RED LAMB: DAN SPITZ/DAVE MUSTAINE SUPERGROUP RELEASES DEBUT ALBUM WITHOUT FANFARE OR, UH, DAVE MUSTAINE

So, hey, remember Red Lamb, the new project from former Anthrax guitarist Dan Spitz and forever Megadeth boss Dave Mustaine (and once upon a time called DeuxMonkey)? Well, guess what? Their self-titled debut full-length was released on Friday via iTunes. And you’d think that first album from a band featuring two founding members of Big Four bands would be treated like a huge event and reported on by every metal news outlet in the galaxy, but it wasn’t, because there was no press release sent out, and the only official announcement came earlier today via the band’s Facebook page. So, that seems pretty weird.

Also weird: yeah I don’t think Mustaine actually had anything to do with this record.

Here is my evidence:

• A guy I don’t know named Don Chaffin is listed as the band’s vocalist on Facebook. His website is so well-constructed that the links, including the one to his bio, don’t work, so I can’t tell you much about him. But he certainly looks like a dude you’d have entered into your phone under the name “Do Not Answer.”
• Dave Mustaine is not listed as a member on the band’s Facebook page.
• I’m listening to the album’s iTunes samples now, and while some of the vocals certainly have a Mustaine-ish quality to them, I actually don’t think it’s Mustaine singing. There are certainly long stretches of music where clearly it isn’t Mustaine singing, though.
• The drums are by Patrick Johansson, a Swedish dude who has played with Yngwie Malmsteen and W.A.S.P. This isn’t really relevant, I guess, except I could totally see Mustaine refusing to work another European drummer.

So, what I’m thinking is, Mustaine left the project at some point, and now Dan Spitz is running it all by himself, and Spitz has no idea how to self-promote (we should also note that there is no music available for streaming in the “music” section of the band’s FB page, which seems like really basic Promotion 101 stuff), and so here we are.

Sooo… yeah. The silver lining is that although the project had been described by Mustaine as a hybrid of Disturbed, Soundgarden, and Rage Against the Machine, it actually just sounds like early-90s Anthrax, only with much cheesier lyrics and weaker hooks. But, I mean, it doesn’t sound embarrassing to me. So the band has come a long way from their DeuxMonkey days.

It actually makes me wonder if one day Dan Spitz woke up and was all, “WHOA, Jesus told me that we canNOT put out an album that sounds like Disturbed, that is an awful idea,” and Mustaine was all, “But Jesus told me to be relevant!”, and then they split. In this imaginary scenario in my head, I actually kinda like Dan Spitz.

Check out the album here. If anyone does more sleuthing and comes up with something interesting, shoot us an e-mail, please.

-AR

Much thanks to Mike Reagan for bringing this to our attention!