're good friends and so to work with Mike and just walk in and we all met in LA the songs we get the songs together we all met in LA mid July I plugged in and banged out 10 songs in two days and and and it was fun I just like hey produce me let me know I got ideas let me know what you want and Mike was very good in the studio
really knows his way around as he says these tracks been coming together they it's it's it's cool stuff and it's very different. It's obviously not thrash metal. Hence the name lucid has this... kind of feels like what the music sounds like.
W got the one thrashy song remember the one you were like I don't want to do this.
Guys. What do you guys writing shit from "And Justice for All" here... ...one song like that.
Okay.
We have to.. yeah...
what is that one called? Can you say
It's kind of this Stone Temple Pilot-y kind of grungy thing a little bit, but it's... I don't want people to just get it.... that's what it sounds like.
That song... That sounds called... am I able to say what it's called? It's called "Damned".
Okay, now would you guys tour for this band?
What's that?
Would you tour with this band? or do any live shows?
I think look, once we all get out of quarantine. Yeah, hope you're I think we're just going to be running like wild rabbits just going and doing anything we can I mean, a lot of 2021, of course is a reschedule of 2020 there'll be new Megadeth stuff next year, sponges a new record coming out next year. So there's some traffic copying that needs to happen there to kind of, you know, for you know, have the flow, but I think everybody's
also pretty reasonable. It's like, Look, you know, there's there's, you know, there's there's new music coming up. You know, it's I always say it's kind of like, quarantine records are kind of like Superbowl babies, you know, nine months after the Superbowl suddenly. I mean, I'm born in November, maybe I'm a Super Bowl, baby. I don't know. But it's like, you know, months after the Super Bowl, you know, they always say that there's this influx of
births. Interesting. People are all holed up on the couch watching the Super Bowl, and whatever else they're doing. That's interesting. So I think I think 2021 is gonna be the same way with with music. I mean, I think it is for me for sure. I mean, there's no cover record.
Yeah. How do you record how do you do all these problems asking Drew about that earlier? How and Drews got a day job. But how can you guys give me some tips on work ethic? I think if I do like two or three podcasts a week, I feel like I've put in a full work week, but you guys are doing movies, books, coffee companies, bands, how do you how do you do that I don't understand what's the secret???
Got to find your zone got to find that Mojo. Once you lock onto something and you start going for you just go for it hard and you just kind of, got to find your right pace. And this kind of, hit on something until to the point where you're not sick of it and you just keep on going with it. Sometimes you got to take a break and go on to something else for a little bit.
So I that's what I do so many things because I get bored of one not bored, but I get to a point with one thing to like, Okay, I need to step away and work on something else for a little bit. And then just kind of bounce back and forth. And that's that's that's always been my thing.
You echo that Dave?
Yeah, pretty much. I mean, again, it's every day. I mean, me and Tom Hazert talk several times a day and we'll kind of Hey, let's do this, he how about this covers, How about we do this and then so there's always that way, Drew and I once I think we kind of started to find our creative Mojo together back in probably April or so when he sent me that
first track. Again, this book was already well on its way and again, the book kind of got to a point and then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I see these emails and Drew, send me these chapters. I'm like, Holy smokes, dude, you're like killing it here. This is awesome. And then that inspires me to get back into the book. The music stuff kind of went up, and then it sort of disappeared for a bit. And next thing you know, it's like, hey, let's meet in July. And hey, the songs are pretty
well lined out now. And it's like, Wow, great. So yeah, things go through seasons. I think that's the thing with creativity. You can't force it, but when it's there, and it's and the floodgates are open, man, you got to go with it. I mean, honestly, look, I just got home from tour Monday morning. As a little shout out, I mean, we hit it pretty hard to the Midwest. And honestly, I was kind of thinking I'd come home and just sort of glide down into
Thanksgiving. And I've been working harder this week than I was last week. You know what I mean? And it's, but that's what it is. It's sort of like, I've learned over the years, nothing feeds momentum, like momentum. And when you've got momentum, you've got to go with it, man. You've just got to keep on the phones ring. And is there you go
back to 2002? When Megadeth ended, dude, it got dark real quick, and, and I was calling people and I mean, my phone was ringing that way,I was going Hey, can I sing on it's gonna hurt me that sing what can I do this and wow, get a real job like, so I've been there I've been it's crickets and scarecrows, and the Ravens out in the corn. So you
like being busy? Like say like, how many hours a week? Do you work that you say that?
That's because again, Megadeth... from the inute I met Dave, it was were r ckin so for 20 years, and the I just stopped. And I was li e, this sucks, man. I do not ike I'm way too motivated. An again, being a clear mind, I ve hive minds work and so to hav things going, I've been used o doing this, you know, as f n as it was, again, I had to b solely dedicated to Megade h those first 20 years y u know, absolutely there's th re's no option you have to be
united. But then there comes a oint in life like now where it' fun to have a handful of othe things as well as mega death because Megadeth You know, we ve shut down now for a couple f years we've done a littl bit of stuff, but we've been working behind the scenes on n album and so got obviously CO ID shut things down this year. So it's fun to have a bunch f other horses in the race you k ow, and kind of get them get th
m up to the starting line. So w 'll get with cut when COVID ha pened I was I feel like I was p epared. It's kind of like that' that's cool. We're shutting down no problem. Let's get to work on some other stuff. You k ow, and not freak out. Beca se I've learned never to put all my eggs in one basket and I hav n't for the last 20 years and i 's it's paid off
Absolutely and yeah, you have a new album and people should check out Ellis Ellison no cover it's all covered songs no cover means like there's no cover to get into the bar Yeah, yeah.
Perfect ally altered by alter ego of drew fun frontier performed on that.
Are they misspell your name or something?
Yeah, well, there was a thing there's a thing on Apple Music when it came out last week. Yeah, we had to do a retake. Well, it's funny because there's a hidden track. It ends with the track 18 by fast way save what you will but if you leave the CD and there's a bonus hidden track on there. Oh, is actually chips enough. Me and drew and Vin actually sings right back maybe we even put that sign up. We're gonna put that song on the loose.
Okay, perfect. Yeah, well, I
know which we get last Olmert mixing the looser the album and I think we may have him do a remix of a of Downton Abbey and he sees Lhasa is amazing. He's done like Al storm and the world Dane and sanctuary. Okay,
cool. Well, I know. I know you guys got to get going. So I do like to end each episode with a highlight in a charity. And so Dave, I know you work with the you have a use youth music foundation. Where you you set up all these like online tutoring with all these rock stars helping kids, right?
Yeah, yeah. David Ellison youth music foundation. Our link is Ellison youth music foundation.org with a little button up there to to donate. I mean, foundations, nonprofits are always doing some kind of fundraising stuff. Yeah, our initiative earlier this year was a School's Out initiative where we did we gave free music lessons to students all around the world. And yeah, so that's my, that's my my highlight and
my charity equipment. So that was really a great way as things were shutting down in the world. It was great to have that platform there because I called everybody up and I just said, Hey, listen, why don't we give some free music lessons to everybody. It'll get us out of our own head. It'll keep us out of fear and freaking out that the sky is falling and our lives are over you know, as much as our tours are going away and stuffs gonna change this year.
Let's get into action helping other people because that's a sure way to get you out of yourself for sure. Do
you ever get people reaching out to you like that are depressed or suicidal or going through a rough time? And do you look at those messages or I mean, because I'm assuming you get a lot of message you can't go through every message on Instagram and Facebook and email.
Yeah, I don't I don't Yeah, I have people that kind of handle the social media stuff and look over that. But yeah, I hear about him you know, and sometimes on live streams and people post little comments and stuff and I picked up on it, you know, and and i know look some of its alcoholism and addiction. So I know I've been
there. Sometimes it's you know, people growing they're teenagers are going through that whole thing, kind of misunderstood by parents and I get that that's what rock and roll largely is, Hey, this is my voice. This is my tribe. And so I yeah, I mean, look, I've lived all that myself, you know, so if Yeah, look at Anytime I can try to be helpful, and even through the foundation, we've done some stuff like that, you know, with, with people that have
depression. You know, and it's, it's, it's an interesting society we live in, because in America, there's sort of this mindset that if we, if we have our basic needs met, we won't want anymore. But we know in a capitalist society that once you get a little, you want a little more. Sure. And that was that's a sure way to lead to a depressing lifestyle. And it's not to say that you can't be blessed with abundance and have nice things and be comfortable.
That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is, is the propensity in in human nature, and in some of our own personal natures, and I know that about myself as well, that, you know, that can't be the end game, that can't be the pursuit. And I think all the stuff that what I see those kind of people, I kind of try to focus it back, like what is your interest? What gets you excited? What wakes you up in the morning and get you? Mine has always been music, I mean, done doing
the same thing at age 56. Today in November that I did back when I was 10 years, 11 years old. You know, it's amazing, you know, getting excited about music, you know, and talking about this, all the stuff we just talked about, you know,
yeah. Well, yeah. If
I follow your path,
yeah, no, I'll let you go, Dave, because I know you got stuff. Do I have one last question, though? Before you before I let you go? Because I did some research. I watched a lot of interviews that you did, I noticed that you're a total pro in interviews, like you, you are the same person if you're talking to Eddie trunk. Or if you're talking to like a 10 year old kid. Is that something you just learned over being in the music business for so many
years? Or did managers like kind of coach you on how to act in interviews? Well,
I remember the very first interview that I did with Megadeth, it was probably at 1985, or 86. And I remember I read it back and I sat with Dave and he pointed some things out he goes now see how you talked about this here? And then and he and he did because he was he was being critical because it was as we called it Rock School trying to be first of all, we wanted a consistent narrative in the
band. Yeah. Okay, that one guy over you're talking about jazz and other guy we're talking about, you know, we let's get a consistent narrative. And that's sort of creating that. And, and then, of course, as I did interviews, over the years, I mean, I remember I think was went into euthanasia. We actually hired an interview coach, and I remember sitting in London and going through some interviews, and you start to kind of notice things like, are you picking your nose or
fluffing your hair? You know, I see people today on the zoom meetings, they get distracted. And next thing you know, they're you can tell they're looking at their phone. Hey, wow, would be where you are. Yeah, you're on
point. You know, and it's easy for, you know, technology and things to distract us, you know, but it's, you know, I think the big thing is, is just just be yourself, man, you know, and then if you just meet yourself, you don't have to kind of try to retrace your steps and go well, who was I? When I was talking to that guy? You know, I mean, it just, it just just be who you are, you know, and, and because people, truth always comes out. Yeah, you can, you can see
truth, you can hear truth. I'm talking truth with the capital T. You know, like, the real truth that always comes out. So just just be that and no, I find that then you never have to retrace your steps.
Okay. All right. Well, thank you so much, Drew. If you want to stick around, we can keep chatting. But I know Dave's got to get going. He's got to have a good one. All right. Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. So and I know your charity is a Toys for Tots. You told me so your dad is like the president of that.
Yeah. He's been the president for probably about a decade now. And in Chicago, huge. parade in Chicago. There's like, like, 80,000 motorcycles. That's going from like, the north side of the south side. Or south side of the north side. Yeah. Every year. I got cancelled this year, unfortunately. Oh, yeah. But it's usually a really big attraction and all that. So that's something I've always been around since as a little kid. I appearance for all these
bikers. Okay. Yeah, they're like, cooler than I am.
Yeah, another question I was gonna ask. We didn't have time to because Dave interrupted us. Now he joined in of course, we wanted to talk that was amazing. Talking. Yes. Oh, there you go. That's it. I was gonna ask him. I had so many more questions. I skipped over cuz I was like, well, he told me it goes well, probably like 20 minutes or 30 minutes. If it's going well. I think he gave me like, 40 minutes. I feel bad. So, but I was gonna ask you.
He's great. He's amazing. I was gonna ask you about this Zen from Mars project. You told me that. Um, so first of all, it's the singer from kick Tracy. Who else is in it? chips.
Oh, yeah, she's Steven Shroff and kick Tracy chips enough in the nuts enough Kate Catalina who's actually chips wife and a very, very talented piano player singer. Okay, and we got Bryn Ahrens from the band split, and my color from your Patreon, Raven and lucid.
So why explain to me You said there's gonna be two versions of the album coming out with different remastering is that because they couldn't agree on how to do it or what was the story though?
The thing all started off with all these instrumental demos wasn't being Tango, and I intended a lot of them to be bank Tango songs,
okay? But at that point like that they were just more conservative playing shows no instead of like recording new material and everything so so I just randomly shut the Steven Sharon from keep tracing me now much like I did Ben from sponge I just had, I'd never met him before this year, I just found an email and sent him an email with a track and he, you know, he did it, he's now got the ban. Same thing with Stephen Sharon.
And that was about six years ago, and sent him a couple tunes and he was like, dude, I'm all over this. And then then we ended up with Explorer. While we're 13 songs. And, man, that was such a learning experience, you know, is that thing It started off as, like, my baby, then it turned into me and
Stephens, baby. And, and on my behalf I Oh, and with the rest of the guys in the band, I always wanted to make sure we had their their say, like, you know, everybody has, you know, say a word should go out and dictate where it should sound musically and all that, but there's so many moving parts and really when it came down to what it is. To be perfectly truthful. It's between me Steven and Mike. And, I mean, Mike. Sure more of the same vision instead of
Stephen. Okay, you know, and both visions were great, you know, they're awesome. I totally got it. That was always the guy in the middle. You know, I never said this out loud before. So you this is well, whoever wants no buds in for Mars. I guess this would be good for him. Yeah, but and so Stephen wanted to do. He ended up with doing his version of the album and he did that get finished about a
year ago. Okay, and then, and me and Mike, we hired a different mixture because Richard Easterling makes dance version Richard did an incredible job. He's a wonderful mixer. And but you know, me and Michael like, let's get a different sound more of like the way that we were, we're hoping to get and so we hired last alum, Merck who's also mixing volution stuff. And and that's really just about done with that to think we're just gonna get two more tracks going, then that sets finished.
Okay, finally, after all this time, it's like the most highly anticipated album that nobody ever cared about.
Oh, I can't write. I'm excited. I likes kick Tracy. I like bang Tango. I'm just sending some of the tracks. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, no,
I think it'd be very ethereal. It's like It's like heavy metal for weeks.
Well, yeah. When I'm, when do you think that will come out?
You have it by 2026? Okay, let's realistically probably hoping by the summertime, okay. I mean, right now, I think what it comes down to is just artwork and sequencing. Okay. Stephens ready to get his sequencing worked out. tracklisting and all that everything we're gonna have. A lot of it's gonna be the same tunes, but but, but different tracks. Looks like we're gonna leave a couple songs off of one version and Steve have a couple more versions on his. And it's, yeah, I'll send you the tracks
though, man. Very cool.
So we got that album and then the the rock star hitmen book is out December 18. So people can get it a week before Christmas, right? Probably preorder now, right, December 18. And
you can pre order right now on Barnes and Noble. You could get the hardcover the paperback and the ebook. And you can also pre order it on Amazon as a Kindle. Okay, and then there will be a paperback on Amazon. It's just if they don't allow pre orders for paperback for whatever reason. So I'll turn that live when you get a release date and everything but and that'll be available worldwide and all that. And everybody I know everybody's gonna ask me you guys do an autographed copies.
New. Oh, okay.
It's so many logistics involved with Sure. You know,
and it's
so and also mean they've spoken like we were gonna be doing a lot of convention appearances for like Weller's and all that and everything and you think it'd be a good way to get people to come out and see us and there you go sign that way. Yeah, I
know. He's doing so Ellison. He's got there's no cover albums out now. His elephant. It's great.
Yeah, that's such a great covers.
The ellefson Coffee is out. I think he's autographing bags of that. And then your guys's movie dwellers will be out soon and the band luces record will be out soon and also a new mega so a lot of stuff coming out in the works for both of you. Very cool Honestly,
this coping stuff gets wrapped up it's like a like 2021 is gonna be ridiculous in a different sense than this year.
Yeah, be busy for sure a lot of promotions so very cool. Well, is there anything else that I missed anything? I feel like that's a lot of stuff to
man. Nicely definitely check out her name is Krista and I got another movie I academics coming out too from the same director writer of her name is Krista club brimstone incorporated that's coming out and I think Valentine's Day and it's like a horror movie anthology.
Okay, that's good. It's where do you shoot these movies in Chicago are
actually those those were in Ohio actually had the groceries not giving getting drunk. Ohio Chuck Mosley lived in Ohio. Okay, we shot in Ohio, I shot dwellers in Ohio. Oh, for some reason I keep getting drawn to Ohio.
Interesting. All right. Well, very cool. Thank you for doing this. Thanks to David. Get Tom. Thank you for me. Okay. So thank you. I hope I said thank you but very grateful for both of you. Come on and, and for you to help setting this up as well. So appreciate it. My pleasure, man. Let's Let's do it again soon. Yeah. Keep in touch whatever you want. Absolutely. All right. Sounds good, man. Thanks.
I think he's ready to talk to you. Bye.
So that was David ellefson and drew for ta the book is called rock star hitmen? It's available on December 18. Everywhere. Look for the band lucid new album coming out soon. Look for a new Megadeth album. The new movie The horror movie found footage thing is called dwellers that should be coming out as well. Zen from Mars is going to be the album from drew and ellefson Coffee Company autographed coffee bags. You can get those on Ellison's website david Ellison website. Ellison's
solo album, no cover. That's a collection of cover songs. That's out now you can listen to it on Spotify for free. Lots of cool stuff to check out. Make sure you follow drew and Dave on social media to keep up with all this stuff. You can follow me on there as well. And if you like this episode, you can let me know by sharing it on your Instagram or Facebook. You can write me an iTunes review or leave a nice comment on YouTube. Also, if you enjoyed this episode, check out some of my
past interviews. I've had some great guests like Glasgow from Ozzy and Rob Zombie's ban. Wiley Arnett from sacred right, Rachel bowling from Skid Row, Don Jamison from that metal show. Jason McMaster singer dangerous toys he sings on Dave's new record, and many, many more. So thank you all for listening. Thanks so much to Dave and drew for coming on. It really was like a dream come true for me. So just remember, shoot for the moon.