Pantera: Classic or Crap?

http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/Alley/1409/panty/diamond.jpg

http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/Alley/1409/panty/pin82_83.jpg

But "Fuckin' Hostile" is good for shits and giggles.

But NO music was used! Is a label suppressing the songs? Did Pantera agree to be interviewed only if Vh1 refused to play Hairtera songs? Who owns the rights to those records anyway?

Look past Anselmo's caterwauling and Walk, Five Minutes Alone, Cowboys From Hell, I'm Broken, all good examples of this. I had forgotten the riff to "Five Minutes Alone." Tasteful use of dead picking = awesome.

just tried to give 'the great southern trendkill' a listen for the first time in about 7 years.

just try and make in past phil's angry rambles in track 2 without feeling harangued and thoroughly bored.

make it past

all due to dimebag, but really this album cover is something else -- is this the birth of furriedom?!?

http://pages.infinit.net/dimebag/magic.jpg

Listening to "Cowboys" yesterday, the breakdown at the end of Heresy is a prime example of locked in ultra-heaviness. Total classic

It's kind of a shame they got obsessed with having to be heavier than thou as they were so groovy on Cowboys from Hell and Vulgar Display of Power.

"Good metal isn't about drum fills or guitar solos, it's about the whole band locking into something and sounding like one instrument."

Yeah and by the time they got big, those guys had been playing together for years especially the Abbott brothers.

I held a soft spot for Far Beyond Driven because it was the first Pantera I heard in any form and I still think "Strength Beyond Strength" is one of their best, most savage songs, but when I did a side-by-side compare with Vulgar I realized why I had preferred that one in high school. "Mouth for War" is just well-constructed, "A New Level" does the dumb groove way better than most of FBD.

Cowboys makes me sad because it was sort of like they felt like their music was too 'wussy' but it was nice to hear them have those extra heavy metal dimensions in addition to their groove.

the riffs never stop giving on FBD. Strength Beyond Strength, Becoming, Five Minutes Alone, I'm Broken, Shedding Skin. wow.

This sounds insane to a lot of people, but my ranking of their discography, in 2015, goes:

Reinventing the Steel
Power Metal
Cowboys From Hell
Vulgar Display of Power
Far Beyond Driven
The Great Southern Trendkill

But pretty much all their albums collapse about four or five tracks in. Can anybody name a good song from the back half of a Pantera album?

Yep, Shedding Skin.

yeah, i actually think i like FBD all the way through.

There's a couple on the second side I'm not that keen on iirc.

the idgaf tracks like "Good Friends..." on FBD knock it down a peg.

I hated Reinventing the Steel when I bought it (the day it came out) and sold it the next day I was so mad. haven't heard it since.

Good song from the back half of a Pantera album? "Hollow". Also features one of Dime's finest solos.

Pantera got really popular around the time I was into other kinds of music than metal. I heard them, as they were quite popular but they were more of a background thing. Fxxxing Hostile is an awesome title and I remember my friends liking to use that as a phrase as it was catchy from the time. I guess Cowboys from Hell was the first tune I heard by them and dug that one. I never really heard their whole albums until the past few years as living in rural KY, I swear Pantera seems to be one of those rite of passage bands to guys around here like Skynyrd was a couple decades before. They seem to still be very popular.

I've heard all their albums now and I probably like Cowboys from Hell the most as it's got the heavy where they were headed but it's still got some of the glam in the mix. The most impressive thing about Pantera is how they will seemingly drop into other feels for 4 or 8 bars out of nowhere or do these sudden 2 bar stops. How they can change gears or directions like that is just impressive. Quite often it's some odd counting, but it sounds groovy and very natural.

Like alot of the thrash and crossover bands, the obsession with speed was to feed the pit. It works in that context, but I just don't think it is as interesting a music for listening myself.

"By Demons Be Driven" has that awesome verse riff until the lame chorus. I also love "Regular People".

don't like Trendkill much but "Floods" owns.

Main riff on Regular People is really funky.

"Slaughtered" on FBD is a second-half favourite of mine, but I think the general point that their albums are patchy is broadly true.

Classic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95lzvy2_HpE

And I just found this, an early Phil show where they do the same song as above but then play a Metallica cover:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8yP8cNzoiM

Whomever filmed it is obviously a Pantera fan who didn't care about the new singer since you don't even see him filmed before "Seek & Destroy" kicks in at the five minute mark.

You know how some people deemed that evidence of the evolution of a species demands a transitional fossil that, if not found, was a missing link? This is the missing link between Glamtera and Thrashtera.

Phil talked 'em into doing an Anthrax cover too and this time you can actually see him in all his big-haired, bare-midriffed glory:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3N7jOQ-CtU

great clips, dude.

i really quite like the song below. the vocals are laughably amateurish, but the music is great -- kinda like the missing link between Queensryche and Skid Row.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTW3tXsxN_w

uhh…I just found out five minutes ago… is it at all possible that no ILM-nik has posted re: Vinnie?

I posted in the regular metal thread.

uh, ILM not giving a fuck about Vinnie is fairly redolent of the WAY THINGS ARE NOW, that the passing of the drummer of the signature metal band of the '90s, defining the state of the art after Metallica, is utterly unremarked upon outside the metal eco-system. so I'll say that Pantera was the greatest metal band the South ever produced, and he was an excellent drummer.

Not that being in Pantera was probably easy on your health, but you have to think Vinnie probably had to re-live losing his brother like that every day since that bad day. It had to be a heavy burden to carry and hopefully he finds some peace now.

Why are there not more household metal names from Texas? Anyway, Vinnie was awesome, something about that really wet drum sound sticks out, and the way he would hit those simple 4/4 grooves without losing any heaviness.

don't you just hate the WAY THINGS ARE NOW? everything so political. wish we could MAKE MUSIC GREAT AGAIN

we are all still reeling from the death of a 20 year old sociopath rapper who tortured women

also eyehategod is the best southern metal band

everyone shitted up the obituary thread arguing about koko so i gave up trying to reminisce about vinnie

I'm super bummed about his passing though. He seemed like such a good dude; twitter is overflowing with nice tributes from all over the place.
(Also I love that he never made peace with Anselmo.)

FoxSports posted this clip yesterday - Vinnie talks about the dent in the Stars' Stanley cup, it's pretty great

RIP to @Pantera drummer, Vinnie Paul.

We were able to witness your passion for the @DallasStars first hand.

Your legacy will live on every time our guys hit the ice. pic.twitter.com/g0zxMnIb7V

— FOX Sports Southwest (@FOXSportsSW) June 23, 2018

Vinnie was an A+ drummer and I super-loved Pantera in high school & college.