DIRK VERBEUREN Is 'Very Excited' To Work On Next MEGADETH Album

In a new interview with Portugal's Look Mag, MEGADETH drummer Dirk Verbeuren was asked how he feels about Dave Mustaine's recent revelation that he has already commenced work on material for the follow-up to "The Sick, The Dying... And The Dead!" album. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "I'm happy about it. I'm very excited to do that again. It was a lot of fun creating 'The Sick, The Dying... And The Dead!' And whenever he's ready, I will be there. I'm happy to start working with Teemu [Mäntysaari, new MEGADETH guitarist], who's now joined the band. I think he will contribute a lot of cool stuff. And, of course, James [LoMenzo, MEGADETH bassist] also, who is an amazing bass player with a lot of history. He's already been on a couple of MEGADETH albums before, so he also knows what MEGADETH sounds like. And so, yeah, it's gonnabe really cool to be with those two guys. And, of course, with Dave, just get together and see what we can come up with."

Dirk also talked about the songwriting process for "The Sick, The Dying... And The Dead!", explaining that Mustaine was open to outside input from the start. "Dave invited us from the beginning to bring ideas, whether it's a guitar riff, a drum beat, a lyric — anything," he explained. "Any ideas we had, he said, 'Just put it in this…' We have some folders, some Dropbox folders. 'Just put it in there.' Then, as we were working together in 2019, we were all together in this house. And he would just listen to some of the stuff. And if something came up that he was, like, 'Oh, this is cool,' then we would work on it together. And that's how Kiko [Loureiro, then-MEGADETH guitarist], of course, ended up writing quite a good portion of the album — some songs that he brought and then also some ideas that ended up in songs together with Dave's riffs. And the same for me. I have one riff in the song 'Night Stalkers'. And then the song 'Life In Hell', which is the second song on the album, is based on a demo that I also put there. And Dave just liked it. He thought, 'Oh, there's a cool idea there.' So he started learning it and kind of improving the guitar riffs and eventually it turned into the song you know. So he was very open, and he still is — he's always very inviting for us to work as a band. He doesn't want it to be, 'Oh, I'm Dave. I'm gonna tell you what to do.' Of course, in the end, we do everything together with him, so he makes the final decision, because this is only normal. But it's very much a band process."

Asked if it's true that Dave has a box with riffs from the 1980s that he sometimes revisits while working on new music, Dirk responded: "Yes, he has. There's a folder that he has that has everything he's ever recorded. He's sitting in 1984, maybe, on his couch in his apartment and, like, 'Oh, this is a cool riff. I'm gonna record it.' It's there. So he has a massive collection of stuff, and we actually went through a bunch of those while we were writing and used some of them. Like some of the riffs in 'We'll Be Back', which is the first single from 'The Sick, The Dying... And The Dead!', they go way back to the '80s. So, yeah, it's pretty crazy."

As for whether he feels he left his mark on "The Sick, The Dying... And The Dead!" with his own sound, Dirk said: "I mean, I like to think so. It was my goal to respect also and honor the MEGADETH sound, because all these years of music, I know as a fan myself of the band, I wanna hear that. I don't wanna hear somebody completely ignoring what Nick Menza did with the band or what Gar Samuelson did with the band or any of the drummers that have been there. They have all contributed to the sound and it's all been part of the vision that Dave had from the beginning for the band. So I did adapt the way I would usually play based on what I learned in my years touring with the band and really getting very intimate knowledge about all the classic songs, the ones we play live, and learning all the parts. But at the same time, of course, I've injected some of my own flavor and my own style and my ideas. So hopefully I found a good middle ground."

"The Sick, The Dying... And The Dead!" sold 48,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. in its first week of release to land at position No. 3 on the Billboard 200 chart. It marked MEGADETH's eighth top 10-charting album. Of "The Sick, The Dying... And The Dead!"'s 48,000 units earned for the week, album sales comprised 45,000, SEA units comprised 3,000 and TEA units comprised a negligible sum.

MEGADETH's previous top 10 entries on the Billboard 200 were "Countdown to Extinction" (No. 2, 1992),"Youthanasia" (No. 4, 1994),"Cryptic Writings" (No. 10, 1997),"United Abominations" (No. 8, 2007),"Endgame" (No. 9, 2009),"Super Collider" (No. 6, 2013) and "Dystopia" (No. 3, 2016).

MEGADETH recently announced a North American tour "Destroy All Enemies", produced by Live Nation. Support on the 33-city trek, which includes stops in Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Boston and St. Louis, will come from MUDVAYNE and ALL THAT REMAINS. The tour begins in Rogers, Arkansas on August 2 and runs throughout the month before wrapping in Nashville, Tennessee on September 28.

Mäntysaari joined MEGADETH last September after Loureiro, announced earlier that month that he would sit out the next leg of MEGADETH's "Crush The World" tour in order to stay home with his children back in Finland. It was later revealed that Mäntysaari would continue to play guitar for MEGADETH for the foreseeable future, with Loureiro seemingly having no plans to return.

The 37-year-old Mäntysaari was born in Tampere, Finland and began playing guitar at the age of 12. In 2004, he joined the band WINTERSUN. He has also been a member of SMACKBOUND since 2015.

MEGADETH played its first concert with Mäntysaari on September 6, 2023 at Revel in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Loureiro officially joined MEGADETH in April 2015, about five months after Chris Broderick's exit from the group.

Since its inception in 1983, MEGADETH has ascended from its raw thrash metal roots to become an unstoppable force in the heavy metal world. With founder Dave Mustaine at the helm, MEGADETH's journey has been marked by a penchant for pushing the boundaries of speed, technicality, and complexity in their music. Their groundbreaking album "Rust In Peace", released in 1990, is frequently cited as a seminal work in the thrash metal genre. Along with the critically acclaimed "Peace Sells... But Who's Buying?", it cemented MEGADETH's place in the annals of metal history.

Over four decades, the band's discography has earned numerous certifications, including platinum and multi-platinum awards, with albums like "Countdown To Extinction" and "Youthanasia" achieving widespread critical acclaim. 2016's "Dystopia" not only marked a high point with their first Grammy Award for "Best Metal Performance" after twelve nominations but also set the stage for their latest triumph, "The Sick, The Dying... And The Dead!" in 2022. MEGADETH's status as part of the "Big Four" of thrash metal underscores their trailblazing role in the genre, laying the groundwork for countless bands and musicians who have followed in their wake.