• DAVE:"I'd never heard those albums. Dave Mustaine, had of
  course but I only knew Marty from his Hawaii records. We heard
  that Marty was looking for a band and we said 'Well, whatever
  happens, let him drop by'. A pretty bad attitude, actually!"
  To the ones of you who don't know: Hawaii was the band with
  whom Marty Friedman recorded his first album called 'One Nation
  Underground' (1983), an album that is a neglected speed metal
  pioneer.
  
  
  
• MARTY FRIEDMAN: "I didn't have the faintest idea what they had heard of me.
  Cacophony and the solo LP don't show at all my possibilities.
  Hawaii was aggression-wise much closer to Megadeth and on the
  other hand I didn't know what direction they were going in bec
  ause 'No More Mr.Nice Guy' was just released and it really didn't
  sound heavy. But at the audition they said 'F**k that song!' And I
  can live with that."
  
  
• DAVE:"We will never play that song live. We recorded it 'cos Alice
  Cooper asked us to. Due to the common problems we have, Dave
  and me had a really good thing going with Alice. At the
  beginning they asked Alice himself to record a new version of the
  so ng for the film 'Shocker' but he had to tour and asked us
  whether we wanted to do a cover version. One thing led to
  another and at once there was the single, a video and a hit in
  England. It got completely out of hand and we didn't plan it that
  way. The h ardcore Megadeth fans thought we had wimped out,
  but of course it's stupid to apologise for the fact we scored a hit!"
  Even if Megadeth had turned into a Madonna cover band, Marty
  would still have joined. Back in January 1990 Friedman was
  unemployed and he says candidly: "At that time I would have done
  anything for money man! I was totally broke and didn't get any
  roya lties off my last album..."
  Ellefson started to laugh: "Yeah, you lived in a shit hole apartment,
  ha ha!"
  
  
  
• MARTY FRIEDMAN: "You'd better believe it! I was sitting in the middle of
  Hollywood in a four hundred dollars a month apartment, with no
  locks on the door, no security. I was surrounded by freaks
  partying all night, hookers and poverty. I didn't care about the m
  usic at that stage, I just had to join a band. But I couldn't have
  done better than joining Megadeth and now I don't have to take
  care of all the commercial stuff. In fact I wasn't too satisfied with
  my audition."
  
  
• THE TWO DAVES THOUGHT DIFFERENTLY. SAID ELLEFSON:
  "Well in the past
  we always tried to find musicians to replace whoever had just
  left, but this time we were looking for real people instead of
  clones of Poland and Young. He was one of the few guys who
  knew how to play rhythms. A lot of people can only play solos,
  but rhythm and a band feel are also important. In Megadeth we
  need complete musicians, with the right spirit and attitude. When
  Marty walked in it clicked immediately."
  
  
  
• MARTY FRIEDMAN: "First of all I studied the songs from their first three
  albums, and nothing from the new stuff because they were afraid
  that if I didn't make it, I would steal all their ideas and say 'Hey
  Jason, lets re-form Cacophony, I have a lot of new songs !"
  

• MARTY FRIEDMAN: "Dave has a strange style of playing riffs, and listening to
  the early songs helped me to get into that. It wasn't that easy
  because he takes care of every nuance, and that's great because
  most bands are happy if you can play in the same key toge ther.
  Dave will let you know if you've placed your hand half an inch in
  the wrong position. I like that. It's a pity Mustaine didn't have a
  lot of time to go through all the stuff but I learned a lot off
  Junior."
  
  
• ELLEFSON:
  "Yeah I play a little bit of guitar myself and because of
  my long association with Dave I could teach Marty how things
  had to be done."
  It must all have been a big change for Marty. With Cacophony and
  on his solo album he had complete artistic freedom. With Megadeth
  he had to play his part in an overall concept.
  "It was a big but welcome change. Now I don't have to carry the
  whole burden on my shoulders. I just do what I have to do,
  playing guitar solos within the songs. My work is much more
  streamlined, which is more important because I have to do more
  in a c ertain space. In the early days I'd have 45 minutes on an
  album and we'd say, 'What shall we do with it? just put zillions of
  solos in there.' Now I have to focus my work, and concentrate
  more. Megadeth is a big challenge and there is a much bigger
  audien ce. With Cacophony it wasn't so important what you did,
  because only twenty thousand people heard what you did. Now
  we are gambling on a million. Of course now I can't put all my
  Stravinsky influences into my playing - the others won't let me,
  ha, ha! (Junior shakes his head in agreement). It's a challenge for me
  to do difficult things that a lot of people can listen to. It's easy to play
  'difficult' things but the hard part is to make it accessible."
  Dave:"The songs only sound so complex due to the arrangements.
  The riffs alone aren't that hard but it's the way they are
  connected to each other."
  
  
  
• MARTY FRIEDMAN:
  "Mustaine is very precise. His way of building up a song is
  brilliant. He knows how to work towards a climax in a song. To
  play riffs and put them in order is not so hard but the clever bit is
  building them up. I never used to do that and was mor e
  concerned with lead playing. Luckily I didn't have to change my
  solo style, only my riffs. I always play for myself but the real
  challenge now is to satisfy others. In the studio I had with
  producer Mike Clink and the band, a lot of good ears around me
  , so if something sounded too Egyptian or Japanese or just
  'weird' - they let me know."
  
  
  
• DAVE:
  "None of that Japanese playing please!"
  Friedman believes he will take a wider role in the future.
  
  
  
• MARTY FRIEDMAN:
  "Yeah, I will compose a bit more. Not whole songs but
  definetely parts of them."
  His solo-plans for the second album are on ice for the moment.
  
  In fact I have written ideas and put them on tape for my
  next solo album but I don't know whether I will ever release it.
  This tour with Megadeth will take a year and after that we start
  writing for the next album. My solo album exist, but..." Dave
  teased:"But only as an idea in Marty's brain!"
  

• DAVE:
  "Not really. Look with all those big bands you are bound to
  have competition but we are on different levels, sounds-wise,
  attitudes-wise and presentation-wise, everything is different.
  Slayer really suprised me. I hadn't seen them for four years a nd
  hadn't thought much about them, but now they are really good.
  Seven years ago Kerry King played together with Dave and me.
  (He helped out Megadeth on live gigs a few times -RH). But then
  he started to do that Slayer stuff and I thought, 'Oh man, do
  something reasonable.' But nowadays they are really the best in
  their field. They sound like a war machine man! There can't be a
  clash between Megadeth and Slayer because we sound so
  different."
  But what about Suicidal Tendencies and Testament, who have
  both complained about bad sound on their tour. Ellefson denied
  responsibility for that.
  "Look, Slayer and Megadeth are of course the headliners. We
  have worked hard to get here but we are nevertheless
  sympathetic towards our support bands. We went thought a lot of
  stuff in the past and got bad treatment, use of only half a PA etc.
  Headlin ers are often afraid of newcomers so they cheat. We
  don't do that. Personally I'm pleased about this tour. It's a really
  heavy package and it gives us a chance to play some of our
  harder songs. We finally got to play some heavy shit again!"
  

from: Metal Attack 4/90