MEGADETH bassist David Ellefson says that his brother's recent passing after battling cancer brought Ellefson and the band's leader, Dave Mustaine, "closer together."
MEGADETH canceled a number of shows last month so that David could spend time with the rest of his family as they mourned the loss of Eliot Elelfson, who died on May 19 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
In a brand new interview with Lithium Magazine, David spoke about the support he has received from his longtime bandmate following his brother's cancer diagnosis, explaining: "The band was actually ready to go onstage in Buenos Aires on May 1. We were in the dressing room and Dave came up to me and said, 'Hey, man, how's your brother doing?' And I just broke down and started crying and said, 'It's not good. I just got the call today.' And, man, he rallied around me in a way that no one else did or could because he has known me for so long. He's known my family. He knew my brothers, my mother and he knew my father before he passed away. So we are as close as two brothers can be, sometimes even closer, without being blood relatives.
"And it's cool and interesting how in that moment, what I just went through with my own brother passing away, in a lot of ways brought Dave and I closer together. He really rallied around me like the brother I never had, and the brother I don't have anymore. It says a lot about the bond between us and within the band.
"As much as there's a lot of big stuff that goes on around MEGADETH, there's also a lot of closed-door, intimate moments where it's just the two of us or the four of us alone in a room. Especially before we go onstage, we have this 30-minute lockdown where no one comes in and no one goes out. It's just the four of us. And I tell you, my brother's passing brought all four of us in MEGADETH closer together too. And in a weird way, it was kind of a cool gift that my brother gave us on his way out."
David Ellefson is a world-renowned bassist who recently helped Jackson design a new signature model bass to add to his arsenal. In the video below, the founding member of MEGADETH demonstrates some of the key features of the David Ellefson Signature Kelly Bird Bass, with its striking body shape and red pinstripe finish.
The new David Ellefson Signature Kelly Bird Bass features a basswood body with Ellefson's signature red pinstripe finish, bolt-on bound maple neck with 21 jumbo frets and block inlays, EMG pickups, two volume controls and three-band active EQ, Jackson high-mass four-string HM-4 bridge, and Jackson die-cast tuners. It is available in Red Burst with Black Center-Stripe.
The new David Ellefson Signature Kelly Bird Bass was unveiled at this year's NAMM (National Association Of Music Merchants) show, a massive music-products convention that took place in January at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California.
The autobiography of David Ellefson, co-founder and bassist of 11-time Grammy-nominated heavy metal titans MEGADETH, will be made available on October 29 via Howard Books. Ellefson's memoir, "My Life With Deth", chronicles the story of Ellefson's fall into addiction during the band's early years, followed by his subsequent recovery and the return to faith which championed the band's rise to fame over the past several decades. The book was written with Joel McIver, the bestselling author of 21 books on rock music, and features a foreword by Alice Cooper. World rights to "My Life With Deth" were sold to Philis Boultinghouse atHoward Books by agent Lisa Gallagher at Sanford J. Greenburger Associates.
Since 1983, the celebrated metal band MEGADETH has sold more than 20 million albums, received eleven Grammy nominations, and built a fan base of millions. Still going strong, they recently toured the world withMETALLICA, ANTHRAX and SLAYER. Now, in "My Life With Deth",Ellefson tells the whole behind-the-scenes story of the band and his personal journey from suffering to salvation.
