Like Most Metalheads, Marty Friedman Hasn’t Listened to Megadeth’s Risk Since the ’90s
Every band’s got that one album that everyone looks at and wonders… “why?” Metallica’s got St. Anger, Judas Priest’s got Nostradamus (that’s a hill I’ll die on), and Megadeth has the insanely lambasted Risk. By now, you should also know that decisions made while recording that album are the reason why Marty Friedman left the band, which adds another layer of WTF to that forgettable release.
During a recent interview with Whiplash.net‘s Gustavo Maiato and Mateus Ribeiro (transcribed by Blabbermouth), Friedman looked back on Risk was asked how he perceives that album roughly 25 years after the fact. Ever the candid interview, Friedman admitted that he doesn’t at all, stating that the band “did the best we could.”
“I haven’t heard it since back then. I don’t think it was much of a risk, actually. And I just remember we did the best we could. And it’s exactly where we were as a band at that time. And that’s all any album is, really. An album is like a yearbook in school or in high school or college or whatever. An album is a yearbook of that period of time. So you can’t really go back and say, ‘Oh, this sucks’ or ‘We didn’t mean to do that’ or ‘It was not a good idea,’ or whatever, you can’t go back and say that, because it is what it is and it was what it was. At the time, we believed in it and we did the best we could and that’s all I can say about any album, really. It’s the same answer for any album.”
Released back in 1999, Risk was largely seen by critics as a weird release from the iconic thrash metal band. Gone was the insanely technical and speedy musicianship in lieu of way more radio friendly tracks. That sonic change absolutely pissed off Megadeth fans, especially since it felt like a response to Metallica’s Load and ReLoad albums.
In the years since, Mustaine has gone on record saying Risk came out the way it did because he relented to demands by Friedman that the band approach a more alternative sound.
“We kept slowing down and slowing down and slowing down. If that record would have been called The Dave Mustaine Project and not Megadeth, I think it would have been successful. People wanted a Megadeth record. They didn’t wanna see Dave bending over backwards to keep Marty Friedman happy, ’cause Marty wanted us to sound like fucking Dishwalla.”
Though no one will really know what went down behind the scenes, what we do know is that Risk was a turning point for Megadeth.
