David Ellefson Wants In On Megadeth Farewell

08-23-2025

Megadeth cofounder David Ellefson has reacted to the news that his former band has announced their farewell tour and said that he would like to take part in Megadeth's final trek but is not sure if that is going to happen.

The bassist made the comments during the latest episode of his video podcast, The David Ellefson Show. After reflecting on his roller-coaster history with the band and cofounder Dave Mustaine, he said, "look, for Dave to call it quits or to retire, I should say, Farewell, I don't even know if he's retiring. He's just basically saying Megadeth's over. Would I like to be a part of it? Yeah, of course. Who wouldn't?

"I'm a founding member of it. I'm a 30-plus-year member of it. Is that gonna happen? Who knows? It's too early to tell. I don't know what they have planned. I have no idea what it is. They just made an announcement about it. Do I think there should be some sort of farewell that everybody gets to participate in?"

He then referenced the recent Back To The Beginning concert in Birmingham, England where the original Black Sabbath lineup performed together for a final time, shortly before Ozzy Osbourne's death, and noted that former Ozzy guitarist Jake E. Lee took part in the show. "Now, was everybody there? No. There were some key people, Bob Daisley, some people that weren't there. But for the most part, they brought a lot of the people back.

"And just speaking Of Black Sabbath, they brought the original, the core four back, and they said goodbye. Not only did they say goodbye, everybody got to say goodbye to them. And I think when you're doing a farewell, that's important, that you get to say goodbye and everybody gets to say goodbye to you. I think that that's an important part of it. But that's me. I'm not in the band anymore. I have no say in it. So that's just me. That's just one guy with an opinion, quite honestly."

The show's co-host Joshua Toomey then said that "everyone that was ever in Megadeth should also be able to say their farewell too." Ellefson responded, "Well, I strongly stand against the notion that Megadeth was only Dave Mustaine, because it wasn't. And everybody knows that.

"So, if Dave needs to retire, wants to retire, I get it. I understand. He's given a lot. It's taken a lot out of him. It's taken certainly a toll on him, as anyone can imagine. So, look, God bless you, brother. If you're done, this is it, you wanna go do something else with your life, spend time with your family, just not play guitar, I get it.

"I mean, dude, believe me, I'm 60. There's some days I just kind of go, 'God, really? Should I write another album, another song? Do I really wanna go on stage?' And the answer always comes back to yes, I do. So I do. So I can't speak for him, and I'm not gonna speak for him. But, look, again, I haven't talked to the guy now in four and a half years, so I have no idea what his reasoning is, what the thinking is behind it." Stream the full episode below: