Vinnie Paul Retrospective Part I: The 80's
Last month the world lost Vinnie Paul, the drummer from Pantera, Damageplan, Rebel Meets Rebel and Hellyeah. I grew up listening the shit out of Pantera, so this one hit me. It also made me a bit conflicted, since Pantera is on an ever-growing list of artists I don't listen to anymore for...reasons. In this case, because of the actions of their singer Phil Anselmo, revealing himself to be a white supremacist piece of shit (which we probably should have seen coming, to be honest).
Point is, I haven't listened to anything with Anselmo on it for two and a half years now. I keep his catalogue buried next to the dead legacies of Ted Nugent, Kanye West, Charlie Daniels and (worst of all) Lostprophets. But Pantera has always felt...different. On one hand, you could make the case that you shouldn't throw the whole band under the bus because the singer was a dick, but when the lyrics butt up against some of the reasons you stopped listening...it kind of makes it hard. But since Vinnie Paul has left this mortal coil, I decided to unearth this body of work and give it another look.
Because I'm a completionist and a bit of a masochist, I've decided to break this up into three posts: The 80's, the 90's and the 2000's. This first one will concentrate on Pantera's first four albums, none of which got a proper CD release, and you'll see why in a minute. The second one will be the meat and problematic potatoes, aka: The five albums people remember. The third one will be Vinnie Paul's post-Pantera output, including all five Hellyeah albums, which I've never listened to because that band seemed like a not good thing to my ears and brain. So let's get started by whisking all the way back to the ancient year of 1983 with some...
METAL MAGIC (1983) * and 1/2
"In this time of Rock and roll...we need Metal Magic...we need...PANTERA!!!"
With an album cover straight from the notebook of your friend who's third best at drawing in your circle, a so pompous you have to smile intro and a low rent if high energy Kiss ripoff to kick in the door, Pantera burst on the scene in 1983. To be fair, Dimebag (excuse me..."Diamond") Darrel was only 16 and Vinnie was 19. Getting an album made wasn't easy in 1983, and if their dad wasn't a producer already, it would've been a lot tougher.
Terry Glaze isn't very good. He's like a karaoke parody of an 80's rock singer. Then again, this is the first album of people who were all still technically teenagers. I did some horrible sounding things when I was that age. The saving grace here is Vinne & Rex are solid, Dime is incredible (even as a high school sophomore) and the production is a lot better than this project might have deserved. Most of the songs are forgettable 80's schlock, but if you're into that sort of thing, they're not bad. The only reason they crossed my ears is what Pantera did later, though.
If you're curious...maybe just listen to the first three songs and stop? You'll have gotten the idea, cuz it's kinda downhill from there.
PROJECTS IN THE JUNGLE (1984) * and 7/8
"Projects" is better than "Metal Magic". They're starting to sound like a real band. "All Over Tonight" goes for the throat and "Out For Blood" has early 80's commercial thrash energy. But the whole thing is still pretty forgettable. "Blue Light Turning Red" is a nice showcase for Dime to solo the fuck out, but other than that, all I can recommend is the title track because it has kind of a cool chorus riff and "Heavy Metal Rules!" because at least it's amusing.
I AM THE NIGHT (1985) * and 2/3
The last album with Terry Glaze. I guess the cover for this one is slightly less worse than the first one, but it's a tough call. At lest "Projects From The Jungle" sort of looked like a real cover. Anyway...
"Hot And Heavy" sounds like a parody song. "You see my ice cream cone, baby. Go ahead and...take a lick." Glaze doesn't even sound like he thinks this line is a good idea. They apparently made a video for this, so go check that out at your leisure. The title track is some 80's Priest shit; it has a little more bite to it than their previous faire, but it's still not quite worth taking seriously. That's the problem with their glam albums: It's funny the first time because you're hearing Pantera of all bands play this glammy bullshit, but it's not terrible enough to be funny for more than two or three listens. It's also not good either, so there's just no replay value.
"Onward We Rock!" has a neat galloping riff, but again, Terry Glaze makes it pretty tough to enjoy. On the flip side of that, "Daughters Of The Queen" has him singing in his range for fucking once, but it's a song called "Daughters Of The Queen" trying to be sincere about its subject matter. That might have replay value just for the schadenfreude. Also, "Down Below", with the opening lines: "People running / In the street / Looking for some / Meat to eat". Okayyyy....
The rest of the album just blurs together and this winds up being the least distinct of their Glaze-era records.
POWER METAL (1988) ** and 1/2
"Power Metal" was the world's introduction to Philip. J. Anslemo. Instantly, you can tell this is what Terry Glaze wished/hoped/thought he was doing on the first three records. Thing is, he can sort of sing in a lower register, but that's not the style of vocals needed for the material: the operatic, Aqua-Net soaked sorties on the senses were mandatory for any band looking like these guys looked on this cover. It's still a bad cover, but at least it's several steps up from the first three.
"Rock The World" is already better than their first three albums put together, so they've not only upgraded vocalists but have stepped up their songwriting skills as well. This is definitely trying to ape the harder side of Judas Priest, but they manage to get there and sound like B-tear. Movin' on up!
"Power Metal" is their first real hair thrash song, with a tough breakdown that sounds for real. It's the first moment I felt like this band wasn't coasting on mere trends and put some personality forward.
"We'll Meet Again", though a cliche pile of 80's metal balladry, has a good guitar tone and the melody of the chorus makes me sit up and take notice. Anselmo's doing that mumblecore thing for the verses that made several 90's Pantera songs skippable, but can't have everything. (I mean, dude thinks it's creepy, but it was just annoying.)
"Over And Out" is a Megadeth song. They even kind of bite Mustaine's tone. Sort or reminiscent of "Ride The Lightning" at points (which Mustaine co-wrote). Through the first four songs, I was wondering why this never got a proper re-release on CD, but then "Proud To Be Loud" happened, and oh God.
The Motley Crue knock-off has not aged well at all. But that's merely an aesthetic problem: the second verse is cringe-worthy in light of what's happened with the singer since. "Well, I've always believed / In freedom of speech / And I've always been the one / Who practiced what I preached". ("Free Speech" being the battle cry of like-minded white nationalists and considering the lyrics of "No Good (Attack The Radical)" (which we'll get to), the smoke screen of saying you only looked like a skinhead has blown away, dude. Practice what you preach indeed.)
They redid "Down Below" from "I Am The Night to start side two, and it's definitely better; tighter, nastier, and they fixed the line about "Meat to eat", so there's that. "Death Trap" opens up well, but the verses sound like a watered down version of "Over And Out". All it really has is that gallop, but that's enough to make it okay. "Hard Ride" sounds like a Dokken rip-off that would've ended one of their other albums, but it's so cheesy it winds up being enjoyable. It's out of place between "Death Trap" and "Burn", but eh. Oh, excuse me. "Burnnn!" with three n's and an exclamation point. It's another Priest knock-off, but it has a cool solo.
The closing track "P.S.T. '88" is one of the more musically interesting songs on here; it has teeth, it has energy, but it also has Dime singing about how the pussy's tight, so your mileage may vary. It sounds like a Testament song, actually.
All in all, "Power Metal" is rough around the edges and is definitely a transitional record, but it's one hell of a turn from "I Am The Night" to "Cowboys From Hell". It doesn't even sound like the same band by then.
Come back for part two when we cover the band that morphed into one of the most influential angry music bands of all time.
Point is, I haven't listened to anything with Anselmo on it for two and a half years now. I keep his catalogue buried next to the dead legacies of Ted Nugent, Kanye West, Charlie Daniels and (worst of all) Lostprophets. But Pantera has always felt...different. On one hand, you could make the case that you shouldn't throw the whole band under the bus because the singer was a dick, but when the lyrics butt up against some of the reasons you stopped listening...it kind of makes it hard. But since Vinnie Paul has left this mortal coil, I decided to unearth this body of work and give it another look.
Because I'm a completionist and a bit of a masochist, I've decided to break this up into three posts: The 80's, the 90's and the 2000's. This first one will concentrate on Pantera's first four albums, none of which got a proper CD release, and you'll see why in a minute. The second one will be the meat and problematic potatoes, aka: The five albums people remember. The third one will be Vinnie Paul's post-Pantera output, including all five Hellyeah albums, which I've never listened to because that band seemed like a not good thing to my ears and brain. So let's get started by whisking all the way back to the ancient year of 1983 with some...
"In this time of Rock and roll...we need Metal Magic...we need...PANTERA!!!"
With an album cover straight from the notebook of your friend who's third best at drawing in your circle, a so pompous you have to smile intro and a low rent if high energy Kiss ripoff to kick in the door, Pantera burst on the scene in 1983. To be fair, Dimebag (excuse me..."Diamond") Darrel was only 16 and Vinnie was 19. Getting an album made wasn't easy in 1983, and if their dad wasn't a producer already, it would've been a lot tougher.
Terry Glaze isn't very good. He's like a karaoke parody of an 80's rock singer. Then again, this is the first album of people who were all still technically teenagers. I did some horrible sounding things when I was that age. The saving grace here is Vinne & Rex are solid, Dime is incredible (even as a high school sophomore) and the production is a lot better than this project might have deserved. Most of the songs are forgettable 80's schlock, but if you're into that sort of thing, they're not bad. The only reason they crossed my ears is what Pantera did later, though.
If you're curious...maybe just listen to the first three songs and stop? You'll have gotten the idea, cuz it's kinda downhill from there.
"Projects" is better than "Metal Magic". They're starting to sound like a real band. "All Over Tonight" goes for the throat and "Out For Blood" has early 80's commercial thrash energy. But the whole thing is still pretty forgettable. "Blue Light Turning Red" is a nice showcase for Dime to solo the fuck out, but other than that, all I can recommend is the title track because it has kind of a cool chorus riff and "Heavy Metal Rules!" because at least it's amusing.
The last album with Terry Glaze. I guess the cover for this one is slightly less worse than the first one, but it's a tough call. At lest "Projects From The Jungle" sort of looked like a real cover. Anyway...
"Hot And Heavy" sounds like a parody song. "You see my ice cream cone, baby. Go ahead and...take a lick." Glaze doesn't even sound like he thinks this line is a good idea. They apparently made a video for this, so go check that out at your leisure. The title track is some 80's Priest shit; it has a little more bite to it than their previous faire, but it's still not quite worth taking seriously. That's the problem with their glam albums: It's funny the first time because you're hearing Pantera of all bands play this glammy bullshit, but it's not terrible enough to be funny for more than two or three listens. It's also not good either, so there's just no replay value.
"Onward We Rock!" has a neat galloping riff, but again, Terry Glaze makes it pretty tough to enjoy. On the flip side of that, "Daughters Of The Queen" has him singing in his range for fucking once, but it's a song called "Daughters Of The Queen" trying to be sincere about its subject matter. That might have replay value just for the schadenfreude. Also, "Down Below", with the opening lines: "People running / In the street / Looking for some / Meat to eat". Okayyyy....
The rest of the album just blurs together and this winds up being the least distinct of their Glaze-era records.
"Power Metal" was the world's introduction to Philip. J. Anslemo. Instantly, you can tell this is what Terry Glaze wished/hoped/thought he was doing on the first three records. Thing is, he can sort of sing in a lower register, but that's not the style of vocals needed for the material: the operatic, Aqua-Net soaked sorties on the senses were mandatory for any band looking like these guys looked on this cover. It's still a bad cover, but at least it's several steps up from the first three.
"Rock The World" is already better than their first three albums put together, so they've not only upgraded vocalists but have stepped up their songwriting skills as well. This is definitely trying to ape the harder side of Judas Priest, but they manage to get there and sound like B-tear. Movin' on up!
"Power Metal" is their first real hair thrash song, with a tough breakdown that sounds for real. It's the first moment I felt like this band wasn't coasting on mere trends and put some personality forward.
"We'll Meet Again", though a cliche pile of 80's metal balladry, has a good guitar tone and the melody of the chorus makes me sit up and take notice. Anselmo's doing that mumblecore thing for the verses that made several 90's Pantera songs skippable, but can't have everything. (I mean, dude thinks it's creepy, but it was just annoying.)
"Over And Out" is a Megadeth song. They even kind of bite Mustaine's tone. Sort or reminiscent of "Ride The Lightning" at points (which Mustaine co-wrote). Through the first four songs, I was wondering why this never got a proper re-release on CD, but then "Proud To Be Loud" happened, and oh God.
The Motley Crue knock-off has not aged well at all. But that's merely an aesthetic problem: the second verse is cringe-worthy in light of what's happened with the singer since. "Well, I've always believed / In freedom of speech / And I've always been the one / Who practiced what I preached". ("Free Speech" being the battle cry of like-minded white nationalists and considering the lyrics of "No Good (Attack The Radical)" (which we'll get to), the smoke screen of saying you only looked like a skinhead has blown away, dude. Practice what you preach indeed.)
They redid "Down Below" from "I Am The Night to start side two, and it's definitely better; tighter, nastier, and they fixed the line about "Meat to eat", so there's that. "Death Trap" opens up well, but the verses sound like a watered down version of "Over And Out". All it really has is that gallop, but that's enough to make it okay. "Hard Ride" sounds like a Dokken rip-off that would've ended one of their other albums, but it's so cheesy it winds up being enjoyable. It's out of place between "Death Trap" and "Burn", but eh. Oh, excuse me. "Burnnn!" with three n's and an exclamation point. It's another Priest knock-off, but it has a cool solo.
The closing track "P.S.T. '88" is one of the more musically interesting songs on here; it has teeth, it has energy, but it also has Dime singing about how the pussy's tight, so your mileage may vary. It sounds like a Testament song, actually.
All in all, "Power Metal" is rough around the edges and is definitely a transitional record, but it's one hell of a turn from "I Am The Night" to "Cowboys From Hell". It doesn't even sound like the same band by then.
Come back for part two when we cover the band that morphed into one of the most influential angry music bands of all time.
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