Hear Megadeth Recruit Ice-T for Blistering ‘Night Stalkers’
Megadeth has recruited Ice-T for their blistering new song "Night Stalkers," the second single off their upcoming 16th album The Sick ... the Dying ... and the Dead!
You can listen to the song and watch the video below.
"Night Stalkers" opens with Dave Mustaine's menacing vocal and a characteristically breakneck guitar riff. Once the drums come crashing in, the song goes full-throttle thrash, with guitarist Kiko Loureiro supplying several dizzying solos. The onslaught is briefly punctuated by an acoustic guitar and orchestral passage around the four-and-a-half-minute mark, but the song resumes its pulverizing tempo after about 30 seconds.
Mustaine previously told guitar.com that "Night Stalkers" "is about the 160th Battalion with the U.S. Army, and it's all the black-ops helicopters that go in at night, nobody knows they're there, they're in, they're out." Ice-T delivers a thematically appropriate spoken-word passage halfway through the song.
"Yo, when you hear four MH-47 and Black Hawk helicopters coming in low in the dark of night, loaded with Rangers and Delta Force Special-Ops shooters locked and loaded — game's over, bitches," the rapper and Body Count frontman barks.
Fans got their first taste of The Sick ... the Dying ... and the Dead! last month with lead single "We'll Be Back." The videos for both singles function as the first two chapters of a short-film trilogy that tells the origin story of the band's mascot, Vic Rattlehead. The "Night Stalkers" video shows Vic's transformation from a husband, father and soldier into an almost Darth Vader-esque monstrosity who exacts revenge on his enemies as he's haunted by memories from his past.
Megadeth will release The Sick ... the Dying ... and the Dead! on Sept. 2. They'll launch the Killing Road tour with Five Finger Death Punch on Aug. 19 in Ridgefield, Wash., and will wrap on Oct. 1 in Noblesville, Ind. Bassist James LoMenzo will accompany the band on the road as he's done since last year, following the dismissal of David Ellefson, whose sexually graphic exchanges with a female fan were leaked.
"Let me just say this — it was a hard decision that had to be made," Mustaine told Metal Hammer of Ellefson's dismissal. "There were a lot of people involved and I had to make a decision, because unfortunately when you're the leader, you're the one that has to suck it up and face the music. ... I've forgiven him before when he sued me and I'll forgive him a thousand times. I just won't play music with him anymore."