Ashdown Engineering recently caught up with Megadeth bassist James LoMenzo, who discussed his music career, his departure and return to Megadeth, his Ashdown rig, and how to get his signature sound.
LoMenzo was with Megadeth from 2006 - 2010, then returned to the line-up earlier this year following the firing of David Ellefson.
On returning to Megadeth
LoMenzo: "When they needed a bass player, I thought to myself... 'They'll probably call me up.' But, I also thought to myself, 'It's been a while since I played that kind of music, so maybe it'll be great, it'll be all right, maybe not.' Sure enough, the phone rings, and Dave (Mustaine) is like, 'We've gotta do this Metal Tour Of The Year. James, I know you're the guy who can do it, I would love to have you here. If you would just commit to just doing this tour, that would be great.' And I thought, 'Well, that's kinda weird. He doesn't want me to rejoin the band.' But then I thought about it: He knew I had another band, and he was telling me 'I don't want you to screw up whatever you've got going.' I was being loyal to John (Fogerty). We went out on the tour, and gosh, it was just the best time. I was so enamoured with the band that he put together, and with Kiko (Loureiro / guitar) and with Dirk (Verbeuren / drums) that I was blown away. And Dave, he's just delivering the goods every day.
The great thing about Dave is he's been through a lot. He recovered from cancer. He's had problems with his back. Over the years, he's had more things than most professional wrestlers would have, and he shows no sign of it. He just gets up there and plays and just gives it his all. So after that tour, I was sitting there going, 'Man, I think I might like to stay here for a while.' As luck would have it, not too long after that, Dave calls me up at home and he goes, 'You know, we would love to have you be part of the band officially if you wanna stay.' And I thought, 'That's exactly what I was thinking, man. Let's do it.'"
During a September interview on Detroit radio station WRIF's Meltdown program, Megadeth frontman / founder Dave Mustaine revealed the band had recorded a Judas Priest cover for an upcoming Amazon project. He later revealed on BBC's The Rock Show With Johnnie Walker for the program's Rock God segment the Judas Priest song in question was "Delivering The Goods" from the Killing Machine / Hell Bent For Leather album, released in 1978.
Mustaine: "I had no idea how much Glenn Tipton and Judas Priest had influenced my guitar playing until I recently covered 'Delivering The Goods' with my band, Megadeth, and got to go over all those guitar riffs again. It was really revealing to me how much Glenn's playing had influenced me."
"I remember when I was living with my mom and we moved in with my middle sister - I have three older sisters - and she was married to a police officer that was the Chief Of Police in a city called Stanton in California. He walked into his house and heard Priest blaring in the bedroom I was sharing with their son; that was the first time I ever stood up for metal. And when he stomped out, you know what I did? I put the record back on."
Check out the clip here.
The song is available exclusively via Amazon Music here.
