DAVE LOMBARDO Says There Are 'Rumors' Of A SLAYER/MEGADETH U.S. Tour

Bob Suehs of Rock N Roll Experience conducted a short interview with SLAYER drummer Dave Lombardo at the Camden, New Jersey stop of this year's Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival on August 7, 2009. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

Rock N Roll Experience: With a lot of the '80s hair bands, you see a situation where they have one or two original members still in the band and the rest are "new" members. If one of the core members of SLAYER were no longer in the band, would the band carry on?

Dave Lombardo: Well, that's really hard to say. Obviously, if it's Tom [Araya, bass/vocals], I think it would be very difficult and maybe the easiest position to fill for them was when I left; they just got another drummer and continued. But I don't see it quite that easy, maybe, with getting another member in SLAYER. I mean, you can't replace Tom — Tom is Tom, the sound of his vocals... and the guitar playing is the same way. You could probably find some guitar player that could mimic what Jeff [Hanneman] plays, or what Kerry [King] plays, but it wouldn't have their soul or their spirit in the way that they play, so you could copy it, but you can't really duplicate their performance.

Rock N Roll Experience: I actually saw the Clash of the Titans tour years ago with SLAYER, ALICE IN CHAINS, MEGADETH and ANTHRAX. Would you ever consider doing a Clash of the Titans reunion tour with the same billing?

Dave Lombardo: Maybe not with that lineup, but there are rumors going around that we might be doing something in the States with [Dave] Mustaine... with MEGADETH.

Rock N Roll Experience: So is the feud totally patched up now? Because there was a feud [between] Kerry and Dave Mustaine.

Dave Lombardo: You know, there was, but I don't really think there's anything going on right now, because we did, like, four shows with MEGADETH up in Canada and Kerry didn't come across Mustaine at all, so I guess everything is OK.

Rock N Roll Experience: So when you left SLAYER, did you get the same satisfaction in your music that you did with SLAYER?

Dave Lombardo: Absolutely! Yeah, I loved doing the stuff with Mike Patton, I loved doing the all the avant-garde music that I did and the jazz stuff, the classical stuff, some of the movies that I did, but that doesn't stop... things are continuing. Right now I am in the process of closing a deal to put some drums down on a skateboard video for Volcom Entertainment, for Geoff Roley; he's like a famous skateboarder, so it's really exciting. There's a movie that I'm gonna do soundtrack stuff for when I get back home... rhythmic, tribal kinda shit.

Rock N Roll Experience: So would you ever do a Dave Lombardo solo record?

Dave Lombardo: Yes. It would be very avant-garde, very left-field, very strange, very weird and it would revolve around drums alone and rhythms and maybe moods and textures, but everything involving drums. I mean, it's in the works — I am working on it — but I don't know when I'm gonna release it... hopefully by 2010. Who knows?

Read the entire interview from Rock N Roll Experience (scroll down to bottom of the page).