Megadeth will reissue their albums, The World Needs A Hero and The System Has Failed, today (February 15th) via BMG. Frontman Dave Mustaine recently spoke with Consequence Of Sound about the albums. Following is an excerpt from the interview.

Q: For The World Needs a Hero, you went for a heavier sound than the preceding four albums, and The System Has Failed is even thrashier. What was your headspace that you wanted to get heavy again?

Mustaine: "Well, it wasn’t that I’d ever thought about getting lighter. As a bandleader, domestic tranquility amongst the members is tantamount. There’s a joke among musicians that it’s one of “the four p’s” that’ll cause a band to break up: power, property, prestige, or p-ssy. Whenever we’ve had a problem with any of our alumni or people who’ve worked with us, there’s always been some kind of disagreement that’s led to it. With The World Needs a Hero, Marty (Friedman, lead guitarist) had just left. His body was there, but his soul was gone way before he actually left. He wanted to play different music. We’d gone to Japan and he’d fallen very much under a spell from the Japanese J-Pop bands. Cool, that’s Marty’s thing. He’s an amazing talent, and if he wants to listen to disco, that’s his trip. But it was hard to make Marty happy and make myself happy.

We were having incredible problems with (late drummer) Nick Menza, too, because of stuff that was going on between him and me. With respect to Nick, I’m not going to say anything bad about him, but we were fragmenting. (By the time) my arm got hurt in 2001, it gave me some time to really look at what I was doing and who I was playing with. And after Marty left, I figured, “You know what? I’m not happy playing stuff that’s slow. I love the fact that I’ve been one of the few metal bands that’s been able to incorporate real melodic music into the heaviness that we have, but there’s (also) twists and turns and tempo changes and all kinds of interesting things (in what we do).”

The last thing I said to Marty — before the door basically closed and his mind was made up — was when we were writing the song 'The Doctor Is Calling' (from 1999’s Risk), the riff goes nah-nah-nah nah-nahh, nah nah-nah-nah nah-nahh. I was trying to make a joke out of how Marty was saying, 'You need to slow the riff down.' So I was slowing it down, and I played that riff to show that, 'Okay, this is soooo slow!' (Laughs.) And he goes 'I love it!' And I thought, 'Aw, shit.' Marty was really impressed with Dishwalla’s song 'Counting Blue Cars'. I guess they got wind that I talked about this, which is cool; I liked the song, too and they had some cool chords. But alternative music was huge at the time, so we had to make a choice: do we go underground and stay metal, or do we try and survive and use what we have and compete against alternative and nu metal and all this other crap? I’m not saying alternative was crap, but nu metal was really hard to deal with — guys going out there and playing with no solos??! The solo is my favorite part of the song! (Laughs)."

Read the complete interview here.

The World Needs A Hero is the ninth studio album by Megadeth. Originally released in May 2001 the album was critically acclaimed as a return to a heavier musical direction for the band and charted at #16 in the Billboard 200 upon release. It received positive reviews across the music press and it gained comparison to the bands classic albums Rust In Peace and Countdown To Extinction.

- The full album has been newly remastered by Ted Jensen (Guns N' Roses, Mastodon, Trivium, Machine Head)
- Includes rare live bonus track "Coming Home" on the CD and digital versions
- Back on vinyl for the first time in 18 years
- CD has been out of print for 5 years

Tracklisting:

"Disconnect"
"The World Needs A Hero"
"Moto Psycho"
"1000 Times Goodbye"
"Burning Bridges"
"Promises"
"Recipe For Hate Warhorse"
"Losing My Sense"
"Dread And The Fugitive Mind"
"Silent Scorn"
"Return To Hangar"
"When"

CD Bonus Track
"Coming Home"

Megadeth released their tenth studio album, The System Has Failed, in September 2004. Following the direction set by its predecessor The World Needs A Hero, it headed further into the bands thrashier past and was a hit amongst fans and critics alike. Debuting at #18 on the Billboard charts, the album received positive reviews across the board stating it as vital and solid.

- The full album has been newly remastered by Ted Jensen (Guns N' Roses, Mastodon, Trivium, Machine Head)
- Includes rare live bonus tracks "Time/Use The Man" and "Conjuring" on the CD and digital versions
- CD has been out of print for 5 years

Tracklisting:

"Blackmail The Universe"
"Die Dead Enough"
"Kick The Chair"
"The Scorpion"
"Tears In A Vial"
"I Know Jack"
"Back In The Day"
"Something That I"m Not"
"Truth Be Told"
"Of Mice And Men"
"Shadow Of Deth"
"My Kingdom"

CD Bonus Track
"Time / Use The Man" (live)
"Conjuring" (live)