In a new interview with Finland's Radio City conducted at this weekend's Tuska festival in Helsinki, MEGADETH leader Dave Mustaine spoke about the band's latest addition, Finnish-born guitarist Teemu Mäntysaari, who officially joined the group in September 2023 following the departure of Kiko Loureiro.

Mustaine said “Yeah, I'm excited.

I'm really excited for Teemu because he's never played here [at Tuska] with us.

And Teemu is a national treasure here — the first Finnish man to ever have a Number One record in America.

So I get a lot of pleasure out of seeing him have success.

” Reflecting on what it was like for him to initially play alongside Teemu, Dave said: “Well, he was very, very shy when we first hired him, because you go from being in a smaller band into a bigger band, obviously there's gonna be a little bit of an adapting period.

But MEGADETH is not a little bigger band — it's a lot fucking bigger.” Mustaine praised Teemu's guitar playing skills, stating that he plays a lot like Marty Friedman and that the new album “Megadeth” has over 40 solos on it.

The album was Number One in 11 countries, making it a great success for the band.