DAVE ELLEFSON Seems To Doubt MEGADETH Is Coming To An End

Megadeth recently announced their final studio album alongside plans to begin a farewell tour sometime in 2026. Which is all well and good, unless you’re former Megadeth bassist David Ellefson. Then you’ve got your doubts.

In an interview with AlternativeNation.net, Ellefson expressed doubts over Megadeth‘s farewell and even insinuated that it could be an “an attempt to boost ticket sales.” Which I seriously doubt – Dave Mustaine seems genuinely ready to hang it all up. Plus the guy just battled cancer and he’s 64 years old. Hanging it up as a musician playing heavy metal seems like a pretty reasonable choice.

“If it really is a farewell, if it really is, and it’s not just an attempt to boost ticket sales, ’cause we’ve seen this movie before — boost ticket sales, go away, then the bigger offers come after everybody’s gone away for a couple years; I mean, we’ve seen how this works — but, look, if Dave needs to shut it down and call it quits because he is just had enough and he’s been through it all, then hey, you know what?

“As a still friend to him, even we haven’t spoken almost five years — you know what? God bless you, brother. Put it away with grace and go enjoy the rest of your life. So if he really is shutting it down and he’s really gonna put it away, then please do so with dignity and grace and do what you say and mean what you say. ‘Cause I think that farewell thing has been thrown around so much by so many people that it doesn’t have much weight to it. We’ve just seen it over and over again.

“So, if you’ve really gotta shut it down, shut it down and put it away and go enjoy the rest of your life.”

And yeah, there it is – the explanation of the headline. Ellefson goes on for whole paragraphs about how he’s not really believing that Megadeth is truly done. A little doubt is fine, but that’s… a lot.

Ellefson also touched on the fact that he got fired from Megadeth, and seems to think that getting classic Megadeth members back for one final show – like Back To The Beginning – is the way to go. Which I personally don’t see happening. Mustaine seems like a guy who’s made up his mind.

“It’s been a rocky road, for sure, obviously, and there have been moments sublime and there have been moments that I just scratch my head over, but at the end of the day… Look, Dave said four and a half years ago he doesn’t wanna play music with me anymore, so I just left it there and just moved on. I’m not sitting around waiting for a call. I’ve already offered, if it should come my way, I’d be happy to participate on some level.

“What we saw in Birmingham [at Back To The Beginning], in my opinion, was 100% on point the right way to say goodbye. You bring back the O.G.s — Geezer, Tony, Bill and Ozzy; the four O.G.s — ’cause, obviously, they went through their… Look, they fired Bill, they fired Ozzy, and at some point they’re back together. The four guys that started it all get to say goodbye together, to each other, to the fans, the fans say goodbye to them. So, to me, that is the model of how it’s done. I mean, that is a hundred percent the right way to do it.”