founded by Dave Mustaine after he was kicked out of Metallica, the core members have been Mustaine (guitar, vocals) and Dave Ellefson (bass), joined by a string of session musicians for the first three albums. with their fourth album, 1990's "Rust in Peace", they got off the drugs and recruited Marty Friedman (guitar) and Nick Menza (drums) and managed to keep this stable line-up for three more albums.

In 2002 Megadeth split up after Mustaine sustained an injury to his arm. He says in interviews he was sick of the rest of the band anyway, even founding member Ellefson.

When his injury was healed he recorded a solo album, however due to contractual obligations with his record company, it had to be a Megadeth album, 2004's "The System has Failed"