Megadeth leader Dave Mustaine explained if he thinks the current state of the world would allow him to be himself and speak his mind the way that he used to be able to four decades ago.
Speaking with TV War, Mustaine said the rules have changed for anyone with a public voice.
“Well, I think right now, the world has changed for the worse, with all the cancel culture, all the hatred that people have. You used to be able to say stuff in the United States, and now you can’t, unless you’re the people that’s telling everybody else they can’t,” he said.
“The other thing is, the times have just changed. If you sing about politics, for example, and somebody can determine where your political leanings lie, you’ve just halved your audience, because the people who are one party will be for you, and the other party will be against you. And that really sucks.”
“Before, it used to be nobody knew who you voted for. Nobody cared. And now it’s important for the hateful people in the world to find out who people voted for and to expose them for something that’s very private.”
Mustaine also argued that his own fanbase is not made up of that kind of person.
“I think anybody that is a Megadeth fan aren’t of that walk. I don’t think any of our fans are that kind of person who would get joy out of doing shitty things in life. I think our fans know that I came from a terrible upbringing, and that everything I’ve done, I’ve tried to make myself better, and that includes sharing everything that I’ve done with our fans so that they can get better, too.”
Mustaine’s frustration with political hostility is not a new theme for him. For more than a decade, his willingness to speak his mind has repeatedly placed him at the center of controversy, and he has often paid a price for it with fans and critics alike.
Mustaine disapproved of President Barack Obama, calling him “the most divisive president we’ve ever had” in 2011, and during a March 2012 interview on George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight he said he believed Obama was born outside of the United States. The remarks fueled a wave of backlash and became one of the most cited examples of a rock frontman stepping into political territory.
The pattern continued in the years that followed. Mustaine has a long history of speaking on political and social issues, and in the past he has aligned with conservative views. That commentary has periodically made him a target of criticism from both his own audience and the wider public.
Much of that willingness to speak openly traces back to his childhood, which he has described in detail over the years. David Scott Mustaine was born on September 13, 1961 in La Mesa, California, where he endured a difficult childhood after his parents separated when he was four and his father John’s alcoholism led to his early death.
Mustaine has never hidden that history. “It was terrible. My dad drank a lot and was abusive, so my parents got divorced when I was young and it got worse from there,” he told Rock and Roll Garage, recalling that the family moved to Costa Mesa to live with his aunt, a Jehovah’s Witness, which his mother later became as well.
That instability also shaped the band he built. Mustaine was fired from Metallica in 1983 over his alcohol abuse and violent tendencies, and he formed Megadeth that same year to rival his former band, with the name inspired by the phrase “the arsenal of megadeath can’t be rid.” It is that same willingness to share the worst parts of his story, he says, that he believes keeps his fans from turning on him today.
