A few weeks back, we posted a story about Dave Mustaine‘s honest opinion of Metallica’s cash cow, The Black Album. Dave recounted the review he gave to Lars Ulrich, which, not entirely surprisingly, was a bit of a backhanded compliment. Per Dave:
“You know I talked to Lars the other day and I told him when I listened to his record [The Black Album] I said you know I thought that ‘The Unforgiven’ was the best song in the whole album and I listened to his whole album and this was [about the first time I heard it was almost a year ago or something].
And he goes ‘man that really meant a lot to me man’ you know and I went well you know I mean I really don’t really care too much for the rest of the album because that song means so much more than everything else because the chords were innovative and it was really cool.”
Now, in an older clip from the late 90’s that’s making the rounds on YouTube, Lars Ulrich and James Hetfield talk about their previous history with Dave Mustaine, with Lars in particular giving his own honest review about Megadeth’s music. Interestingly enough, he offers the same honest critique of Megadeth’s music that Dave offered of Metallica’s. Lars starts the interview clarifying that he and Mustaine’s friendship was in a good place:
“There was never really any animosity between me and him [Mustaine]. I think we forgave each other rather quickly… I’ve seen him a lot and we’ve run into each other a lot over the last couple years. Me and him have actually gotten in a kind of cool phone thing. He calls me once in a while and just tells me how he’s doing. I have a really kind of a pure thing going and stuff like that.”
James Hetfield jumps in: “We definitely experienced a lot of cool stuff together that can never be changed and never be done again with the same innocence and virgin territory… virgin used loosely [laughs].”
Lars goes on to talk about the early Megadeth albums: “Rust In Peace… [gets confused]. No, Peace Sells [… but Who’s Buying?]… I remember the first record [Killing Is My Business] didn’t do that much for me. I mean, I respected it and stuff like that.
But I was like a really big fan of Peace Sells the second record- I thought was an awesome heavy-metal record at that time. And I listened to it a lot, and even though I certainly didn’t tell anybody at the time, I was actually secretly kind of proud of the work that he’d done because he had stepped up to the plate. I certainly didn’t tell James… but I thought that was an awesome record.”
Lars goes on to talk about the respect he has for Mustaine, and then reflects on their short-lived time together in Metallica:
“I don’t know I mean once again, you know the one thing you got to admire about anybody who’s been around for as long as he has, you know, just the staying power is awesome. I mean in a time frame where most fans stick around for 15 minutes or less, it’s just awesome that it’s been 15, 16 years for him and he’s still here making records. You gotta almost tip your hat to that.
It is pretty crazy that we were actually in a band together for what now seems like about five minutes or something, you know, but it’s something that nobody can ever take away.
And that was just- it’s a great part of our history great part of his history and a great part of rock and roll history in the last 20 years of the 20th century, you know?”