Former Megadeth guitarist, Chris Poland, has been looking into reissuing most of his recorded output, with plans in place to issue both works by The New Yorkers, and his 1990 solo effort Return To Metalopolis already in place. Chris divulged the information in a brand new inteview with eonmusic about his Nuclear Messiah project.
On the early days with Megadeth: “When Gar [Samuelson] joined the band, the way he explained it to me was, ‘it’s super intricate. it’s really fun to play. It’s just like what we’re doing, just super heavy and distorted and fast,’ and it didn’t matter; wherever Gar went, I was going to follow, because I had been playing with Gar my whole life, and I just wanted to be in the band with him. I really liked playing with Dave [Mustaine] and [David] Ellefson. That was the first introduction anybody had to that music, because Dave had invented a new thing with those records and I just tried to keep up, man!”
On the photo shoot for the Peace Sells… But Who’s Buying? album artwork: “The photo session was very bizarre because they put makeup on all of us, and we had an interview, like, an hour after that photo shoot at Capitol Records, and I forgot to go wash my face. I just forgot, and so they’re interviewing, and I saw the interview somewhere, and first of all, I cringe [shakes head]. Anyway, back in those days, I was a young and dumb, but anyway, I’m looking, oh, my god, I’ve got eyeliner on! Man! But, I mean, we didn’t know what, you know, they’re telling us what we’re going to do, and we were like, ‘okay, we’ll do it!’ The gas flames in front of us, we were all kind of like, ‘really, you’re going to have that?!,’ because that’s real; that’s real flames for the photos. Man, they lit that shit! A very strange day.
On suing Megadeth in the early 2000s: “You know, I swear to God, I called at least twelve times trying to get the manager to get on the phone with me. And then when he told me that he thought I would do it for the fans, and I said, ‘well, is everybody else doing it for the fans? I just want to get paid for my tracks, man,’ and here’s what he said, he goes, ‘Chris, that’s not the point.’ Okay, all right. The manager was so rude to me that that I just called Owen Sloan, my attorney, and I said, ‘you know what, Owen?,’ and even he told me, ‘dude, you sure you want to do this?’ I’m like, ‘I just want to do it out of principle.’”
Finally, on reissuing his back catalogue: “They’re releasing New Yorkers on vinyl, and there’s just all kinds of stuff. A year and a half ago, Randy Burns calls me up, and he goes, ‘hey, do you have the two inch tapes from the ‘Metalopolis’ sessions?,’ and I said, ‘yeah, I kept it in a good environment this whole time.’ He goes, ‘here’s some money. Go to this address, have them take the tapes. They’re going to bake the tapes. They’re going to send it to me digitally, and I’m going remix and remaster it,’ and wait till you hear it, man! It’s kind of on hold but that record is going to be so killer, man. I told Randy, ‘I don’t want it to sound like the first time it came out. I want to do stuff to it. I want to make it something entirely cool and different; same songs, but better.’”
Read the entire interview at eonmusic.co.uk.
Nuclear Messiah – spearheaded by Chris Poland – have released their thunderous, all-star concept album, Black Flame, via Cleopatra Records.
Built around the visionary guitar mastery of Chris Poland, the legendary former Megadeth guitarist whose emotive phrasing and fusion-driven technique helped redefine modern metal, Black Flame is a sonic prophecy uniting 36 of the most iconic musicians in rock and metal history across five decades.
Produced by Brian Perera, Derek Hughes, and Jürgen Engler for Cleopatra Records with a commanding spoken introduction to the album by William Shatner, Black Flame is an apocalyptic, cinematic, sonic album uniting a staggering line-up of 36 of the most iconic musicians in rock and metal history. Representing every era of heavy music, and uniting icons from thrash, classic rock, hard rock, and progressive metal, the appearances include:
Chris Poland, Marty Friedman, David Ellefson, Glen Drover, Shawn Drover, Chris Adler (Lamb of God, Megadeth), Ron “Bumblefoot” Thal (Guns N’ Roses, Sons of Apollo), Mick Box (Uriah Heep), Joel Hoekstra(Whitesnake, Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Night Ranger), Carmine Appice (Vanilla Fudge, Jeff Beck, Bogert & Appice, King Kobra), Vinny Appice (Dio, Black Sabbath, Heaven & Hell), Simon Wright (AC/DC, Dio), Don Airey (Deep Purple, Rainbow, Ozzy Osbourne), Rick Wakeman (Yes), Jonathan Cain (Journey, The Babys), Derek Sherinian (Dream Theater, Sons of Apollo, Black Country Communion), Bob Daisley (Ozzy Osbourne, Rainbow, Gary Moore, Uriah Heep), Phil Soussan (Ozzy Osbourne, Billy Idol, Last in Line), Alan Davey (Hawkwind), Vinnie Moore (UFO, Alice Cooper), Joe Bouchard (Blue Öyster Cult), Tim “Ripper” Owens (Judas Priest, Iced Earth, Yngwie Malmsteen), Joe Lynn Turner (Rainbow, Deep Purple, Yngwie Malmsteen), Sebastian Bach (Skid Row), Andrew Freeman (Last in Line, Lynch Mob), Marc Lopes (Ross the Boss, Metal Church, Let Us Prey), Pat Travers (Pat Travers Band), Ronnie Romero (Rainbow, Michael Schenker Group, Lords of Black), Arthur Brown (The Crazy World of Arthur Brown, Kingdom Come), Lance Lopez (Supersonic Blues Machine, Billy Gibbons), Greg T. Walker (Blackfoot, Lynyrd Skynyrd family), Steve DiGiorgio (Testament, Death, Sadus), Thor (Thor), Fred Aching (Dead Groove, Kings of Thrash, BulletBoys, Powerflo, BillyBio), and Jürgen Engler (Die Krupps).
This staggering lineup represents every era of heavy music, from Vanilla Fudge to the Kings of Thrash, via Guns N’ Roses, Uriah Heep, Whitesnake, Black Sabbath, UFO, Rainbow, Ozzy Osbourne, Alice Cooper, Judas Priest, Deep Purple, Yngwie Malmsteen, Thor, Testament, Night Ranger, the Michael Schenker Group, Yes and more.
Eye-opening covers, too, will be ripping open your ears – Lucifer’s Friend, May Blitz, NWOBHM heroes Holocaust and the immortal Uriah Heep, and, while the remainder of the album is all new material, each song composed by the line-up that performs on it, reflecting, too, upon the history of hard rock, prog and metal – a living timeline of rock and metal, from the pioneers of the past to the trailblazers of today.
It’s more than a collaboration. It’s a metal summit, the multi-generational union of the artists who shaped the evolution of heavy music itself.
Order Black Flame on CD/Vinyl, and Digital.
Tracklisting:
“The Prophet Of Fallout”
“Devil Won’t Let Go”
“Death Or Glory”
“Ride The Sky”
“Dice And Thunder”
“For Mad Men Only”
“Nuclear Messiah”
“Look At Yourself”
“She’s So Evil”
“Black Flame”
“Electric Burn”
“Look At Yourself” video:
“Devil Won’t Let Go” lyric video:
“The Prophet Of Fallout” video:
“Nuclear Messiah” lyric video:
“Death Or Glory” lyric video:
“For Mad Men Only” video:
“She’s So Evil” lyric video:
“Electric Burn” video:
“Black Flame” video:
“Ride The Sky” video:
“Dice And Thunder”
Out now “Stoned Babies” the first single from VOICES OF EXTREME on BraveWords Records full album coming in 2026.
Iridium Rock and Metal Reviews reviewed Stoned Babies the first single from Voices of Extreme saying “I love everything about it… Can’t wait to hear more from them… Fucking brilliant… Beautiful song.”.
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