Do You Remember Dave Mustaine's '90s Side Project With a Punk Legend? (He Wasn't the Singer Initially!)

While Dave Mustaine is primarily known for Megadeth (and that period early in his career with Metallica), do you remember that he once spun off a side project in the '90s?

That's right! Back in 1996, Mustaine put together a side band called MD.45 with a legendary punk singer taking on vocals while Dave primarily handled guitar (initially, but more on that later).

Who Were MD.45?

MD.45 were an all-star collective. Dave Mustaine was on guitar and as the band name just featured his initials reversed, he had a big hand in everything. He was joined by the legendary FEAR frontman Lee Ving, who handled vocals and harmonica. The "45" in the band name comes from Ving as his backwards initials (VL) were converted to Roman numerals (45).

The rhythm section featured bassist Kelly LeMieux, who played in Goldfinger and later joined Ving in FEAR after the MD.45 album, as well as drummer Jimmy DeGrasso, who had made his name playing for Lita Ford, Y&T, Ozzy Osbourne, White Lion and Suicidal Tendencies prior to MD.45. His time in the band also overlapped a period where he was handling drums in Alice Cooper's band as well.

How Did MD.45 Form?

In the aftermath of a lengthy tour in support of the Youthanasia album, Megadeth took some time off and nearly split up. Mustaine had started coming up with ideas for new Megadeth music, but the other band members weren't ready to move forward just yet. With the band in a state of flux, he decided to explore his love of punk a bit more and put MD.45 together with Ving.

The group worked quickly and turned around their lone studio album, The Craving, in 1996. Some of the material had initially been targeted toward Megadeth, but was now put into play with MD.45 while Nick Menza and Marty Friedman took time for outside projects.

The superstar pairing yielded 11 songs that made the initial track listing. But the record, issued by Capitol Records subsidiary, Slab Records, failed to chart.

MD.45 did not tour in support of the album and eventually tensions in Megadeth subsided allowing Mustaine to resume work with his primary band on a new record in the fall of '96, just a short time after The Craving was issued.

Was There Controversy With MD.45?

MD.45's The Craving appears to be one of those albums that got a little lost in the shuffle at the moment it was issued. Despite the superstar pedigree, it didn't seem to find its audience.

But in 2004, Mustaine decided to give the record a second chance by releasing a remastered version. However, there was one noticeable difference as Ving's vocals and harmonica were removed from the recordings in favor of Mustaine now taking lead singing on the material.

In Mustaine's 2011 autobiography, Mustaine: A Heavy Metal Memoir, he explained of the decision that he felt with hm taking lead that it might "entice interest from Megadeth fans who might have overlooked the original."

Ving claimed on The 80ids podcast (as shared by Metal Injection) that he was not consulted on the reissue and that his exclusion came "without any notification or preparation." He voiced his frustration at the time over not knowing how to contact Mustaine to discuss how to approach speaking about the move that caught him unprepared.

But it appears as though the two musicians whose reversed initials made up the band moniker did eventually find a common ground. Ving turned up during a 2023 Megadeth show where he performing MD.45's "Nothing Is Something" with Mustaine's Megadeth band in Tampa, Florida (as seen in fan footage below).

Megadeth Featuring Lee Ving Perform MD.45's "Nothing Is Something" in 2023

What Did the Original MD.45 Sound Like?

The Craving album is an interesting footnote in Mustaine's history as it allowed him the freedom to dig into something more punk influenced without the Megadeth construct.

"Hell's Hotel" bristles with energy, "The Creed" lets the rhythm section swing and songs such as "Nothing Is Something" and "Day the Music Died" stand out among the record's bright spots.

Both the original version with Lee Ving and the Mustaine-led remaster probably deserved a bigger spotlight than they received at the time. As it stands, this is more of a footnote in Mustaine's history that has largely gone overlooked. But it also shows the well-rounded musician that Mustaine can be and is worth digging into for fans of Mustaine's work who might have previously missed it.