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The Latest Breaking News from Chris Poland

“To all intents and purposes, it was a disaster. I wanted to kick my habit, I didn’t want to kick it.” A wasted singer, a bizarre producer and a real-life Sex Pistol: how Megadeth made thrash metal’s most chaotic album

Megadeth were strung out and at war with each other when they made their third album So Far, So Good… So What!. And things were about to get worse…

Metal Hammer

“It made me want to go all the way in, bring in the best metal players I could find, and create something fearless”: Zakk Wylde gifted William Shatner a guitar. Now Shatner is making an album with 35 metal icons – and an AI-generated Les Paul, apparently

The cast of players is yet to be announced – there is no title either – but Shatner says the whole thing was inspired by a guest turn on a Nuclear Messiah record with Chris Poland

Guitar World

“We’ve been through guitar player after guitar player. We get to the solo, and he nails it. I just thought, ‘Oh my God’”: Dave Mustaine recounts the hiring and firing of every Megadeth guitarist

As Megadeth prepare for their final album release and tour, Mustaine looks back at some Mega-memories, the ghosts that still haunt him and the lead guitarists he played with along the way

Guitar World

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“That would be a huge undertaking. It’s not ‘puppet show Megadeth’”: Dave Mustaine says he won’t reunite with former Megadeth members on the band’s farewell tour

Don't expect Marty Friedman, Kiko Loureiro, Chris Poland or any other ex-Megadeth guitarist to make a cameo

Guitar World

“I was like, ‘It’s time to do your solos.’ He goes, ‘OK, I’m gonna call up my guitar teacher, have him do the solos and then have him teach me’”: Dave Mustaine on the ill-fated guitar appointment that led Megadeth to Jeff Young

The thrash icons thought they’d found Chris Poland’s replacement, only for a bizarre moment in the studio to force a change

Guitar World

“Dave and I were in a position where there was no Plan B. There was no escape hatch”: Megadeth were broke, homeless and way behind Metallica. But this thrash classic inspired by Patti Smith and written on a borrowed bass would change everything

How Megadeth wrote a landmark thrash metal classic in the midst of personal and financial chaos

Metal Hammer

“My hand got totally trashed. I looked down and could see the bone of my pointer finger. I lost the ability to bend it”: An accident defined Chris Poland’s playing, but it didn’t stop him handling the high demands of Megadeth’s debut

Chris Poland offers an eye-witness account of a seminal moment in metal history, when Dave Mustaine channeled his fury through his Marshall and debuted with a thrash classic

Guitar World

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“That’s why things were so hard for me to try and get deals”: Former Megadeth guitarist says Dave Mustaine damaged his career by calling him a “liar”

Chris Poland, who performed on Megadeth’s first two albums, likens being the subject of Mustaine’s ire to dragging around a “50-pound ball”

Metal Hammer

“My hand hit the glass and it broke. It got totally trashed. I can’t feel my pinky from nerve damage”: The freak injury that changed the way Chris Poland played guitar – and ended up informing the sound of Megadeth’s Rattlehead

The former Megadeth guitarist had a stand-off with a 200lb oak door, resulting in an injury that would forever change how he plays guitar

Guitar World

“Trying to emulate these different players was a challenge. Chris Poland to Marty Friedman is like night and day. But that’s what excites me”: Glen Drover grew up idolizing Megadeth and King Diamond’s guitar heroes –then he had to step into their shoes

Inspired by Yngwie Malmsteen but weaned on Black Sabbath, the Canadian guitarist discusses the new gear and new skills he’s racking up as his own band Withering Scorn takes flight

Guitar World

“There is potential here for the world’s most unlikely mash-up”: It’s Steely Dan versus Megadeth in the Battle of Black Friday!

Both have songs called Black Friday - so which one to choose?

MusicRadar

“We had a living, breathing Sex Pistol come in and play on it. He wanted $100 and some ‘suction’”: The insane story of Megadeth’s So Far, So Good… So What!, thrash metal’s most self-destructive album

Megadeth’s first two albums were thrash classics. And then they made So Far, So Good… So What! and the debauchery caught up with them

Metal Hammer

"There’s a sadness to that album." How addiction, thrash royalty and the long tail of 9/11 oversaw Lamb Of God's career-defining Ashes Of The Wake

Twenty years old this year, Ashes Of The Wake remains a classic of 21st century metal

Metal Hammer

Watch Megadeth play rare ’80s cut Liar live for the first time in almost 20 years

The So Far, So Good… So What! classic hasn’t been heard live since 2006

Metal Hammer

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Louder

Listen to Todd Rundgren's version of King Crimson's 21st Century Schizoid Man

All-star reimaging of King Crimson's debut album, Reimagining The Court Of The Crimson King, to be released in April

Metal Hammer

"The fight against Metallica was not my fight. I am glad to be friends with them." From his Megadeth days to THAT scandal, thrash metal icon David Ellefson has lived quite a life

David Ellefson talks his storied Megadeth career, bouncing back from an embarrassing scandal and the wild days of early thrash

Metal Hammer

Three ex-Megadeth members once started a Metallica cover band together

Drummer Nick Menza, bassist James LoMenzo and guitarist Chris Poland recorded some takes on Metallica and Megadeth tunes in 2014, before quickly and sadly disbanding

Guitar World

“I'd hear Dave Mustaine aimlessly riffing on the couch, and it's the riffs that ended up on the first two Megadeth – and, frankly, Metallica – records”: Megadeth's first lead guitarist Greg Handevidt on the birth of a metal institution

The first guitar player to stand toe-to-toe with Dave Mustaine in Megadeth looks back on his intense initial meeting with the metal icon, and his memories of the band's mythical demo tape – their equivalent of Metallica's No Life 'Til Leather

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Guitar World

"I don't even own a Strat! I used my Dean Thoroughbred, a far cry from what David Gilmour used": How ex-Megadeth guitarist Chris Poland ended up covering Pink Floyd

Dave Mustaine's former right-hand man was surprised to find himself tackling Floyd's San Tropez, but it's the perfect showcase for his flexible chops. He explains his approach to playing Gilmour's leads, what he thinks of Megadeth's latest material, and why he was "so bummed out" when he first heard Peace…

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