*Nov
20, 2009 - The Official Pantera store has moved! Click here for the new location.
*Nov
14, 2009 - Check out Philip's Housecore Records site for updates on signed bands haarp, Warbeast, Crowbar and more.
*Nov
11, 2009 - The Best Of Pantera on iTunes is $7.99 on iTunes for a limited time!
*Oct
8, 2009 - Vinnie's busy schedule, and
half of the next Hellyeah cd is done.
*Oct 8
, 2009 - Check out Philip interviewing
Anvil at the Download Festival here.
Check Philip out performing with Anvil here.
*Sept
23, 2009 - On this day in 2003, Pantera released "The Best of Pantera: Far Beyond the Great Southern Cowboy's Vulgar Hits".
Click here to check it out on Amamzon.com.
Click here to check it out on iTunes.
*Sept
7, 2009 - Vinnie helps out in recording Carrot Top show intro.
More
photos here.
*Sept
5, 2009 - Download Vulgar Display of Power for $2.99! Today and tomorrow only.
*Sept
1, 2009 - The Down tour resumes in Atlanta tonight. Follow along at downontour.com.
*Aug 24, 2009 - Check out Big Vin Records on Facebook.
*Aug 22, 2009 - Check out footage from this year's Ride For Dime
from the official myspace.
More
photos here.
*Aug 20, 2009 - Happy Birthday Darrell R.I.P.
*Aug 12, 2009 - Philip is to appear 96.7 KCAL FM on the show "The Moshpit" On Aug 15. This can be streamed from www.kcalfm.com between 10:00PM and 2:00AM Pacific Time.
*Aug 9, 2009 - Rex will miss the first leg of the Down tour.
*Aug 5, 2009 - Down begins their US/Canadian tour next week. Check out downontour.com for schedule and ticket info. |
*July 22, 2009 - On the first weekend in July in Las Vegas, Vinnie joined Joey Belladonna (Anthrax) and Evan Seinfeld (Biohazard), and the Sin City Sinners for a jam.
*July 18, 2009 - Vinnie Paul presents Chinaman "A Rock N Roll Comedy Experience". Live at the Greek Isles Hotel, Las Vegas.
*July 10, 2009 - Check out downontour.com for Down live pics, videos, archives, and ticket info.
*July 7, 2009 - Kerry King inspired by Dime and Dime's guitar on upcoming Slayer album.
*July 6, 2009 - One of Dime's guitars goes on display at the new Dallas hard Rock Cafe.
*July 3, 2009 - New interview with Rex on
faceculture.tv.
*June 25, 2009 - New interview with Vinnie at metalsucks.com.
*June 12, 2009 - Down's performance at the Download festival
on June 13 will be streamed live from the Download site!
Click here to visit the streaming page. Times
in the USA are:
10am Eastern
9am Central
8am Mountain
7am Pacific
*June 12, 2009 - Down begins European tour!
*May 1, 2009 - Enter PANFREEGIFT at checkout and get free stuff from the Pantera store with purchase.
*April 30, 2009 - New video of Vinnie being interviewed at Golden Gods.
*April 7, 2009 - Vinnie wins at Golden Gods
Awards. Click here for video.
Click here to see list of other winners.
*March 25, 2009 - Video of Philip signing
autographs at the Kronk Gym
fundraiser.
*March 24, 2009 - Rex will appear via live streaming audio on
brokenwavemusic.com April 7.
*March 23, 2009 - Check out Vinnie's appearance in the
commercial for the Revolver Golden Awards..
*March 16, 2009 - Pre-Order the upcoming release, Heaven Is Gone by Seventh Void (Big Vin Records) and get a limited* autographed CD booklet with purchase! Click here for full details.
*March 7, 2009 - Check out Vinnie's appearance on
"The Metal Show" here.
*March 6, 2009 - On the Jim Rome show, Rex
confirms a Pantera box set is in the works.
*March 6, 2009 - Check out VINNIE PAUL on VH1 Classic's "That Metal Show"
March 7 at 11PM East (10PM Central or 8PM west coast)
*March 6, 2009 - Check out the new release from BIG VIN RECORDS,
Seventh Void and their new single "Heaven Is Gone".
*March 5, 2009 - Rex will be on the Jim Rome show
tomorrow, Mar 6.
*Jan 15, 2009 - Vinnie's NAMM schedule.
*Jan 7, 2009 - Vinnie's first cell phone
auctioned on ebay.
*Jan 7, 2009 - Philip's 'The Retired Journeyman' on Boxing Insider.
*Dec 6, 2008 - Vinnie on Headbanger's Blog.
*Dec 5, 2008 - Pick up "He Came To Rock"
*Dec 1, 2008 - Vinnie's ustream webcam.
*Nov 26, 2008 - Vinnie on Liquid Metal.
*Nov 24, 2008 - Philip on antiquiet.com
*Nov 24, 2008 - Vinnie on DC9 At Night.
*Nov 19, 2008 - Check out the new ad from Vinnie for
DDRUM!
*Nov 3, 2008 - Check out bigvinrecords.com for info on the Official Dimebag Darrell book!
*Nov 3, 2008 - Pics from Vinnie's Halloween bash at Fire Water posted online.
*Nov1,
2008 - Vinnie launches relationship with DDRUM. Click here for story.
Click here for Vinnie's DDRUM page.
*Nov 1, 2008 - Free song download with Over The Under
Deluxe Edition purchase.
*Oct 23,
2008 - Over The Under Deluxe Edition now on sale.
*Oct 22,
2008 - Video footage of Down in AZ.
*Oct 22,
2008 - Philip on Headbanger's Blog.
*Oct 22,
2008 - Pics from Down in AZ Oct 21.
*Oct
10, 2008 - Down begins touring today. Tour includes
headlining dates and dates with Metallica.
*Oct 8,
2008 - Vinnie's Halloween bash now open to the public.
*Oct 7,
2008 - "He came to Rock". Details of the upcoming
Dimebag Darrell photo book.
*Aug
11, 2008 - Dime tribute jam at Ozzfest
*Aug
10, 2008 - Vinnie speaks to NHL.com!
*Mar 13, 2008 - Hellyeah video interview |
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With all his
greatness and accomplishments on the guitar, Dime will be missed
more for his giving personality, charisma, caring for others, love
and most of all his HEART!! Twice as big as the state of
TEXAS!!!!!!!!!!!! Dime gave it all every day to each and every one
of us and our lives have forever been hollowed without him...Thanks
to all of you for reaching out
to us in this time of our
immeasurable loss.
REST IN PEACE BROTHER DIME!!!!!!
-Vinnie Paul |
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PANTERA: A VULGAR DISPLAY OF METAL
by Don Kaye
“The thing about us is that we always stayed on the ground
level with the fans,” proclaims Pantera guitarist Dimebag Darrell in
his proud Texas twang. “We never rode above the fans – I’m a fuckin’
fan myself – and we always had great interaction with them. They’re
us, we’re them, we’re all for one and stronger than all.”
Of course, it took the Dallas-based Pantera time to find their
groove, shape their sound, and harness the right mix of combustible
personalities. The band emerged in the early Eighties, when drummer
Vinnie Paul and his guitarist brother Dimebag Darrell put Pantera
together with bassist Rex Brown and vocalist T Lee. After three
self-released albums, it was clear that a remarkably different
heavier sound was evolving. Enter new frontman and New Orleans
native Philip Anselmo,
, on a fourth independant release. The
collaboration with the heavy trio and explosive singer was about to
set the stage for a harder, more damaging, trademark Pantera.
After being turned down “twenty-eight times by every major label on
the face of the earth,” an Atco Records A&R rep named Mark Ross saw
the band when Hurricane Hugo stranded him in Texas. The long-sought
record deal finally arrived, and with it, Pantera’s “official” 1990
debut, titled Cowboys From Hell. Co-produced by the band and
Terry Date (Max Norman turned the project down in favor of Lynch
Mob), Cowboys From Hell took Pantera’s evolution to the next
level. Darrell’s chugging, jagged guitars, Vinnie’s machine-gun,
darting drums, and Philip’s collection of harsh screams,
clenched-fist roars, and eerie melodies, all fused together into a
sound they called “power groove.”
“Cowboys is where everybody came into their own, along
with the full-blown Pantera sound,” says Vinnie. “That was actually
the first song we wrote for the record. Basically it was about us
coming out of Texas and being out of place. People don’t think of
Texas as being a hot spot for heavy metal, they think of New York or
L.A. or something like that, so it just seemed like an obvious
concept for us.”
Cowboys From Hell spawned several other unquestionable
classics, including the moody, morbid epic, “Cemetery Gates.”
“We’ve always done a bunch of musically diverse things,” says Dime.
“I’m a big fan of King’s X and bands like that. I was just showing
a broader side of the band, the more melodic stuff we can do.”
Months of solid touring molded the band into an even more
lethal live act than they had been before, and two years after the
release of Cowboys, the band reconvened to lay down what many
fans consider their masterpiece: Vulgar Display Of Power.
Working with Date again, the band carved out an even more
incendiary sonic assault on an album that truly lived up to its
monicker with frightening intensity.
The disc yielded, among others, the awesomely heavy shuffle,
“Walk,” the pummeling, warped riffage of “Mouth For War,” and the
disturbing, bitter “This Love.” Vinnie: “If there’s one thing that
Philip did the very best, it’s that he always wrote straight from
the heart. He never candy-coated anything or had a bullshit way of
saying anything in his lyrics. ‘This Love’ was pretty much the
story of a relationship that he had been in, that just didn’t work
out, and he was fuckin’ pissed about it!”
More endless roadwork followed the release of Vulgar Display,
elevating the band into bigger venues and drawing larger audiences
all the time. By the time 1994 and Far Beyond Driven rolled
around, Pantera was established as the metal act to beat in
terms of heaviness, sheer power, and slavish allegiance to the metal
lifestyle.
“We drove ourselves, that’s for sure,” says Vinnie about the
album, which remains the most extreme disc to ever debut at
Number One on the Billboard Top 200. “We didn’t debut at
Number One for any other reason than all the fans we had made on
tour. We still weren’t a radio band or anything like that, so it
was strictly word-of-mouth and the live show that did it.”
“We couldn’t get airplay and nobody gave a fuck about it, but
the fans damn sure did,” agrees Dime. “We wrote that record for
them.”
The first single from the album, “I’m Broken,” was “a
soundcheck riff – one of them ones where I’d walk in with a hangover
from ripping it up night after night with everyone in every town,”
chuckles Dime. “That’s where a lot of the best riffs I ever wrote
came from. I just played the first riff I thought of, Vinnie started
kickin’ in on it, Rex joined in, we didn’t write the entire song on
the spot, but we kept toying with it and finally worked on it once
we got into the studio.”
And then there’s “Five Minutes Alone,” which crystallized the
band’s “take no shit” attitude, as Vinnie explains: “There was a
guy in the front row at Pine Knob in Detroit who was heckling Phil.
Finally, several people in the crowd just jumped this guy’s ass and
beat the shit out of him on the spot, so he sued us. And when his
dad called our manager, his exact quote was, ‘you just give me five
minutes along with that Phil Anselmo guy and I’ll show him who’s big
daddy around here.’ Phil’s response was, ‘You just give me five
minutes along with that cat’s dad and I’ll whoop his ass.’ That’s
where that song came from.”
As brutal as Far Beyond Driven was, it ended on an
uncharacteristically quiet note with the band’s cover of Black
Sabbath’s dreamlike “Planet Caravan.” “Black Sabbath’s one of our
all-time favorite groups,” says Vinnie. “We got asked to be a part
of the first Sabbath tribute record, Nativity In Black, and
we were thinkin’ about what song to do, and we just suddenly decided
that “Planet Caravan” was a cool song, plus nobody would even expect
it. It turned out great, but due to legal circumstances, we ended up
not being on Nativity In Black, so we added it to the end of
Far Beyond Driven. We thought it was the perfect way to end
the record.”
The Great Southern Trendkill, released in 1996, is now
considered Pantera’s “overlooked” album, coming out as rap-metal was
hitting its stride and temporarily drowning out the mighty Pantera
roar. Trendkill did, in fact, find Pantera adding some
different spices to their corrosive metallic stew, but the chilling
“Drag The Waters” best represents the album. “That song is about a
lifetime of dealing with people that you can’t tell what they’re
really comin’ at you for, or what their motives really are,” snarls
Dime. “You’ve got to drag the waters to get to the bottom and find
out the truth.”
It was four years before Pantera released their next
full-length studio effort, but the band was far from inactive.
Touring nonstop, the boys still managed to find time to release a
live album, Official Live: 101 Proof, featuring the ominous
studio bonus track, “Where We Come From,” and a scalding cover of
Ted Nugent’s “Cat Scratch Fever” for the soundtrack of the
Kiss-themed movie, Detroit Rock City. “Gene Simmons actually
approached us to be a part of that,” remembers Vinnie. “And we were
like, ‘we’re old Ted fans, let’s see if we can do a throwdown
version of it.’ To this day, I probably still hear our version in
titty bars more than I hear his.”
Dimebag Darrell calls the band’s most recent studio album,
2000’s Reinventing The Steel, a “best-of in its own right,” a
mix of elements from the albums that had preceded it. Even the
closing epic, “I’ll Cast A Shadow,” was a monster. “Usually when we
write, the songs come together really fast,” says Dime. “But
sometimes, you’ll be drilling at one for hours before you realize it
ain’t workin’. This was one of those. So we put it on the back
burner, finished up all the other tunes, then went back to give it
one more pull. We rearranged it, throw a few new parts in, and it
really brought it to life. I think it ended up being the baddest-ass
song on the whole record.”
“Goddamn Electric,” a tribute to metal itself, was another
bad-ass anthem, and warranted a special guest appearance. “We
thought, ‘this song just gives so much respect to these other bands
like Black Sabbath and Slayer, we’ve just gotta get Kerry King down
here to put a lead on the motherfucker,’” relates Vinnie. “We went
and met him at the Starplex in Dallas when Slayer was on Ozzfest. I
took some portable recording gear, and we recorded that lead – first
take, one take only, backstage in the bathroom at the Starplex. And
it’s awesome.”
As one of metal’s most ferocious acts, with one of its most
insanely devoted audiences, it’s clear as an empty whiskey bottle
that Pantera’s impact and influence on heavy music is still being
felt. “Every time I hear a kick drum with that extra slap on top,
or that chainsaw sound on the guitar, I know where it came from,”
concludes Dime. “We’re just glad we can hand it down and see
everyone else bring some new shit to the table and keep passing it
on. I’m glad we could actually put a stamp out there that everybody
could get a pull off of.” |
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