MEGADETH Guitarist Says 'TH1RT3EN' Is 'A Very Diverse CD'

Amy Kelly of Ultimate-Guitar.com recently conducted an interview with MEGADETH guitarist Chris Broderick. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

Ultimate-Guitar.com: MEGADETH has certainly covered some broad ground musically. Do you feel the latest record ["TH1RT3EN"] gravitates to any particular era of the band?

Chris: I think it borrows something from a lot of those different elements. There are some songs on there that hearken back to "Peace Sells" and "Rust In Peace". There is some stuff that is a little more like "Countdown To Extinction". I've been likening it to a very diverse CD. It's not one of those ones that you'll put it on and every song sounds like the last one. It's got everything from anthems to more radio friendly stuff to hard-hitting thrash and some cool, dark-sounding stuff.

Ultimate-Guitar.com: Considering your eclectic musical background, how did you approach the songwriting on this album with Dave [Mustaine]?

Chris: We all submitted riffs and we all submitted ideas. At the end of the day, you need to make it sound like MEGADETH. I think everything we used on the CD was pretty much written by Dave. Then we came in and we added our elements over the top of his riffs. So whether it was harmony guitars or melodies or counterlines, we were always constructing in that sense.

Ultimate-Guitar.com: How important do you feel that musical theory is?

Chris: For me? It's fundamental because it's the type of person that I am. I believe that you follow the path that your personality takes you down. For some people theory is that path. For other, it isn't. For me, I'm the type of person that has to understand everything I play. I want to know everything about it and how it functions. Why does it sound this way to our ears? How can we augment that and extrapolate different tones from that? That's why I like theory so much.

Ultimate-Guitar.com: Regarding the business side of a music career, what advice would you offer someone?

Chris: I would say definitely with the way the market is changing, you can't rely on any one source to get your name out there. You never know where the opportunities are going to come from. You really need to look at the business side of music and playing guitar or whatever instrument you play as a nice challenge, too. You can't have any expectations from it. You want to see it as something else to develop whether it's posting video clips or getting your own interviews or trying to find management that will get you those interviews, gigs, and opportunities. Finally, just don't turn down any opportunities. You never know if you're going to get that opportunity again. It's a lot of luck. I would tell anybody that you can be the best player in the world, but it's still 80 percent luck.

Read the entire interview from Ultimate-Guitar.com.

Photo below by Stephanie Cabral