Dave Mustaine Says Dave Ellefson Isn’t a Founding Member of Megadeth

So Dave Mustaine recently gave an interview to the radio station Real Rock 99.3 (bottom of the post). And during that interview, the DJ, Kirby Ray, remarked, “I know that you and Dave Ellefson formed the band. I guess that your probably friendship is closer now than ever.” To which Mustaine responded thusly:

“No, that’s not true. Megadeth was already in its formative phase long before I even knew David Ellefson. The name Megadeth didn’t come up until after Dave and I had met. But there was another bass player before Dave.”

Which is an interesting assertion, and not just because it’s our billionth example of Mustaine’s ego rearing its ugly head.

Rather, it’s interesting because it raises the following question: what does it mean to be a founding member of a band?

Certainly, I think the vast majority of Megadeth fans, if polled, would refer to Ellefson as a founding member of the band. Neither AllMusic nor Wikipedia lists a predecessor for Ellefson; a Google search for “original Megadeth bassist” brings up no one besides Ellefson; a Google search for “Who was the bassist in Megadeth before David Ellefson?” is similarly fruitless. There exists no official recording a pre-Ellefson Megadeth. And even Mustaine admits that the band wasn’t called Megadeth until after Ellefson joined.

So was that pre-Ellefson Megadeth even really Megadeth? Is Ellefson to be discounted as a founding member of the band because he wasn’t in the room the moment Mustaine decided to start the band? And if that’s the requirement for being a founding member of a band, then, technically, aren’t James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich and Cliff Burton all founding members of Megadeth? How many other founding members of famous bands can we now no longer consider founding members? For example: the Appetite for Destruction-era version of Guns N’ Roses was actually an amalgamation of two bands (L.A. Guns and Hollywood Rose) that became an amalgamation of three bands (Hollywood Rose, L.A. Guns, and Road Crew) before they were ever signed. So who the hell founded Guns N’ Roses? The guys on Appetite, which was the brand’s debut? Or the guys before the guys on Appetite?

This relates back to an idea we explored last year — that branding has become too important, the consequence of which is that it’s increasingly common to see bands touring with fewer and fewer members of their classic, or most well-known, line-up. Mustaine’s assertion that Ellefson didn’t co-found Megadeth is really about emphasizing the fact that Mustaine is Megadeth… which is basically true, but paradoxically not really true at all (if fans really didn’t care who was in the band besides Mustaine, then those Rust in Peace-era reunion rumors wouldn’t get so much traction, and we’d all be indifferent to the fact that Lamb of God’s Chris Adler is touring with them). Obviously, for business reasons, it’s in Mustaine’s best interest to further the perception that he’s the only member of the band who really matters… except that decision, ultimately, is up to the fans, not him.

So I ask you: is Dave Ellefson a found member of Megadeth, or not? Sound off in the comments section below. ‘Cause I honestly can’t make up my mind as to what the damned answer is.