{"id":246970,"date":"2025-11-06T08:42:12","date_gmt":"2025-11-06T08:42:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/246970\/"},"modified":"2025-11-06T08:42:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-06T08:42:12","slug":"megadeths-peace-sells-the-story-behind-the-song","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/246970\/","title":{"rendered":"Megadeth\u2019s Peace Sells: the story behind the song"},"content":{"rendered":"

Megadeth<\/a>\u2019s debut album, 1985\u2019s Killing Is My Business\u2026 And Business Is Good<\/a>, was recorded on a budget of $8000, and it sounded like it. That record crackled with energy and spite – it was leader Dave Mustaine<\/a>\u2019s personal fuck-you to his former bandmates in Metallica<\/a>, who had kicked him out of the band a couple of years earlier for partying too hard.<\/p>\n

Killing Is My Business\u2026 had been a decent start, but it would be their second album, Peace Sells\u2026 But Who\u2019s Buying?, that elevated Megadeth to thrash metal\u2019s top tier. And in the song Peace Sells itself, they delivered one of the cornerstone songs of the era \u2013 one that showed Megadeth were way more than just the band fronted by the guy that got thrown out of Metallica.<\/p>\n

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Megadeth existed in a state of perpetual chaos during the early years of their existence. Mustaine\u2019s partying had only increased since putting the band together, and his drug intake had gotten more hardcore with it. Guitarist Chris Poland and drummer Gar Samuelson were a couple of jazz-loving musos who had moved to California from New York and brought their heroin habits with them. Mustaine and original Megadeth bassist David Ellefson<\/a>, who were no strangers to booze and coke, soon jumped onboard that train.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt was very hard,\u201d Ellefson told Classic Rock in 2017 of the band\u2019s lifestyle at that point. \u201cAny money we should have saved for food or paying rent immediately went up our noses or on cigarettes or burgers. Peace Sells\u2026 Buy Who\u2019s Buying? was the heroin, cigarettes and hamburgers album.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Megadeth\n<\/p>\n

Megadeth in 1986: (from left) Dave Ellefson, Gar Samuelson, Chris Poland, Dave Mustaine (Image credit: Paul Natkin\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Heroin may have sunk its claws into Megadeth, but the fog wasn\u2019t so thick that it clouded their ambition. The band moved into a dank rehearsal room in Vernon, an industrial area south of LA\u2019s downtown. They\u2019d kitted out the room with egg crates and built a loft so they could crash there.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn any given day, either me or Dave was homeless,\u201d recalled Ellefson. \u201cAnd so it became a party place \u2013 we could invite girls down, we could hang out. It was the place to hang. But it was also a very lonely, dark, bleak existence if you ever had to stay there. You\u2019d pass out hearing other bands rehearsing all night.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAny money we should have saved for food or paying rent immediately went up our noses or on cigarettes or burgers.\u201d<\/p>\n

David Ellefson<\/p>\n

Despite their living circumstances, there was a momentum to Megadeth as they entered Music Grinder Studio with producer Randy Burns in March 1986 to record their second album. The band\u2019s new label, Capitol, stumped up $25,000 to make the album \u2013 triple the advance for Killing Is My Business.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was like: \u2018Wow, this is a real record deal,\u201d Ellefson remembers. \u201cWe\u2019ve got enough to make a good-sounding record. There\u2019s even a couple of bucks to pay some bills and survive.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a mark of Mustaine\u2019s drive that the songs that appeared on Peace Sells\u2026 But Who\u2019s Buying? were already in the bag long before Megadeth entered he studio, despite the band\u2019s seat-of-their-pants existence.<\/p>\n

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\"Megadeth&rsquo;s\n<\/p>\n

Megadeth\u2019s Chris Poland and Dave Mustaine onstage in early 1987 (Image credit: Paul Natkin\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were out on tour constantly, playing Killing Is My Business\u2026 and writing Peace Sells\u2026 But Who\u2019s Buying? as we went along,\u201d Mustaine told Classic Rock in 2017. \u201cIt would have been nice to have sat down and been in a house in the hills: \u2018Hey, let’s write some songs!\u2019 But we were bouncing around in vans and motorhomes, trying to survive.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Mustaine and Ellefson were actually in the house of Killing Is My Business producer Karat Faye when the seeds of the title track were sewn. Ellefson had brought along a BC Rich Eagle bass that he had ripped the frets out of. Suddenly, Mustaine picked up the instrument and started playing the rolling bass line that would become Peace Sells\u2019 instantly recognisable intro.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was like, \u2018Whoah, that sounds really cool,\u2019\u201d recalled Ellefson. \u201cThat same day, we were driving over to Vernon to pick up Gar. I was driving and Dave always sat in the shotgun seat, and Dave looks over at me and said: \u2018What do you think of \u2018Peace Sells But Who\u2019s Buying?\u2019 I was, like: \u2018Wow, that\u2019s cool.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

The pair got to their rehearsal space with Samuelson and Chris Poland in tow and instantly began fleshing out the track. \u201cThat song fell out on the rehearsal room floor in about two hours,\u201d recalled Ellefson. In its nascent form, Peace Sells stretched on for eight sprawling minutes. It was the experienced Samuelson – one of the few people Mustaine deferred to musically \u2013 who insisted they hack it back to four minutes.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was not a typical groove for Megadeth. It almost felt too simple in a way. I’m surprised, especially with the level of musicianship of Chris and Gar, who were very progressive fusion musicians, that we could keep it that simple. It really was an exercise in discipline for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Megadeth – Peace Sells – YouTube
\n\"Megadeth<\/p>\n

Watch On <\/a><\/p>\n

The lyric that gave the album its full title had been rattling around Mustaine\u2019s brain for a while. He\u2019d been staying over at casual girlfriend\u2019s place when he saw copy of Reader\u2019s Digest magazine on her nightstand, which featured an interview with Patti Smith<\/a>. Something Smith said in the article instantly grabbed Mustaine\u2019s attention: \u201cPeace sells, but nobody\u2019s buying it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI went, \u2018Oh god, I gotta write a song about that,\u2019\u201d Mustaine told MSN Music. \u201cSo I changed the words around a little bit, but I had no paper so I took a pen and wrote the lyrics on the wall of the rehearsal building we were living in.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI wrote it because I was tired of people mocking metal in general and mocking people who are metal fans,\u201d<\/p>\n

Dave Mustaine<\/p>\n

Lyrically, its jaundiced view of government and religion dispensed with metal\u2019s swords-\u2019n\u2019-sorcery approach in favour of a more realistic world view. When Mustaine sang: \u2018What do you mean, I don\u2019t support your system? I go to court when I have to,\u2019 he meant it. This was an underdog rooting for his fellow underdogs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wrote it because I was tired of people mocking metal in general and mocking people who are metal fans,\u201d Mustaine told Rolling Stone. \u201cIt was hard for me to watch the way we were stereotyped on TV, just as dumbasses. For the most part, I think that a lot of musicians are very intelligent and very talented. It’s a bummer the way people had been stereotyped.\u201d<\/p>\n

In terms of velocity, Peace Sells barely qualified as a thrash song. Still, the riff that powered it remains one of Mustaine\u2019s finest moments, while the kicker came towards the end of the song, when it picked up the pace. \u2018Peace sells, but who\u2019s buying?\u2019 sang Mustaine, delivering the mantra-like line with cynicism in his voice and a sneer nailed onto his face.<\/p>\n

Megadeth – Peace Sells – YouTube
\n\"Megadeth<\/p>\n

Watch On <\/a><\/p>\n

Megadeth made a video for Peace Sells \u2013 a rarity for a thrash band in 1986 \u2013 which cut clips of the band playing live into a disorientating rush of stroboscopic images taken from contemporary news footage. MTV picked up on it, instantly elevating the band\u2019s profile. The channel also used the opening bassline as the intro for their news channel. \u201cBut they did it minus one note so I wouldn\u2019t get paid for it for years,\u201d Mustaine complained to Rolling Stone.<\/p>\n

Despite Megadeth\u2019s narcotic lifestyle and constant money struggles, Peace Sells and its parent album served notice that the band were genuine contenders, and their leader was far from the permanently wasted fuck-up his reputation suggested. Increasingly poisonous personality differences between Mustaine and guitarist Poland and drummer Samuleson resulted in the latter pair being fired soon after the Peace Sells\u2026 But Who\u2019s Buying? campaign, but the singer and David Ellefson were in it for the long haul.<\/p>\n

\u201cDave and I were in a position where there was no Plan B,\u201d Ellefson told Classic Rock. \u201cThere was no escape hatch. There was no, ‘If this doesn’t work we’ll go do that.\u2019 That backs-against-the-wall commitment is what drove us to make Peace Sells.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Megadeth\u2019s debut album, 1985\u2019s Killing Is My Business\u2026 And Business Is Good, was recorded on a budget of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":246971,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[96,128,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-246970","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-music","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246970"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246970\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/246971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}