The Sick, the Dying... and the Dead!

In the year 2022, the legendary Dave Mustaine of Megadeth fame has graced us with a new musical output. After the band's latest release, the hopes for its successor were high and the wait couldn't seem to end. You could say that the wait has paid off..., but has it really?

The title track that opens the album sets the tone for its brightest moments. Megadeth's songwriting on this record tends to be more unpredictable and ambitious when compared to a couple of the preceding albums. Songs like The Sick, the Dying... and the Dead, Dogs of Chernobyl, Nighstalkers, and We'll Be Back are a display of Mustaine's unceasing creativity. Musically varied, consisting of frequent and far from obvious transitions outweigh some of the questionable choices that were made during the writing process (like the abysmal passage in Nightstalkers featuring Ice-T). There are some typical post-2000s Megadeth songs on here, like Soldier On! or Killing Time, which, despite not bringing anything new to the table, still prove to be earworms that, once settled comfortably in your brain, refuse to leave, making you hum their choruses and melodies.

While the album deserves praise for bold choices in its songwriting, it also deserves to catch some flak for the exact opposite of that - laziness. Tracks like Life in Hell or Junkie bend under their own weight. Almost as generic as their titles are, the songs also wear the listener out by being needlessly repetitive. One song deserves to be mentioned separately – Sacrifice features one of the most awkward vocal performances in Megadeth's history and buries the interesting instrumental beneath the shitshow we are presented with. Also worth mentioning is the track Mission to Mars, which, despite being pretentious (I wanna be an astronaut) and much too radio-friendly, has some replay value due to it being as silly as it is.

Overall, it’s a solid release and a nice statement – yes, the old Mustaine still has it. He is creative and capable of writing aggressive and fast songs that can haunt you for days on end. It is dragged down by a batch of questionable choices and some of the most unremarkable tracks in the band’s catalogue, but it leaves us, Megadeth fans, with a promise - they'll be back and hopefully without the flaws that can be found here.