Dave Mustaine has been picking at some old bones of contention between him and his erstwhile bandmates in Metallica.
The Megadeth frontman was interviewed on The Shawn Ryan Show podcast and suggested that Metallica's Enter Sandman riff may have something in common with one from fellow thrash band Excel, in their song Tapping Into An Emotional Void.
It’s not the first time Mustaine has done this. Comparisons have been made over the years and indeed there’s no denying that there are certain similarities. But though Excel did apparently consider suing at one point, no case has ever been brought against Metallica.
Mustaine, though, seems unwilling to let this go. Or his exit from the band back in the early 1980s, which he discussed at length during his three-hour conversation with Ryan.
“I made sure not to ever say that I quit, because I wanted people to know that I was unfairly dismissed and that I didn’t give a shit,” the Megadeth man of his time with Metallica. “Because we may not be as big as they are. Hell, their biggest song, Enter Sandman - go look up the band Excel right now. Look up their song, I think it’s something ‘Into the Unknown.’ Pretty similar.”
By ‘Into The Unknown’ Mustaine was presumably referring to Tapping Into the Emotional Void.
“At the time, I was really mad and I didn’t wanna forgive them for what they did,” Mustaine said of his ousting from Metallica. “And I told them when I left, ‘Do not use my music. And of course they used it. Ride the Lightning, I wrote. The Call of Ktulu, I wrote. Let’s see, what else? There’s Phantom Lord, Metal Militia, Jump in the Fire, The Four Horsemen. And I wrote a bunch of Leper Messiah, too. They didn’t give me credit on that. You listen to the riffs, you know they’re my riffs.
“It’s, like, you think I’m gonna all of a sudden hear my riff and say, ‘That’s not me.’ So, yeah, I wrote a lot of their music that made them, and all the solos on that first record were mine - the best Kirk [Hammett[ could [do was] try and copy them.”
Dave Mustaine left Metallica in April 1983 – over 42 years ago.
Anyway, for what it’s worth, here is Tapping Into The Emotional Void:
And here’s Enter Sandman.
Compare and contrast.
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