A higher power — Reunited Megadeth finds God to their liking

• Reprints

Megadeth. | TRAVIS SHINN PHOTO

Updated: February 10, 2012 8:10PM

After the decades of substance abuse, fights, injuries, pathologies, legal hassles, breakups, floods, plagues of locusts — it’s a miracle the members of Megadeth are still able to stand, much less tour and record.

Small wonder they pray together backstage. Twice before each show, in fact.

“We haven’t had bad stuff happen to us for a long time, but it used to be commonplace,” says Dave Mustaine, the veteran heavy metal band’s singer-guitarist and unmovable founding member. “We all — well, not Chris [Broderick, guitarist] — but we all enjoy praying before we go on stage. Our schedule is down to a routine. An hour before stage everybody has to leave [the dressing rooms] except family. Thirty minutes before, family has to leave. That’s when me, Shawn [Drover, drummer] and Dave [Ellefson, founding bassist] do our first prayers. Ten minutes before stage, we then do a big group prayer. That’s really grounding.”

This is a band with a legendary and punishing hard rock sound, visuals that often include a demonic, skeletal form reaching out to grab viewers, and cynical album titles — the breakthrough “Rust in Peace” in 1990, the multi-platinum “Countdown to Extinction” after that, “The System Has Failed,” “United Abominations,” etc. — that aren’t exactly chapter and verse.

“Yeah, a lot of eyebrows go up when I say, ‘Let’s pray,’” Mustaine says. “Some people who work for us probably thought there would be decadence, a lot of terrible things going on. They probably think there’s going to be a goat in the middle of the prayer circle.”

Such activities are ordained — literally — now that Ellefson is back in the band. He’s currently a student at Concordia Seminary, studying to be a pastor in the Lutheran Church. His emails are signed, “Vicar Dave.”

That in itself is a miracle, given that in 2004 — two years after Mustaine had folded the band — Ellefson sued Mustaine for $18.5 million, claiming he’d been short-changed on profits. Court documents claimed Mustaine, who’s been in drug rehab at least a dozen times, resented Ellefson for having kicked his own habit. Before long, the two were arguing publicly online, and Mustaine reformed the band with other players.

The suit was dismissed a year later, just as the new Megadeth was launching its first Gigantour — an ambitious package concert supported by Dream Theater, Anthrax, Fear Factory and six other bands. Megadeth organized and headlined three more Gigantours in ’06, ’07 and ’08.

After that, some fence-mending was in order.

“I flew out to Phoenix, and Dave and I met for dinner,” Mustaine says, recalling the reconciliation with his founding bassist. “We sat down like the two old friends I always said we were. I said, ‘I forgive you.’ It looked like a 10-pound weight came off his back. He said, ‘It was the dumbest thing I’ve ever done.’ If you really love someone, you love them when they’re up and when they’re down. I’ve always cared for David.”

The partnership revived, a new album was recorded, “Th1rte3n” — nominated for a Grammy at the Feb. 12 ceremonies — and the Gigantour was reborn, this year featuring metal legends Motorhead, plus VolBeat and Lacuna Coil.

“It’s not that I decided to bring it back,” Mustaine says of the package tour, “it’s that I decided not to do it the last few years because there wasn’t a good-enough second band available. … We’ve toured with Motorhead before and did dates with them a long time ago when we were just babies. We’ve been friends, and we can definitely stand up against each other.”

Can I get an amen?

“I know, people might be surprised, but I have no problem with God,” Mustaine continues, chuckling. “The first line of ‘Peace Sells’ is, ‘What do you mean I don’t believe in God / Talk to him every day.’ I’ve confessed my faith pretty openly. ‘Looking Down the Cross’ is all about Jesus. I’m not afraid to talk about it. We talk about the dark side of stuff, but it’s accented because of my knowledge of the light.”