MEGADETH bassist David Ellefson is featured in a new Q&A; with Pollstar.com. An excerpt is available below:

Q: Megadeth has a lot on its plate in the next few months. What’s different about this year’s Gigantour compared to past years?

Ellefon: "It seems that every one of them has had a different objective. The first one, which I was not in the group at the time, was arranged around progressive musicianship and varying degrees of heaviness within the metal genre but extreme musicianship being the benchmark.

The second one dipped down into kind of, I would say, a generation behind Megadeth with the bands that participated in that.

Then last year, the first Gigantour I participated in, what was exciting was … I would say MOTÖRHEAD were certainly the elder statesmen of the thrash genre, Megadeth (was) probably commercially the biggest band on the bill but then also bringing out LACUNA COIL who offered something different because of Cristina (Scabbia) being a female vocalist. And then also VOLBEAT, who was I think probably the cool young upstart, at least here in the United States. So far, those three Gigantours all offered something uniquely different as a package.

What I find really intriguing about this is everybody in these bands has had a prior history with other groups but also had success on their own, in their own merits. Clearly Megadeth is part of the “Big Four.” Zakk Wylde went from Ozzy to growing his own culture, is with BLACK LABEL SOCIETY. Vinnie Paul reinvented himself with HELLYEAH. Newsted is kind of the new kid on the block but certainly has earned the respect of everybody from his professional career with Metallica.

The thing about it that’s cool is that every band has, not only some name recognition from all their years in the business, but is doing something that’s new and fresh. To me, that’s probably the hook of this year, a new kind of metal union that we’re able to take around North America this year."

Click here to read the Q&A; in its entirety.

Gigantour 2013 dates:

July

14 - Corpus Christi, TX - Concrete Street Amphitheatre
16 - Oklahoma City, OK - Zoo Amphitheatre
18 - Bloomington, IL - Cellular Coliseum
19 - Milwaukee, WI - Eagles Ballroom
20 - Cadott, WI - Chippewa Valley Music Festival
22 - Winnipeg, MB - MTS Center
23 - Regina, SK - Brandt Centre
25 - Calgary, AB - Stampede Corral
26 - Edmonton, AB - Rexall Place
27 - Dawson Creek, BC - EnCana Events Centre
29 - Abbotsford, BC - Abbotsford Entertainment Center
30 - Everett, WA - Comcast Arena

August

1 - West Valley City, UT (SLC) - Maverik Center
2 - Denver, CO - 1st Bank Center
4 - Fargo, ND - Scheels Arena
6 - Manhattan, NY - Hammerstein Ballroom
7 - Manhattan, NY - Hammerstein Ballroom
9 - Camden, NJ - Susquehanna Bank Center
10 - Montreal, QC - Heavy Metal 2013
11 - Toronto, ON - Molson Canadian Amphitheatre

For more details visit Gigantour.com.