John Katic of GuitarWorld.com recently conducted an interview with Megadeth bassist David Ellefson about David‘s new book, Unsung: Words And Images, featuring never-before-published original lyrics and images. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.
GuitarWorld.com: You recently released a self-published book, Unsung: Words And Images. Can you tell us what inspired the project and how it got started?
Ellefson: I have a lot of lyrics from just the past few months, ideas that were really good, but I wasn’t necessarily inspired to go through the process of writing music around them all. Setting the lyrics to photo images opened up a whole new realm of creativity with these words and didn’t confine me to having to edit ideas to fit into a specific musical genre, either.
GuitarWorld.com: Were the works in the book written specifically for the book?
Ellefson: Much like when you compile a musical album, the lyrics started to shape the book very naturally. Once I realized the potential, I had to not be locked into writing only genre-specific lyrics, other ideas started to flow effortlessly. Pieces like Sweet Affections, Goddess Divine and even The Cycle really helped round out the book and give it some unique emotion and variety that I may not have been able to put on a musical album with many of the same lyrics.
GuitarWorld.com: The photos used in with each piece — were they take with a piece in mind or did you look through photos to find what fit your vision?
Ellefson: I was really blessed to find a fantastic creative team to help me put this book together. Raffaella is a photographic artist and, as a result, she has so many great photos we were able to utilize. Her specialty is taking random, thought-provoking photos of various subjects, much the same way I create thought through lyric ideas. Bringing our creative works together with mine was a really unique way to co-create with our respective mediums.
Read the entire interview from GuitarWorld.com.
Unsung is available now for purchase through Blurb.com in a deluxe hardcover “Gift” edition, softcover high-gloss version and instant downloadable version through the iBooks app for iPad and iPhone.
For more information, visit DavidEllefson.com.
Related articles:
‘Megadeth’s’ ‘David Ellefson’ Is Studying to Become a Pastor [Jan. 2012]
‘David Ellefson’: ‘Dave Mustaine’ And I Study Scripture Together [Feb. 2012]
Megadeth – Th1rt3en [CD review]
‘Megadeth’ & ‘Rob Zombie’ Announce Co-Headlining Tour [Feb. 2012]
‘David Ellefson’ ‘There Are A Lot Of Artists Who Are Very Open About Their Faith’ [March 2012]