Dave Mustaine says the room for a musician to say what he thinks has narrowed considerably since MEGADETH started.
Interviewed by Hakos Pervanidis for TV War, the Metal Hammer Greece television programme, the frontman was asked whether the current state of the world would allow him to be himself and speak his mind the way he could four decades ago.
"Well, I think right now, the world has changed for the worse, with all the cancel culture, all the hatred that people have," he answered. "You used to be able to say stuff in the United States, and now you can't, unless you're the people that's telling everybody else they can't."
His second point was commercial rather than moral. "If you sing about politics, for example, and somebody can determine where your political leanings lie, you've just halved your audience, because the people who are one party will be for you, and the other party will be against you. And that really sucks. Before, it used to be nobody knew who you voted for. Nobody cared. And now it's important for the hateful people in the world to find out who people voted for and to expose them for something that's very private."
Mustaine, who has drawn scrutiny over the years for conservative-sounding remarks, has repeatedly pushed back on the label. In February he told Roisin O'Connor's Good Vibrations that "people think I'm a right-winger. I'm not. I'm an independent. I've voted for Democrats, I've voted for Republicans. I vote for whoever's the least of two evils, sometimes three." In January he told The New York Times: "I'm a Christian, and I answer to a different set of angels. I obey the law, but no, I'm not a right-winger."
Asked why that narrative attached itself to him, he blamed the exits. "I believe that people who get fired from MEGADETH are bitter, whether it's musicians or people who work in another area with the band. And it's really easy to say bad stuff about me. All you can do is show up and be the best person you can be. And my reputation will precede me, of course, but my character will remain."
The most memorable part of the interview had nothing to do with politics. Describing what fans bring to meet-and-greets, Mustaine recalled how often he hears that "In My Darkest Hour" saved someone's life — and one encounter he has clearly never shaken.
"I remember one time at a meet-and-greet, this girl came up to us in a wheelchair, and she was missing her legs, and she was a professional classical violinist who was an amazing violinist. And she said, ''Train Of Consequences' is my song.' And I thought, 'Really? That is so weird.' And she said, 'No. I lost my legs by a train, so 'Train Of Consequences' is my jam.' And I went, 'Wow, you never know.'"