An air of finality, inevitably, heightens expectations. These will mark the last words of Megadeth, if Dave Mustaine is to be believed. We should hold him to his word. Four years on from their previous album and it seems the veteran thrash metal figurehead had time to reflect on how he wants to bow out of the business. Forty years is a long while, and bands have a knack for becoming lesser versions of themselves in those waning, final years. A promise of departure is what kicks some of their senses back into place. Farewells can only be done once, really. Twice if you’re The Band, and as many times as you like if you’re The Damned. Heading into Megadeth with knowledge of the band’s influence is crucial. You can hear them play up their own style, meddle with what worked best for them across their forty years together, and even push that last gasp of creativity to the very limit.
Menacing thrash rock is what fans will want, and it’s what they get. Album opener Tipping Point is a fine example of what Megadeth can still do. A great electric guitar tease at the end of the song implies it’ll be a long haul of a track, a song which will go on with instrumental excess, but the band cuts it off and moves on. They’re hoping listeners will do the same. Megadeth is a chance to make peace with the hang-ups and lingering what-ifs the band has presented for so many years, and it’s a satisfying conclusion, above all. Part of that is because steady material from the twilight years of any group is difficult, just look at Metallica in the past decade, but also because it sounds as though Megadeth are calling time on this when their skills are still clearly there. Any further and the viciousness, the edge of their music which has kept fans returning for so long, could be lost.
That’s not to say there aren’t major problems. Once you cut through the sweetness of sentimentality, you’re facing off with some redundant lyrical choices and a collection of instrumentals that are plodding at one moment, softly innovative at the next. It’s erratic, but then that has been the charm of the band, to some extent, anyway. I Don’t Care is a miserable song, the ramblings of a songwriter whose attitude to the world is self-serving and unconvincing. Instrumentally constricted backing to that song is one of the many shortcomings found within, though when the guitar work is given time to breathe, it’s inevitably strong. A shame about the lyrics, that reflective tone doesn’t work when the attitude to ending the band is a frivolous one. Hey God! is an unconvincing conversation with the divine. If he does get in touch with the Almighty again, Mustaine may want to make sure he has something to say. He admits he has nothing to say but this creates an easily burst bubble – there must be something to say beyond goodbye.
A lot of it is reflection without the throwback. Let There Be Shred is beyond embarrassing. It’s the sort of work you’d expect from Bryan Adams, not the band who spent decades protecting Vic Rattlehead as one of the cooler metal mascots. If only the embodiment of censorship had been in the studio when Mustaine wrote these lyrics. Get through those early spots and there’s a fine line walked by Megadeth in the latter stages, with The Last Note and bonus track Ride the Lightning particularly solid work. Preceding songs like Another Bad Day and Made to Kill try and bundle some particularly embarrassing sentiments in with a bolder instrumental section. A tricky back and forth between some of the band’s most impressive instrumental work and some truly grating low points for their lyrical intentions and theme is what listeners must straddle here. Get through the latter to enjoy the former. It is their farewell, after all.
