|
 I may be wrong
in assuming this--God Knows it's been known to happen--but as I write this,
I am under the impression that Pantera are no more, never ever to be heard
from again. The Cowboys from Hell have downed their last collective shot
at the heavy metal saloon and thundered off into the sunset. I'll leave
the eulogizing for someone else, though. We've got
Superjoint Ritual and
New Found Power (now
Damageplan) to keep us warm on these winter New England nights that
are coming up. (Although in all honesty, I thought Anselmo had found his
true muse with Down, so I'm disappointed that they seem to be history as
well).
A few years back the sometimes-decent "Trouser Press"
record guide referred to Pantera's glam roots as "the best in joke in
heavy metal". Since then, the in-joke has passed more into the realm of
Rob Halford's once closeted homosexuality. You would have to live on
Mars not to know about either.
Just about everyone I know has a reaction to Pantera's hairspray days. The
fans defensively say something about how everyone wore lip-gloss in the
'80's, and the detractors offer it up as some sort of Holy Grail of the
band's innate phoniness. For the record, I think it takes more balls to
walk down the street looking like a teased and sprayed poodle than a
lumberjack with a bad attitude does. Any schmuck can shave their head,
sprout a goatee and riddle their skin with tough guy ink. To walk around
with no shirt and a leather vest, fingerless gloves and the like…now that
takes serious commitment!
 But what about the four- count 'em, four - records that Pantera released
during this reviled period? Four albums isn't chicken feed. I've been in a
band, and just releasing a damn 7" nearly killed the band and me. Four
whole records equals some serious hard work. And if everyone says these
licorice pizzas are as bad as they say they are, then why the hell do they
go for such
monumental sums on ebay and the like? I once bid on "Projects
In The Jungle", setting twenty-five dollars as my maximum price. A week
later the damn thing was going for literally five times that. The last Pantera record of their so-called "Metal Magic' years, "Power Metal",
usually goes for something in the range of fifty or sixty dollars. I
bought mine for thirty-five from some Hun in Brandenburg and thought I was
getting screwed until I went online. I know people want these things as
collector's items, but at the prices they fetch, they must be at least
listenable, Si? Forty bucks for a novelty record is a lot. If you want
novelty why not slap on the Vanilla Ice metal album and be done with it?
I'm also quite sure there's copies of Napoleon XVI's "Coming To Take Me
Away" or "Chipmunk Punk" readily available as well in bargain bins near
you.
For the purposes of this article, and my own curiosity, I finally plunked
down thirty clams for a suspiciously well put together four CD collection
called "The Metal Magic Years" (naturally) which compiles all four records
into a nicely packaged and convenient format.
 The first ever Pantera album, "Metal Magic" (1983) is pretty much as bad
as everyone says. It's just guitar histrionics courtesy of "Diamond"
Darrell and characterless playing and singing from the rest of the band.
Terence Lee Glaze (later of the quite fab
Lord Tracy) provides the vocals
for this, as he did right up until 1988's "Power Metal". Glaze doesn't
seem like he knows quite who he should mimic on this, and the plinka-plinka production almost makes it sound like porn music taking a
stab at HM. This is strictly for Berklee School of Music students who want
to know about everything that was wrong with hard rock prior to 1987 or
so. Myself, I'll pass. Though the truly horrible cover art almost makes it
worth at least looking up online.
Their next salvo, "Projects In The Jungle" (1984) is miles better. It
isn't so much that the sound is radically different, there is just more
energy, more juice to the disc. Glaze is perfectly comfortable in the
confines of his yelp, and Diamond has found the niche between outright wankery and impressive riffing. The production is chunkier, too. Not all
of it sticks though, for every "All Over Tonight" there's a "Blue Lite
Turnin' Red". There's more blindingly awful artwork on this one as well.
One day I'm going to compile a coffee table book of the worst album covers
of all time. "Projects in the Jungle" would most certainly be in the top
ten.
  With "I am the Night" (1985) Pantera really begins to hit their stride.
"Down Below", "Right On the Edge" and "Come on Eyes" outline a shape of
things to come aggressiveness. Even some poor titles like "Onward We Rock"
don't sink this. Once again, the main thing hampering this one is that the
band is still grasping for a definite direction. This material is really a
little too in your face to be considered "hair metal" but at the same time
it sports some of the earmarks of that dreaded genre. But damn it, this
one shows some promise! At least fans of early Motley Crue should feel
perfectly at home with "Night".
I know many people will claim that Pantera's true career began with
"Cowboys From Hell", which is supposedly when they got "hard". Bullshit.
"Power Metal" makes Swiss cheese of that theory. Saying there is somehow a
vast difference between the two--other than the fashions sported in the
photos--is like arguing over
 whether Hostess Fruit Pies are more
nutritious than Twinkies. I won't make any friends for saying this, but
"Power Metal" has some of my favorite Pantera songs ever on it. The title
track, "Over and Out", "We'll Meet Again" and a slew of others rock like
"British Steel" era Priest. And for those of you who insist "Cowboys" was
so quantitatively different, go back and listen to it. There's plenty of
the old band still lurking in those grooves, and Anselmo's vocals only hit
the high end slightly less than on "Power Metal". Just a few death piggy
growls and the budding Pantera morbidity really separate the two. If you
want to argue that there's a huge difference between "Power Metal" and
"Vulgar", okay, you have me beat. Otherwise, shut up and enjoy "Power
Metal" for the fine record it is. (Yes they look stupid on the cover, but
that makes it all the cooler somehow). Besides which, how can you live
without Diamond's sole vocal contribution "Pussy Tight 88"?
After "Power Metal" it's all history of course, as the band went on to
bigger and better things. I'm never sure if they outright denied making
these records or merely hush-hushed them as much as possible. I've heard
both. If Darrell and Vince still have the original masters to at least the
latter two, they should just grin a little sheepishly and re-release them.
At the very least, "Power Metal" should get it's rightful due.
 I wouldn't pay forty dollars for any of these records, and most likely
I'll never bother to listen to either "Metal Magic" or "Projects in the
Jungle" again. But I just don't see this period of Pantera's history as
being as awful as everyone says it is. The music is very much of that time
period in rock. One day people will probably listen to Limp Bizkit,
Korn
et. al and cringe as well. (If you're not already doing so). I'd rather
listen to some of this stuff than the current slew of junk in any case.
On a side note, these records have come in for some severe drubbing from
those who don't like the band in any incarnation. There are some great
websites out there for those of you who don't take things too seriously.
The side-splitting "Panteribble" (currently down) is one, as well as "Pantera
Sucks".
I'm sure there are more. After all, most people love to laugh at someone
else's yearbook photos.
-The Cowboy From Cambridge |