Dave Mustaine has confirmed to Guitar World magazine that MEGADETH is working on material for the follow-up to 2016's "Dystopia" album. "We have been for a few weeks now," he said. "All the bandmembers are at home writing stuff and putting it in the same spot, keeping all the riffs centralized in one place. And anybody can access anybody's stuff. And then once we're done, I'll start assembling everything."

Asked if that means we will see new MEGADETH music in 2019, Mustaine responded: "Absolutely. For sure. A whole new record, I would say the chances are probably 95 percent. And at least one new song, I'd say it's 100 percent. No question."

MEGADETH's upcoming effort will mark the group's first release to feature drummer Dirk Verbeuren, who officially joined the band more than two years ago.

Dave told "Rock Talk With Mitch Lafon" back in June that some of the new MEGADETH music is turning out to be more extreme than anything the band has done in the past. "The stuff that Dirk's been playing along to it is scary," he said. "We've never had any of those blast-beat kind of things on our music before, and some of the drumming on this is so mind-blowing. It's making me a better guitar player again, which I love. But I never thought we were gonna be playing this fast or this aggressive again."

Mustaine also revealed that the release of the band's next album would coincide with the launch of a new MEGADETH-curated event, to be held in at least two separate installments over the course of several months. "We've got a huge festival that we're gonna be announcing," he said. "It's really a big deal. It's kind of the equivalent of Gigantour, but it's a much fresher idea. We've got that set up in about 10 cities in April, and then we're gonna do it again for a three-day weekend in the middle of the year, and we're gonna do probably about another 10 of those dates at the latter part of the year."

"Dystopia" was MEGADETH's first album with guitarist Kiko Loureiro, who was previously best known for his work with ANGRA.

In 2018, MEGADETH is celebrating its 35th anniversary all year long, with special releases, exclusive merchandise items, and one-of-a-kind events and opportunities for fans worldwide.