Dave Mustaine has revealed that he’s suffering from a hand condition that is severely impacting his ability to play guitar, which is a driving factor behind his impending retirement.
The metal guitar icon is retiring Megadeth after the album cycle for their forthcoming 17th studio release, aptly titled Megadeth, wraps up. While early single releases show the guitarist still has plenty of chops – for instance, Let There Be Shred is a guitar solo love-fest – his Dupuytren's contracture diagnosis has made it “really painful to play.
“It's already started, where it's kind of bunching up a little bit,” he tells MariskalRockTV in a new interview. “And then if you look at the tips of my fingers, they're severely arthritic. So all those bumps make it really painful to play.”
The condition is often referred to as Viking Disease due to its commonality in Northern European populations. It sees tissue under the skin thicken to the point it pulls fingers into a bent position, as if the hand were clutching an imaginary axe.
Straightening the fingers back is said to be difficult, and while surgery is an option to slow its progress, Mustaine won’t consider it until Megadeth’s race is run.
“If I wait until my hands are causing a problem and I try it and it doesn't work, well then I've toured everywhere, I've said farewell to everybody and am not leaving stuff unsaid or unfinished,” he explains.
Megadeth is poised to be a poignant send-off for the guitarist. It will be the first and only release to feature new hotshot guitarist Teemu Mäntysaari, who is in to succeed Kiko Loureiro’s two-album spell.
The record will close out with a cover of Metallica’s Ride the Lightning, a thrash classic for which he has a co-writing credit from his ill-fated time in the band. Mustaine believes that offering his take on the song will provide a full-circle moment to close his career in the right way.
Elsewhere, Mustaine has revealed how he found Chris Poland’s successor, and the bizarre request that cost the would-be new guitarist the job – at the expense of his guitar teacher.
