With Pantera's album Cowboys from Hell I am crossing over into the next metal subgenre: groove metal. Cowboys from Hell was Pantera's fifth studio album, released in 1990 and is said to be the first groove metal album there was.
Pantera - yet another band I had not heard of before embarking on my blog project. And this is quite extraordinary as Pantera has its fair shair of history in heavy metal. Pantera was originally founded as Gemini, then renamed to Eternity and finally Pantera in 1981 in Arlington, Texas by the Abbott brothers Vinnie Paul (drums) & Darrell (lead and rhythm guitar) and Terry Glaze (vocals). Bassist Rex Brown joined the band in 1982 and stayed with them until their breakup in 2003.
When reading about the Abbot brothers, I was immediately reminded of Ron and Scott Asheton from The Stooges. Yet another pair of brothers playing drums and guitar in a band that was very influential on its genre. Darrell Abbott, better known under his stage name Dimebag Darrell is to this day considered one of the best guitarist of all time. He was shot in 2004 at point-blank range during a stage performance with his band Damageplan. His attacker killled three more people and wounded others by gunshots. Vinnie Paul died only fourteen years later in 2018 from a heartattack. Both brothers are buried next to their mother in Arlington, Texas.
One possible reason for the murder was the breakup of Pantera and the rift with their vocalist Phil Anselmo. The shooter, Nathan Gale, was said to be obsessed with Pantera and blamed Darrell for "breaking up Pantera". This has never been proven though.
Phil Anselmo joined Pantera in 1986, replacing Terry Glaze. He was introduced on Pantera's fourth album Power Metal. During their first years Pantera was actually just another glam metal band, spandex and all. Their first three albums with Terry Glaze never helped them to a big breakthrough. Pantera's sound shifted from pure glam metal on Metal Magic (1983) to a heavier sound in I Am The Night (1985) and the band was noticed for that. When Anselmo joined the band there was a definite change from glam to thrash metal. For Power Metal Pantera had not only changed their vocalist and looks but also their producer (the first three albums were produced by Vinnie and Darrells father Jerry Abbott, a country music songwriter and producer).
In 1989 Pantera was signed by Atco Records and recorded their first major label album Cowboys from Hell. The eponymous song was acutally the first Pantera song I've ever listened to and it blew me away. While the intro part is interesting, when Darrell starts shredding his riff in at 0:34 the song just gets insanely good. This riff carries you through the whole song, accompanied by Vinnie's relentless drumming and perfect tempo changes, topped with perfect guitar solos. Anselmo's voice shows range from screams to gritty singing and growls. The whole song is just four minutes of pure power and ends with the perfect metal grunt.
Another notable song is Cemetary Gates which has power ballad elements and shows that Anselmo can actually sing pretty well. The song starts with yet another super catchy riff by Darrell and a swift tempo change before Anselmo sings a very cleanly delivered intro. He is effortlessly able to add grit to his voice if needed and brings out perfect metal screams at the end of the song, echoed by Darrell's guitar. The guitar solo starting at 3:30 is one of Darrell's most famous solos.
I have listened to the whole album several times over the last couple of days and there is not one song I don't like. I especially enjoy Heresy and Domination and I put them on my playlist together with Cemetary Gates and Cowboys from Hell.
Pantera's Cowboys from Hell was groundbreaking for the then new metal subgenre groove metal which came from thrash metal but focused less on speed but more on the heavyness of riffs and rhythms. While thrash metal faced a decrease in popularity during the 1990s groove metal continued to flourish and inspired many other bands like Sepultura and White Zombie. Anthrax, Overkill or Testament also used groove metal styles in their 90s releases. From what I've heard of those other bands and also from the other Pantera releases, I find groove metal very enjoyable and I am sure there will be more of that on my playlist in the future.