Dave Mustaine still feel bitter about being fired from Metallica in 1983? In a recent interview for Joe Rogan (via Ultimate Guitar Megadeth frontman revealed his biggest frustration about leaving his former band and answered this question.
The singer and guitarist had previously revealed that he created Megadeth with the goal of founding a band that was "more metal than Metallica ," but today he realizes that perhaps he needed more time to deal with the grief of being fired. "In my mind, I dove straight into Megadeth, but at the time I was still trying to digest everything that happened," he said.
Dave Mustaine's biggest frustration about leaving Metallica was regarding the material created with his former bandmates. “What bothered me most was that I had all my songs, I left them behind and said, 'Don't use my music.' And of course they did. They used [my compositions] on the first and second albums. There are parts of my music on the third as well. All the solos on the first album are mine, except they were performed with Kirk Hammett – and it sounds similar, but it's not the same. And he's not a bad guitarist,” he said.
In the same interview, Mustaine said that he received a good portion of the royalties for the copyrights of his contributions to Metallica, but Hammett allegedly received payments for the rights to "Metal Militia" for many years.
Does he harbor any resentment about all of this? “No bitterness – I’ve gotten over it. It’s just money. In the end, my happiness, my family, my wife, and my children are more important than anything,” he concluded.
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