For a long time, Dave Mustaine didn't have a favorite Metallica song, because he didn't want to listen to his former band. The guitarist-singer, who went on to form Megadeth, was fired from Metallica early on and replaced by Kirk Hammett.
"I had to do a lot of coming to terms with myself in order to listen to Metallica", he told Revolver. "Before, whenever I heard them, it triggered me in my mind to get up on my soapbox and spit out complaints of what had happened to me. And then once I finally realized, 'Dave, you're lucky, you're blessed, you're in a great band, you're in another great band'. I finally just said, 'You're missing it'".
Once Mustaine came around on Metallica, he gravitated to one song in particular.
"And I remember hearing this song when I was talking to Lars [Ulrich] once and telling him this is my favorite song off the 'Black Record'. And he goes, 'Really? [Expletive], man'. It was 'The Unforgiven'", he said.
"I liked it because I thought this was really the first time I've ever really heard James [Hetfield] sing. He had sung before, and he was a great singer. But that was the first time I ever heard him really, really sing."
Megadeth and Metallica will join Slayer and Anthrax at the Big Four show at Yankee Stadium in New York City on September 14.
Thanks for the report to Bryan Wawzenek, Gibson.com.
