MEGADETH's DAVE MUSTAINE Names Bands That He Thinks Would Be Included In New 'Big Four' Of Thrash Metal

In a recent interview with Czech Republic's Óčko, MEGADETH leader Dave Mustaine was asked which bands he would pick if he had to "put together a new young generation of the 'Big Four'" of thrash metal. He responded (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "Well, it wouldn't be a young generation, but I do believe that there are ways to do a new 'Big Four'. I think that TESTAMENT, I think OVERKILL, I think EXODUS, and maybe TRIVIUM; I don't know. TRIVIUM's not really a thrash metal band, so I'd have to think about that. But I think those other three guys would be really great."

Mustaine then explained his choices, saying: "OVERKILL is really important on the East Coast metal scene. EXODUS, of course, I love EXODUS. And I've been friends with Gary [Holt, EXODUS guitarist] longest of all people that I've been friends with in the music industry. And TESTAMENT. Eric [Peterson, TESTAMENT guitarist], Alex [Skolnick, TESTAMENT guitarist], those guys are really great guitar players. And I love when we get a chance to play with the band."

The so-called "Big Four" of 1980s thrash metal — METALLICA, MEGADETH, SLAYER and ANTHRAX, the dominant thrash metal groups that helped bring that genre into the mainstream — played together for the first time in history on June 16, 2010 in front of 81,000 fans at the Sonisphere festival at Bemowo Airport in Warsaw, Poland and shared a bill again for six more shows as part of the Sonisphere series that same year. They reunited again for several dates in 2011, including the last "Big Four" concert, which was held on September 14, 2011 at Yankee Stadium in New York City. Since then, METALLICA, SLAYER and ANTHRAX have played a number of shows together, including the 2013 Soundwave festival in Australia. They also performed at the 2014 Heavy MTL festival in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

In 2013, Mustaine spoke to Radio.com about which band should have been included if the "Big Four" were expanded and considered the "Big Five". He said: "You know, people will say there's a whole another generation, like the 'Medium Four' [laughs], and I think there's a lot of great bands that fit that bill, too. But I think probably EXODUS, because there was nobody else at the time that had that kind of pull or that kind of importance in the metal community. Granted, it was with [late EXODUS singer Paul] Baloff, and Baloff had a voice that you had to have an acquired taste for, but you know, I liked him."

Although EXODUS rarely gets mentioned alongside the so-called "Big Four" of 1980s thrash metal, the band's classic 1985 debut, "Bonded By Blood", inspired the likes of TESTAMENT, DEATH ANGEL, VIO-LENCE and many others to launch their careers and is considered one of the most influential thrash metal albums of all time.

Ex-EXODUS vocalist Steve "Zetro" Souza discussed his former band's exclusion from the "Big Four" during a 2014 interview with the Argentinian radio station Rock & Pop 95.9 FM. He said at the time: "Personally, I don't pay attention to that necessarily. I was in the Bay Area in the beginning, before I was even a member of EXODUS, so I remember who was the forefathers of thrash. I mean, Tom [Hunting, EXODUS drummer] invented that drum beat. That [guitar] picking style was from Gary — that's where the genesis of that came from.

"I think what [the media] did [when they came up with the 'Big Four'] was they took the four bands who were probably the most successful in the initial period of thrash metal — from, say, '85 or '84 to '90," he continued. "If you were to go off popularity, if you were gonna go off record sales, you would have to say ANTHRAX, MEGADETH, METALLICA and SLAYER.

"Now, when you ask me that question, this is what I say: it's 'The Big One And The Other Three.' Sorry. Neither one of those bands — and I love every single one of them… But METALLICA sits on their own. So, to say the 'Big Four'? I don't know if you can say that. You have to say 'The Big One And The Other Three.'"

"And again, I was the singer for LEGACY, which turned into TESTAMENT, so I hired everybody in that band — even Chuck Billy. So my influence, as a writer and musician starting a band, was tapered after EXODUS and METALLICA. I didn't even know, really, that SLAYER or MEGADETH or OVERKILL or ANTHRAX existed. I lived in the Bay Area, so then that band which you all known now as TESTAMENT, the genesis of that band was because of EXODUS, so…"

In a 2010 interview with Metal Asylum, Holt was asked if he feels the "Big Four" should have been expanded and considered the "Big Seven", including EXODUS, TESTAMENT and OVERKILL. "Well, I think it should be the 'Big Five' with EXODUS, because we were there at the start of thrash metal with METALLICA in the real early '80s," he said. "Same thing with MEGADETH because Mustaine was a part of METALLICA's birth and he also created MEGADETH. And SLAYER are SLAYER. ANTHRAX are also great and old friends, but if you listen to those first few records, they have definitely changed. TESTAMENT has every right to be part of the thrash metal legends, but it just came down to timing because they came later. And OVERKILL have been their since the beginning also. But I don't get hung up on that shit, because I know how it all started and I know where I was when the shit got created. We [EXODUS] certainly deserve to be part of the founding fathers, but you know who often gets excluded are the Germans — KREATOR, DESTRUCTION and SODOM. Everybody looks to America and forgets those guys. KREATOR, DESTRUCTION and SODOM all released records in the early '80s."

He continued: "Really, the "Big Four" is solely based on sales and the ones who sold the most. But if you compare records, I will put EXODUS' last few albums up against anybody's shit. SLAYER is always awesome; the last TESTAMENT album [at the time of the interview], 'The Formation of Damnation', was great; the new MEGADETH [2009's 'Endgame'] is one of their best; METALLICA are still finding their feet again, and their last album, 'Death Magnetic', was a step in the right direction. The new OVERKILL, 'Ironbound', is one of their best records ever; it's so good. And KREATOR, DESTRUCTION, and SODOM still make great new music. What I think it boils down to is the bands who've been doing this the longest still can do it the best. METALLICA are still a mighty force live, but they lost their way for quite a while. But then again I've never had to deal with the horrible problem of having millions of dollars. [Laughs] Maybe if I had that kind of money, it would distract my hunger for doing this kind of shit, too. But, unfortunately for me, I have to keep kickin' people in the teeth, I don't have the funds to go art-shopping. My version of fine art is a new edition of Hustler magazine. [Laughs]"

In 2014, former EXODUS and current METALLICA guitarist Hammett was asked by U.K.'s Metal Hammer magazine if it's strange to him how much METALLICA has eclipsed the other "Big Four" bands in terms of commercial popularity. "I try not to spend too much time thinking about stuff like that because whatever I think of is still not going to be a satisfying enough explanation," he replied. "It's just the way things are and how the chips fell.

"EXODUS in the '80s had some bona fide problems, but I think their first album ['Bonded By Blood'] is just as good as [METALLICA's debut] 'Kill 'Em All'. We were just playing the music we wanted to hear because no one else was playing it and it wasn't being played on the radio. It was only a small group of people who knew about it and it was almost elitist in that 'No posers allowed!' thing."

In a 2017 new interview with Metal Shock Finland, OVERKILL vocalist Bobby "Blitz" Ellsworth was asked why he thinks his band wasn't included in the so-called "Big Four" of 1980s thrash metal. He responded: "First and foremost, I think it's necessary to be concerned with your own house as opposed to what other people do.

"I think they're for sure a great compliment to the metal community, because I think it shows the power [those bands have within] the industry, being able to play the size venues that they did," he continued. "Obviously, METALLICA is worth the majority of those tickets, because they reinvented music on a heavy level by showing that a band out of San Francisco could make this happen at this large of a scale. And even [METALLICA's] new record [at the time], the 'Hardwired' record, is, to me, back to, let's say, that angry, aggressive approach that was [present] on '…And Justice For All'."

Ellsworth added: "But when it comes to being selected and not selected, that's a simple accounting issue. When you talk numbers, numbers make the world go around, numbers put food on your table, and numbers put the 'Big Four' in arenas. And they sell enough records to do that.

"For me, it's not a concern. To even be asked the question from you is quite a compliment with regard to, let's say, our longevity or tenacity doing what we like doing. But this is quite simply an accounting issue. He who sells the most gets the pole positions."

Earlier this year, TESTAMENT's Alex Skolnick was asked by Chris Akin of The Classic Metal Show why his band wasn't included in the so-called "Big Four" of 1980s thrash metal. He said: "I never give it much thought, because, to me, it's not just the 'Big Four' — it's the first four. Those bands had albums out when TESTAMENT was still called LEGACY and was still a local band that I used to hear about when I was in high school. And they supported some of those bands, but all of the 'Big Four' bands had records out at the time that LEGACY was still getting started. And by the time LEGACY became TESTAMENT and released its first, debut album, those bands all had several albums out. So you can't really make the comparison. They were there [and] they were so much further along by the time we even got started. So I think it makes more sense to look at, okay, the next wave after the so-called 'Big Four' bands. And it's an honor that people think — most of the time we're one of those names. That's great. I'll take it."

After Akin noted that TESTAMENT is widely considered to be one of the "top eight" thrash metal bands of all time, Skolnick replied: "And that is just fine with us. I mean, I can't speak for anybody else in the band, but I don't know of anybody that has any issue with that. [Nobody] says, 'No, we should be in the 'Big Four'.' No. They're the 'Big Four'. All good. But we'll proudly take our place in the next wave."

Skolnick previously talked about TESTAMENT's exclusion from the "Big Four" of 1980s thrash metal during a 2019 interview with the "Basel Meets" podcast. Alex stated at the time: "Interestingly, I have no problem with it, because I look at it as a seniority thing. I joined TESTAMENT in very late '85; I think my first gig was early '86. So, 1986 — what happened [that year]? METALLICA releases 'Master Of Puppets'. They were already on their third record. They were on their way to becoming one of the biggest bands in the world, which was clear… I mean, it wasn't clear they would be that level, but we knew they were gonna at least be as big as IRON MAIDEN and SCORPIONS at that time. So they were already off and running. SLAYER released 'Reign In Blood' that year, after having several albums out. ANTHRAX had several records out. I think at that point, MEGADETH was on their second record. So all those bands, they were past their first record. They were all off and running. At the time, the classic TESTAMENT lineup was just forming. So, I'm fine with that. They were there first, and they were doing big things. And we came along a little later. But I have no problem with those groups being classified together."

Alex's comments echoed those of TESTAMENT singer Chuck Billy, who told the "Music Mania" podcast in 2018 that his band came along too late to be included in the "Big Four".

"When you say 'Big Four,' you think of the '80s when that was what was referred to as the 'Big Four', which is correct — those four bands [METALLICA, MEGADETH, SLAYER and ANTHRAX] were the biggest four bands of our era; at that time, all [of them were] at the platinum level, when there was much more acceptability to this music," he said. "Around '91 [or] '92, the grunge scene came in, and all the bands following us — EXODUS and OVERKILL and all those kind of bands — lost that momentum because the industry started changing its format. So when they say [METALLICA, MEGADETH, SLAYER and ANTHRAX are the] 'Big Four,' I say that's correct. We were the next generation of the 'Four' [laughs], but we were just caught in the wrong time… wrong place, wrong time."

Several years earlier, Billy told Metal Insider that METALLICA, MEGADETH, SLAYER and ANTHRAX are the only bands that deserved to be lumped together as part of the "Big Four".

"I think that when it comes down to the 'Big Four', as far as I can see it, back when metal was at its height in the late '80s/ early 90s, all of those 'Big Four' bands had a ton of great success and were selling millions of records," he said. "I think around that same time, we were growing apart as a band and the music market had changed. So I think we were kind of, I guess, as they say, 'on deck in the batting circle' waiting for our success selling millions of records at that time.

"So when people say the Big Four, Five or Six, I don't see it that way," he continued. "The 'Big Four,' those four bands had great success selling millions of records. But the rest of us — EXODUS, DEATH ANGEL [and] TESTAMENT — we didn't sell out those festivals or that amount of records. So I don't see us being compared to that. I'd say if metal was still going as strong as it was, yeah, we all stood a chance to sell a lot of records. That's just my take on it. When people talk about that, to me, those four bands are justifiable, and that's it. I don't see any other bands that were the 'Big' whatever."