Australia's Metal Obsession recently spoke with MEGADETH drummer Shawn Drover. An excerpt from the interview is available below:

MO: You must be quite pleased the new album, TH1RT3EN, is finished and ready to be released onto the world?

Drover: "Yeah man! We’re pretty psyched about the record. I think it turned out very well. We recorded it in record timing…nine weeks! I mean that was a very short period of time, but the funny thing was everything went so smoothly and so easily that we got it done without any effort. [laughs] I mean it wasn’t like we were thinking 'Oh my god! Will never get this done.' It just seemed very painless and a very enjoyable process for us to do this record. I personally think it turned out great. We are really excited about doing a world tour for TH1RT3EN and support it as much as possible. We can’t wait for the fans to hear it!"

MO: As this is Megadeth’s thirteenth album. Were there any bizarre moments throughout the recording process due to the superstitious nature of the number thirteen?

Drover: "It’s funny. I did my drums on the record first, so I was there for about two and half, three weeks. Nothing weird happened with reference to the number thirteen, but after I left that’s when this whole weird thing started to happen. The funny thing was the title of the record, the working title was Thirteen, until we came up with something else because this is our thirteenth record, you know what I mean? It was just a working title at the time but after I left, Dave started to see all this stuff and it all had to do with the number thirteen. None of it was really that bad, just odd coincidences and just odd things happening with the number thirteen. Dave then started to say 'Why don’t we just call the new record Thirteen' and we all thought 'Yeah! That would be a cool idea.' There were a couple of bizarre things which happened in the studio with the number thirteen and I guess Dave just kinda went with it."

MO: Do you ever feel anxious or threatened by certain fan reactions whenever releasing new material?

Drover: "No, not at all! Because I know its a good record and at the end of the day you can’t…first of all you can’t please everyone, secondly I wouldn’t want to please everyone because that would be boring. I mean we have our fans who are fantastic. We have a fantastic fan base. Ultimately though some people will say 'Oh! It’s not as heavy as Killing Is My Business,' or not as fast as that song or this song. That’s just the way people react and then they’ll go post it on the internet somewhere and be all pissed off. I don’t worry about that kind of thing because there are so many fans who we have, who appreciate us and don’t go out of their way and do all those silly things. If anything, they go out of their way to contact us and tell us how much they love our music.

Like what we were talking about before, I choose to kinda go with the positives rather than the people who bitch about everything and say 'It's not this and it's not that...' The people who want us to sound like we did in the past. For us, you can’t live the past. I mean, we all respect what we have done in the past and it's all fine and dandy. But ultimately for us we want to keep moving forward and keep writing music. We celebrate our past but we want to move forward as well."

Go to this location for the complete interview.

Megadeth will release TH1RT3EN on October 26th in Japan and on November 1st in North America. The tracklisting is as follows:

'Sudden Death'

'Public Enemy No. 1'

'Whose Life (Is It Anyways?)'

'We The People'

'Guns, Drugs & Money'

'Never Dead'

'New World Order'

'Fast Lane'

'Black Swan'

'Wrecker'

'Millennium Of The Blind'

'Deadly Nightshade'

'13'

In live news, Megadeth's South American/Latin American tour kicks off on November 9th in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Dates include:

November

9 - Buenos Aires, Argentina - Estadio Cubierto Malvinas
10 - Buenos Aires, Argentina - Estadio Cubierto Malvinas
12 - Santiago, Chile - Maquinaria Festival, Club Hipico
14 - Sao Paulo, Brazil - SWU Music & Arts Festival
16 - Mexico City, Mexico - Jose Cuervo Salon
17 - Mexico City, Mexico - Jose Cuervo Salon
19 - Guadalajara, Mexico - H&H; Metal Fest, Calle 2
20 - Monterrey, Mexico - Banamex Auditorium
23 - Bogota, Colombia - Coliseo El Campin
25 - La Paz, Bolivia - Estadio Rafael Mendoza Castellon
27 - Asuncion, Paraguay - Live Ace Arena

December

1 - Heredia, Costa Rica - Rosabal Cordero Stadium