Dave Mustaine Vs. Kirk Hammett

[FraiserCrane]

Your pick?

[GreatWhiteSnake]

I enjoy Kirk's playing much, much more. And he seems far less douchey to boot...

[VinnieVincentsVag]

Mustaine.
Kirk has become the wah king

[Mojo]

Mustaine, hands down. Kirk has a few great solos, no question, but didn't even play his own rhythm parts on the first four albums, and again recently on Hardwired. James records his parts and Kirk comes in and plays stock pentatonic weedly weedly over it later. Dave has fucking killed it in both the rhythm and lead on every album he's put out, and has kept his chops up. Kirk has whole tours where it sounds like he's barely hanging on.

[Gibsonite]

After watching a couple of recent shows - Megadeth at Hellfest & Metallica at Werchter, it's a no-contest. Dave's playing was a sloppy, tuneless mess. Kirk, for all the shit he gets played rings around him.

[Sleek]

Dave 100%...but Kirk is way underrated. His soloing on those first 3 'tallica albums is awesome and really helped define the sound of thrash soloing...A little noodly, a little shreddy, a little atonal and not totally in control or overly musical.

[VoiVod13]

Dave all day long, not even a question.

[DangerZone]

After watching a couple of recent shows - Megadeth at Hellfest & Metallica at Werchter, it's a no-contest. Dave's playing was a sloppy, tuneless mess. Kirk, for all the shit he gets played rings around him.

I guess it’s Opposite Day around here

[Tommy2Tone84]

Kirk all day long. Dave is good though. Neither can hold Alex Skolnick’s guitar case.

[TenBenny]

There's no question that Mustaine has always been the better guitarist technically, and he's always been a great ripper, slashing away on his solos with creative flair pretty much from the start until the present. So he wins on the technical front and for consistency.

The Metallica albums through "Justice" had some incredibly memorable solos and melodic parts from Kirk. He really was dynamic and fantastic on those fronts. You can also hum many of his solos, fast or slow, less so with Mustaine. The Black Album also had some fine lead work but of a different variety from Metallica's thrash years. But no matter how much I like Kirk's playing on those early albums, he would lose this poll every time for essentially letting his skills stagnate for the next 30 years.

[DangerZone]

Kirk all day long. Dave is good though. Neither can hold Alex Skolnick’s guitar case.

I’ll never willingly listen to anything by Skolnick after those embarrassing rap videos he made

[Hellbound]

Kirk all day long. Dave is good though. Neither can hold Alex Skolnick’s guitar case.

I’ll never willingly listen to anything by Skolnick after those embarrassing rap videos he made

He almost lost me as a fan with those videos and its got nothing to do with politics because I am Australian and I am lucky to know what a polling booth is only because if I don't vote, I get fined and then I can't put my kangaroo into daycare.

Those videos gave me 2nd hand embarrassment.

[Hellbound]

I think Dave is more complete because obviously he could do it all in Megadeth. He comes up with GREAT riffs, good to great leads and is actually capable of being very melodic. You hear his more melodic parts in the 90s but a lot of people don't like those more commercial songs so your mileage will definitely vary.. However he nails a perfect blend of heavy, catchy and melodic on 99 Ways to Die. He also used a range of techniques especially in the 80s such as tapping, taped harmonics, whammy bar, fretting on the pickups. He was more chaotic, sloppy and more of a feel player but that is totally cool because his actual lead guitarist is a fucking monster.

Cool Dave Leads:

Peace Sells But Who's Buying
Every lead in Wake Up Dead except the Chris Poland one at 1:56. Also worth mentioning that pretty much every Chris Poland lead is an event in itself. Just an insanely unique and awesome player.
The Conjuring at 1:06. Unique melody and its pretty much straight 16ths. Love the tapped harmonics in the intro.
My Last Words at 3:24. The end is particular awesome with the repeating motif before hitting the gang vocal bit.

So Far...So Good...So What
In My Darkest Hour at 3:59 has a typical metal solo but it fits and the one Jeff Young does is even better, very different and weird. Good note choices.
Hook in Mouth has a cool (even if simple) tapped melody in 1:55

Rust in Peace
Holy Wars...The Punishment Due has a great Dave solo at 4:55. Its pretty much pentatonic blues
Five Magics at 4:56. Very melodic and ear catchy melody to start with. Love the unison bending at 5:20. However this song is absolutely the Marty show for leads but some of Dave's best riffs are here ESPECIALLY that riff he is soloing over at the end.

Countdown to Extinction
At 2:28 smooth use of the chromatic scale on Sweating Bullets. Like the ascending tritone end to the high E

Kirk may not record rhythms on anything except Load and Reload as far as I know but he still has to play them live and he keeps up with James and his bullshit downpicking ability. He also has come up with a lot of cool riffs including one of the best in thrash of all time. Damage Inc. at 3:15 which really comes alive after the solo at 4:40.

Except for his weedy vibrato, I love majority of Kirks leads on Kill 'Em All up to the Black album. After that he lost his way and just hasn't come up with any leads to rival his younger days and it all seemed to coincide with wanting to, ironically enough, improve his musicianship and delved deep into jazz and blues. It just didn't work for him.

I could definitely go on but people are probably scrolling past this shit anyway so in that case:

TL;DR: I wrote some stuff.

[Mojo]

99 Ways to Die

My favorite Megadeth song. I don't know why it's not a staple of their set.

[EddieVanHeineken]

Kirk did a lot of good work on RTL, MOP, and AJFA. It sounded like he was practicing and trying to do better with each album. After that, he just stopped growing.

When grunge hit and every guitarist started talking about playing with "feel", there were only a couple of guitar players from metal bands that those grunge guys accepted, that was Kirk and Dimebag. I always felt that Kirk took that to heart, stopped practicing, and focused on playing stale, wah wah drenched licks. Why practice for hours a day when you can just play some old Jimmy Page licks, make the same amount of money, and spend the rest of your time watching movies and smoking some green'?

[BDG135]

Dave is a better rhythm player and songwriter.
Kirk is a better lead player.

[Lobo]

Has Kirk done a single solo since the Black album that didn't involve a wah pedal?

I'm surprised Jame and Lars didn't put a stop to that years ago.

[Tommy2Tone84]

Kirk all day long. Dave is good though. Neither can hold Alex Skolnick’s guitar case.

I’ll never willingly listen to anything by Skolnick after those embarrassing rap videos he made

I haven’t heard nor seen those. I only have heard his jazz albums and know he got his Ph.d in music

[Tommy2Tone84]

Kirk did a lot of good work on RTL, MOP, and AJFA. It sounded like he was practicing and trying to do better with each album. After that, he just stopped growing.

When grunge hit and every guitarist started talking about playing with "feel", there were only a couple of guitar players from metal bands that those grunge guys accepted, that was Kirk and Dimebag. I always felt that Kirk took that to heart, stopped practicing, and focused on playing stale, wah wah drenched licks. Why practice for hours a day when you can just play some old Jimmy Page licks, make the same amount of money, and spend the rest of your time watching movies and smoking some green'?

Kirk plays his balls off on KEA and I’ve heard the Kirk vs Dave tracks side by side. Kirk’s leads are a big improvement imo.

[jens]

Cool Dave Leads:

This was fun, do more!

[Shredderpete]

Not entirely sure Kirk has the kind of focus to do this kind of thing. Dave gave this a really decent stab.

https://youtu.be/TV9DOcoqD0g?si=ouHBGQC_klux5ieN

[LurkingAtWork]

Anyone choosing Kirk has never picked up a guitar. Jesus.

[HueyRamone]

Has Kirk done a single solo since the Black album that didn't involve a wah pedal?

I'm surprised Jame and Lars didn't put a stop to that years ago.

Right. Mr trash can lid snare and Mr “I am the table” should have realized it was a bad idea.

[SW]

Anyone choosing Kirk has never picked up a guitar. Jesus.

I pretty much never had. And voted solely on persona.

Kirk = always cool, Dave = miserable cunt

[GreatWhiteSnake]

Anyone choosing Kirk has never picked up a guitar. Jesus.

Been playing for 38 year. Never liked Mustaine. His massive douchiness probably has something to do with it but the solo in Unforgiven is better than everything Dave ever did. Perfectly constructed...

[tooth]

One created a genre while the other can't even dial in a decent tone, nor take his foot off the wah.

[GoodJudge]

ITL;DR: I wrote some stuff.

I read it all and it made me want to listen to every song at the point you indicated. Unfortunately I'm still at work so it isn't an option right now. Even if, as I'm not a guitarist, I don't get all the references.

I prefer Metallica as a band and Kirk has made some timeless contributions, and although it's a cliche it's also true that Megadave is boring live (have seen him enough times to know), plus both bands have released enough duds over the years, but overall I've got to vote for Dave.

[Engine13]

Mustaine's playing has always been next level.
Even more impressive is the fact he can sing over some of those riffs.
If I was having a BBQ, I'd invite Kirk tho.

[dmbrocker]

Both solid, IMO, but I lean more toward Mustaine and his killer solos.

[whiteowl yesterday]

kirk