My Life With Deth

by David Ellefson

  I quickly wrote a lot of songs for the worship group when I was the leader. If we needed a communion song, or a song for benediction, I’d write it. Essentially a service will be comprised of three songs plus a sermon and shared testimony. For two years MEGA Life! was an evening service, and after that it became a morning event.

  After all of these transitions I was finally in a good place. I had graduated college; I had been in my own bands; I’d worked for Peavey; and I was involved in worship ministry at church. I had a pretty well-rounded life with a lot of stability. I thrived in these aspects of my life. Rather than feeling like a boat bobbing up and down on the ocean, I now felt like a pontoon with stabilizers on all sides.

  A THOUGHT

  The Bass Guitar—and How to Play It

  To me, playing any instrument well requires that you do it often. Practicing at home is good, but there’s nothing like being in a band room or on a stage with other musicians regularly. It’s the thing that really tightens you up as a player. As far as I’m concerned, it’s not about being the flashiest bassist, but rather about being consistently solid and stable in the band, whatever style you play.

  The greatest bass player who ever lived? I’m not sure there is a “greatest” anything or anyone, because everyone brings something unique to the table with their style of playing. Some of the more special ones to me are Steve Harris, Geddy Lee, and Bob Daisley, who played in Rainbow and on the early Ozzy records. Those guys had very melodic and interesting lines and they are also great songwriters, which probably has a lot to do with why their bass lines are so prominent in their music. They are artists as well as bassists, and I’ve learned a lot from that approach in my own career.

  We have so many generations of great music behind us now that there are a lot of genres, players, and influences to draw from. Whatever style you like to play, make sure you do your homework and learn the basics, too. Learn things like the blues and classic rock songs; learn some Beatles, Zeppelin, and country; and study the basics of jazz. In fact, once you learn Jazz 101 you will essentially have the basics to play with anyone, anywhere, and in any key.

  It’s important to dumb it down and play some punk rock, so you can learn how to have some raw emotion in your music, too. Being refined is great, but most music I’ve ever played sounds best when it has some kicking energy to it and is not just played perfectly all the time. I think there’s something we can all learn from the three-chord bands like the Clash, the Sex Pistols, the Ramones, and, more recently, Green Day and Nirvana. That music is all about spirit, even though it may be lacking in some refinement. Also, learn to play by ear, because that can become your most valuable asset on any bandstand anywhere. Most bands don’t have sheet music, so don’t get too used to reading maps when you should be looking at the road signs anyway. Oh, and don’t snub the pick!

  A lot of modern metal is tuned way down to B and even low A. Some of that stuff can be played on a four-string that is strung B, E, A, D, basically eliminating the high-G string. But since I learned how to play bass more formally, not knowing where the notes are in dropped tunings drives me crazy. I would rather grab a five-string and have all those notes available to me in a manner that is musically correct, even if I have to tune it down a whole step for a low A tuning. It keeps me from having to widen the nut space on the low strings, too. Plus, overall there is more wood in the body and neck of a five-string bass, and sometimes a longer scale length, which makes it better for reproducing the lower tunings.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Coming Full Circle

  “Somewhere early in my life the Holy Trinity went from Father, Son, and Holy Ghost to sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll. Even stranger is that it all came full circle and restored itself to its natural order.”

  —David Ellefson

  Things continued to move forward on the musical front. In 2009 I played bass for Tim “Ripper” Owens on a short European tour, which he was doing to support his solo album at the time. Heavy metal singer Ronnie James Dio’s wife and manager, Wendy Dio, was managing Tim, so she put us on several dates with Ronnie’s band Heaven and Hell and gave us an opening slot on the main stage of the Download Festival. I ran into our former booking agent John Jackson backstage and we embraced, having not seen each other for several years. I had apologized back in 1994 for putting him in a bad position after my meltdown at Donington in 1988, and we became good friends after that. That can happen when you acknowledge your shortcomings to people.

  John told me that he was launching a new festival called Sonisphere, and also that he was thinking about doing a festival of the “Big Four” thrash bands—Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth, and Anthrax—in 2010. What’s funny is that I was one of the few musicians who knew about the Big Four dates, and yet I wasn’t in any of the bands at that time.

  That said, hints that things might be about to change in that area were making themselves felt. In the early summer of 2009, my family rented a house up in the mountains to get away from the heat in Scottsdale, and Dave started reaching out to me again by phone. We hadn’t met since we’d failed to make the Nashville thing work, and now here we were trying to heal some wounds. Hooking up with Megadeth was beginning to look like it could be a lot of fun again.

  I played an F5 show in the middle of July, the same weekend as NAMM’s summer show in Nashville. We flew into Nashville to play the show, and as soon as I landed, I received a text from Dave asking where I was. I thought he might be in town doing something with Dean Guitars, whose instruments he endorses, so I reached back to him. He told me that he was at home in San Diego but wanted to know if I wanted to fill in on something that was coming up.

  After F5’s sound check, he and I got on the phone: it was the first time we had talked in three years. It was a very positive conversation, and I thought the next step should be that we would hang out together. It was only a seventy-five-minute flight from Phoenix to San Diego, so a few days later I flew out to see him for an afternoon, just to see if we could be buddies again. He picked me up at the airport and we hung out at his new studio and his home. I flew home again and felt really good about things.

  Dave was very excited, too, and wanted to announce that I was back in the band. With things moving quickly at this point, he and his manager wanted to call me to discuss money. I replied that money had been such a problem between us in the past that I would rather they spoke to my attorney, who would negotiate the deal on my behalf. He knew I wanted to do it and wasn’t going to get in my way, so I took my hands off the wheel and redirected them to him.

  Predictably, everything went south from there, and the reunion didn’t happen that time. I’d gone to see Judas Priest play in Phoenix that night. They were playing the whole of their British Steel album, and I remember thinking how cool it would be if Megadeth ever did the same thing. I was down there, hanging with the Judas Priest guys, having some laughs and catching up on old times, and later that night I checked my BlackBerry—and there was an e-mail from Dave saying that my attorney had asked for too much money. It had been so close to, and yet so far away from, working out.

  But Megadeth and I weren’t done yet, not by a long shot, owing to a set of circumstances that were so fortuitous I have to regard them as a collective act of God. In January 2010, I was back at the NAMM show yet again in Anaheim, California, doing my job at the Peavey booth. On the Friday night of the show, Dave was going to play at Dean Guitars’ party at the Grove in Anaheim. I was out to dinner with one of the guys from Hartke, who was talking to me about some endorsement stuff. After dinner I checked my BlackBerry and there was a text from Willie Gee, Dave’s guitar tech. It read, “Mr. Ellefson, Willie Gee here. Just wondering if you might be available to jump up and play a song with Dave at the Grove?”

  I replied that I had a bass with me and that I would be available to play, and that he should just let me know. Later he texted back to say that Megadeth’s current bassist James LoMenzo was going to play instead, and thanked me. I said that
it was no problem and that he should tell Dave that I had his back either way, which he apparently communicated to Dave.

  The next day, Shawn Drover, the drummer of Megadeth, walked over to the Peavey booth and said hello. I liked Shawn a lot. I’d spoken to him on the phone in the summer of 2009 when Dave and I had talked about rejoining the band. He’s a solid man on his own two feet and he’s a gentleman. He has wisdom and clarity, and he totally understands his role and position in the band without assuming or presuming anything. In short, he’s a real musician I knew I’d like to be in a band with.

  I said, “It’s too bad I didn’t get to play with you last night. Dave and I back together onstage would have been a great news story.” He said, “I know—it would have been great!” I added that if things didn’t work out with James LoMenzo, he should give me a call, and he nodded with an amused smile. We shook hands and I forgot all about it.

  However, Shawn is a Megadeth fan to the core, and he knew that they had to get me back in the band.

  Shawn Drover (drummer, Megadeth):

  I’ve been a fan of Megadeth since day one. I still remember hearing songs from Killing Is My Business . . . on a metal show on the radio in Montreal, where I grew up. I joined the band in late 2004, when Dave re-formed the band. In early 2010, we were getting ready to record the song “Sudden Death” for a Guitar Hero game. Somewhere in the middle of it Dave Mustaine informed me that we needed to get another bass player. The fans had seen numerous lineups come and go over the years, and they were really embracing James LoMenzo at that point—for good reason, as he is a great bass player and a great guy. Within a couple of minutes of this conversation, I thought to myself, “I wonder if I can get in touch with David Ellefson? What better person to have on board?”

  Two pivotal announcements were made at this time, both of which made a profound impact on me. One was regarding John Jackson’s original plan, which had come to fruition. As he had suggested, the Big Four of thrash metal announced European festival dates together. This was a historic gathering by anybody’s standards, and I wanted to be there. Secondly, Megadeth was going to play the Rust in Peace album in its entirety on a U.S. tour in March, to celebrate its twentieth anniversary.

  We were in New York with Hail!, about to play two shows in the area with ex–Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy. We were on our way to do Eddie Trunk’s radio show when I received the press release about the Rust in Peace tour coming up a month later. I thought, “Man, I need to be there for this!” I knew all the songs and I knew it was the right thing to do for our legacy, if the door was in any way still open for me to join in. Portnoy was saying, “You should be there for that. It’s not right that you’re not.” I then had to go on Eddie Trunk’s show and do the interview, even though I felt like I’d been kicked in the gut when I saw that press release on my phone.

  Shawn Drover (drummer, Megadeth):

  At the time, the Rust in Peace tour was only for America: of course, it turned into a full-blown world tour, but at the time, it was just a one-month run and we would then have resumed touring for our most recent album. So I wondered if David would be up for coming in and helping us out, as we were about to lose our bass player. Dave’s guitar tech Willie Gee had David’s cell phone number and so he called him.

  Then, on February 2, which is my son Roman’s birthday, I was at home having dinner with my family. Shortly after, I walked into my office and I happened to see my BlackBerry blinking. It was another message from Willie Gee, asking me to call him. I said to Julie, “Here we go again!” and made the call. I talked to Shawn, who told me that James LoMenzo would be leaving the band. He and I corresponded by text over the next couple of days. It was such a bizarre and immediate thing to happen, because I was sitting in a pastors’ conference in Phoenix and I got a text from him saying, “Dude. If there was ever a time for you to reach out to Dave, it is right now!”

  Notice the irony of this: I’m sitting in a church conference (my future) while Megadeth (my past) is reaching out to me. But as much as I loved my volunteering in the church, I knew that if I was ever going to kick the tires of Megadeth and drive it around the block to see if it was still a good ride, this was the time to do it. I could do everything else another time: they would always be there for me, while Megadeth might not. I also knew that tickets for the Rust in Peace tour were on sale, so I told them that I was both available and interested.

  Shawn Drover (drummer, Megadeth):

  I told him that we had a situation, that we were about to go and do this Rust in Peace tour and that we had a spot for a bass player. I told him that if he even had an inkling of interest, I needed to hear it right then: not next week, but right then. I was calling him out of the blue, so he was probably thinking, “What the hell is going on here?” but I must have sparked his interest. I told Dave Mustaine, who agreed to a conference call with the three of us. I stayed on the line for ten minutes but I could tell they needed to talk, so I put the phone down and they had a conversation.

  I called Dave at the studio, where he was recording, and he and I and Shawn got on the phone. Dave was real clear about what was on the table. He said, “This is the amount of money I can pay you.” If I’m being completely honest, at that point I didn’t care about the money. I was like, “Let’s just go do this, I want to be part of this again.” That was on February 4, 2010.

  I drove over to the band’s studio north of San Diego the next day with a couple of basses in my car. Fortunately I’d kept my chops up and retained my knowledge of the Megadeth catalog over the years. People were always asking me at bass clinics about Megadeth songs, and it was a matter of personal and professional pride to me that I could always pull out a certain lick if they wanted to hear it. So I went over and we rehearsed.

  Shawn Drover (drummer, Megadeth):

  The next day David was on his way over to see us. To witness the two Daves playing together was just awesome. You could tell that it was comfortable for them to play together again, like putting on some old shoes. As a drummer, it was very easy for me to lock in with Ellefson’s bass playing. No disrespect to his successors, who were excellent bass players, but it was great to form a rhythm section with the guy who laid down those bass parts in the first place. From the point of view of a fan, and in the best possible interests of the band, I just had to get them back together—and I pulled it off!

  The first song we played was “Symphony of Destruction,” which sounded great. We looked at each other and we knew right away it was going to work. After that we went out to dinner, and Dave told me that he was impressed with the way I looked and played. He said, “You’ve got the life that I’ve always wanted.” Just for him to say that was enough. We hugged and he said, “Are we going to do this?” and I nervously said yes. He went home thrilled, and I thought to myself, “What did I just commit to?”

  I have a tendency to do this: it’s a shortcoming of mine. My initial reaction was “Never mind the money: let’s just do it!” but then my head kicked in and I started worrying. But once your head starts getting involved, that’s your ego getting in the way. Don’t listen to it, although I did on this occasion. I called Dave and told him that I was worried about letting go of the Peavey gig and all the things I had in my life, and he was devastated—but he reassured me, and I was in.

  There’s a saying that goes “You will keep being presented with a lesson until you finally learn that lesson,” and this was my lesson. To finally jump in and stop trying to control the outcome, to have faith that it will all work out as it should. Over the weekend I played on the new Megadeth track “Sudden Death,” which was being used on the Guitar Hero computer game. But I was still worried all that weekend, and on Monday morning I had a long conversation with Dave where I laid all my fears on the table. I told him that we’d been through a lot together. He told me, “Why don’t we take it one day at a time?” and quoted Scripture, reminding me that the Israelites took forty years to make a journey that should have taken eleven da
ys. How long were we going to wander around like that, he asked? We would never know until we tried it. Sometimes Dave’s wisdom is pretty simple, and this time I heard it.

  I got home and handed the phone to Julie, who talked to Dave and asked about his wife, Pam, and their children, and they had some laughs together. After that, Julie and I talked, and she said, “You need to do this. You haven’t been really happy since you left the band, and Dave is really asking you to come back. Do it because you’re his friend. Don’t even do it as the bass player for Megadeth: just do it as a friend. If it doesn’t work, at least you two will walk away as friends.”

  As it happened, Peavey were making cutbacks at the time, and after seven years with them, my job went away—just as I was rejoining the band. If that isn’t a sign of a higher power at work, I don’t know what is. I was grateful to them for my job there. I got to study business and apply those principles in the real world at the same time. It was a great eight-year period of my life that was about to transition once more.

  Initially I signed up for the one-month Rust in Peace U.S. tour. Shawn told me, “Come on, it’s just a month,” probably knowing full well that a month would turn into a permanent commitment. And I’m glad he did it, because when I rejoined Megadeth in February 2010, I really felt that a new season of my life had begun. I handed the reins of MEGA Life! to a good friend, Ray Berry, and when I’m in town share my testimony there about once a year. I also play bass in the services when the schedule allows, and my wife and kids have been able to let go of their service commitments and attend with other regular churchgoers. It’s really lovely.