Former MEGADETH bassist David Ellefson, who contributed a cover of METALLICA’s instrumental epic “(Anesthesia) – Pulling Teeth” to the recently released “No Life ‘Til Leather – A Tribute To Metallica’s Kill ‘Em All”, spoke to The Pipeman about his involvement with the project. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “There’s some other riffs of Cliff that I think are very definitive. For me, of course it’s ‘Peace Sells’. That’s my riff — that’s my star that was blessed upon me. [BLACK SABBATH’s] Geezer’s [Butler] got ‘N.I.B.’, a bunch of stuff. [IRON MAIDEN’s] Steve Harris has got ‘Wrathchild’ [off] ‘Killers’. So we all kind of have our identified signature riffs. And so I thought about Cliff’s signature riffs. And, of course, there’s several inside of this piece of music with ‘Anesthesia’. But I also thought, look, ‘For Whom The Bell Tolls’, that’s his ‘Peace Sells’. When you hear ‘For Whom The Bell Tolls’, that’s really his riff. The other one that I really like is ‘Orion’. I love that. And ‘Master Of Puppets’ is really one of my favorite metal records and one of my favorite METALLICA records.

“I got to talk with Cliff a bit,” David continued. “They [METALLICA] were on tour with Ozzy [Osbourne in 1986]. Me and Dave [Mustaine, MEGADETH leader] went to go see them [with] Michael Alago, who had signed them to Elektra Records. We were in town. Michael was courting me and Dave to sign MEGADETH to Elektra Records. And it didn’t go that way, but we went over to see METALLICA. It was a big tour — them supporting Ozzy on the ‘Master Of Puppets’ tour — and I got to chat with Cliff a little bit about some of his composing on ‘Master Of Puppets’. And then, of course, sadly it wasn’t but a few weeks or a couple of months later he was was gone. Cliff and I never sat down with basses in hand and sort of broed down or anything like that, but just chatting as fellow musicians, fellow bass players, et cetera, seeing him perform a bunch… And that’s why I said in the little video that I shot when I did the playthrough, I said, ‘This is my homage to Cliff.’ So, to me, I kind of tried to make it even a little bigger than just ‘(Anesthesia) – Pulling Teeth’. I tried to make it really more of a salute to him as an artist, and tried to include a bunch of his music inside of that performance.”

Ellefson and Dave Mustaine formed MEGADETH in 1983, after Mustaine got kicked out of METALLICA. METALLICA recruited Kirk Hammett and went on to record its debut album, “Kill ‘Em All”, later that year, while Ellefson and Mustaine began work on MEGADETH’s first LP, “Killing Is My Business… And Business Is Good!”

During a 2019 ALTITUDES & ATTITUDE conversation with moderator Ryan J. Downey at the MI Concert Hall in Los Angeles, Ellefson was asked if Burton was an inspiration on his bass playing during MEGADETH’s formative years. Ellefson responded: ” I met Dave [Mustaine] in June of 1983. He had just left METALLICA literally not more than eight weeks before that, in April. So I didn’t know anything about METALLICA, didn’t know who Dave was, heard nothing about Cliff Burton — knew nothing about it, coming from the Midwest. And I didn’t know anything about Cliff. And because the only recording Dave had of METALLICA was ‘No Life ‘Til Leather’, and that had another bass player on it named Ron McGovney. So when we did a cover of ‘Mechanix’, I played Ron McGovney’s basslines.”

He continued: “Really, quite honestly, my METALLICA bass player was Ron, believe it or not, and I kind of modeled what we did off of that ‘No Life ‘Til Leather’ demo. And I remember the day when ‘Kill ‘Em All’ and we sat… There was complete silence in the room, and we sat and we listened to the album. And the differences — tempos were pulled back. And obviously the bass solo, ‘Anesthesia’. That was really my first experience hearing Cliff. And at that point, we were two months into… MEGADETH was well on its way.

“So, long answer to your short question is I didn’t really have an influence [from Cliff]… That was not where my influence came from. And quite honestly, growing up in a rural area of Minnesota, bass players in rock and roll were cool, but when I started hearing some jazz players… Those guys were more of my influence, along with Steve Harris [IRON MAIDEN] and Geddy Lee [RUSH] and Ian Hill [JUDAS PRIEST] and the metal guys. But, for me, I went more into the jazz world… But those were the things that I brought in, and I think that made, me and Dave, our participation together with the MEGADETH sound something that was… And even then with Gar Samuelson and Chris Poland — they were jazz-fusion musicians. We really had a very different sound — different even from ANTHRAX, from METALLICA, from SLAYER — a very different sound. And I think that probably is what sort of set us apart as our own pillar of the ‘Big Four.'”

“No Life ‘Til Leather – A Tribute To Metallica’s Kill ‘Em All” is available on vinyl, CD, and digital formats.

“No Life ‘Til Leather – A Tribute To Metallica’s Kill ‘Em All” track listing:

01. Hit The Lights – TAILGUNNER
02. The Four Horsemen – THE ALMIGHTY
03. Motorbreath – SOEN
04. Jump In The Fire – TYGERS OF PAN TANG
05. (Anesthesia – Pulling Teeth – DAVID ELLEFSON
06. Whiplash – MOTÖRHEAD
07. Phantom Lord – SAXON
08. No Remorse – DIAMOND HEAD
09. Seek & Destroy – TESTAMENT
10. Metal Militia – RAVEN