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

Some mythic thrash bands are still around in the 2020s. Some of them already released their first effort of the decade (Destruction, Kreator, etc). Megadeth joined the party with The Sick, The Dying and The Dead. 6 years earlier, they made a good thrashy comeback with Dystopia, but the magic faded with this new confort-zoned album. Without being completely awful, nothing is really memorable.

At the roots, it is a quite consistent thrash metal effort. It’s fast (too fast ?), heavy and experimenting new ideas without sacrificing the elements that caracterizes the band. Sacrifice and We’ll Be Back are the most standard thrash metal tracks you will find on this album. The first is very straightforward but generically forgettable, the latter is quite fast and rehashing some 80s thrash elements. It is the kind of it-looks-like-a-80s-track-I-like-from-the-band kind of song. One would even say it’s a medley of Good Mourning...Black Friday and Metallica’s Disposable Heroes played in a D-standard tuning. Despite their flow being a little bit cut by acoustic or/and rap interludes, the title track and Night Stalkers are agressive headbanging songs with a great ‘Deth vibe while incorporating fresh ideas. The ABABC song structure often found in Megadeth still works well here : Dogs of Chernobyl and Celebutante are good examples. Nothing special to say neither about the two bonus cover songs at the end. Quite enjoyable and this Sammy Hagar guy has a voice that could suit perfectly well in Megadeth.

For a reason, because vocals and lyrics are the biggest flaws on this album. Dave Mustaine is out of breath, he just cannot do it anymore and he will have to humbly prepare for a replacement on the mics. We all know he’s not a good vocalist at the start, but since Dystopia he struggles more and more. Despite this, he still tries to give us catchy phrases with mixed results. Lyrically, he also seems out of fresh ideas and bringing back those cliché themes. Celebutante sounds like a song written by Espace The Fate with its cringy depiction of a person obsessed by fame. A bunch of cheesy war songs are also included on the package deal and what about quotes like ‘’I wanna be an astronaut’’ ? Ouffff.....

Musically, it is still good, but less memorable than Dystopia in the guitar/bass department. There are more riffs relying on open string rythmic patterns and the solos, while still being technical, are easily forgettable in most cases. Sad to say this about Megadeth. On The Sick, it is not completly awful, but it sounds a bit recycled. On drums, it’s much better than the Drover-era and a continuation of the great Adler’s work on Dystopia.

A review like this make it clear, there are no Rust In Peace/Peace Sells kind to see around here. Instaid, The Sick, The Dying and The Dead is ranging among their most recent thrash albums : would return to listen to it, but would really like to have the possibility (and talent) to re-record it to correct its flaws.