Last year, drummer Shawn Drover and guitarist Chris Broderick quit Megadeth pretty suddenly. Fans were concerned if Megadeth was still planning on doing a new record in 2015 or even if the group, consisting solely of frontman and guitarist Dave Mustaine and bassist Dave Ellefson, would be staying together.
Between then and now we've heard some pretty wild rumors about who would be joining (or rejoining) the group. So far we've heard guitarist Marty Friedman might come back, drummer Nick Menza might come back and former Slayer drummer Dave Lombardo said he'd join if asked. Let's turn to Ellefson for an answer via an interview with The Metal Review!
"The departure of those guys was pretty sudden, it changed the course of the plan for sure. Dave and I, let’s just say this, we are investigating all of the opportunities that are out there. We’re going to working diligently to get that sown up because we want to get this new record done and we have some tour work on the books for later in the year. It’s time to knock this out."
So… it could be any of those guys and it could be none of those guys. Great! At least we know Menza, Friedman and Lombardo are at least in the running, alongside I'm sure a whole slew of other incredibly talented dudes. Megadeth is a household name at this point- if Mustaine calls you to join the band, are you really going to say no?
Oh, and Ellefson confirmed in the interview that there's still going to be a record this year. No word on if Mustaine and Ellefson will be waiting for the new guys to join to start up the writing process or if they'll be waiting to be back to full strength.