Commentary: Worst fears realized at tragic heavy metal show
By Michael Corcoran
Austin American-Statesman
DEC. 9, 2004
It was inevitable that it would one day happen and, if it did, that the band Pantera would somehow be involved. The Dallas thrash metalheads set out to be harder, fiercer, faster than the rest and their fans reacted more jubilantly savage than any I've ever seen. Pantera was the Marines while all the other metal bands were the Coast Guard. Coaxed on by the devil's barker, singer Phil Anselmo, Pantera fans didn't start mosh pits, they brawled to the monster shrieks and the manic shredding of guitarist Dimebag Darrell Abbott. When they limped out after the concert, nursing split lips and bloody noses, the Pantera devoted looked like they'd survived an explosion.
It was shocking, but not entirely surprising, to wake up Thursday morning to the news that the night before a 25-year-old man jumped onstage at a nightclub in Columbus, Ohio, and opened fire on the Pantera spinoff Damageplan, killing Dimebag and three bystanders before being killed by police.
A police spokeswoman in Ohio said authorities didn't know of a motive. Speculation Thursday morning, fueled by a posting on the band's Web site from a person who claimed to be an eyewitness, was rampant that the tragedy was related to the breakup of Pantera, which cast fans into two camps. Sickeningly, many of the postings on www.damageplan.com cheered the results of the rampage.
I've never had more concern for my safety at a concert than when I first saw Pantera in Dallas in 1994. I had been warned by my predecessor at the Dallas Morning News, who told tales of venue destruction and countless fights, but I still wasn't ready for this scene right out of a bleak, futuristic action flick. After opener Sepultura's set, fans started unbolting seats at the Starplex to make room for a pit. The crowd on the grass, meanwhile, built a bonfire out of trash and some maniacs rolled through the flames.
"I wanna see some destruction!" yelled Anselmo, wearing a Charles Manson T-shirt. Arms pumped, heads flailed and as I squeezed forward to my seat, some kid took a swing at me and clipped the back of my head. When I turned around to see who had done it, the guy got right in my face and let out a vicious, vein-bulging scream, then put his hand up for a high five.
I used to like to go to hard-core shows as a rubber-necker, standing a safe distance from the mosh pit, but at that Pantera show there was no comfort zone in the whole amphitheater. A mix of sweat, adrenaline and fear, much of it mine, scented the air and the faces were all contorted. It wasn't fun danger; this roller coaster threatened to jump off the track at any moment.
That was the one side of Pantera — the concert side. I interviewed Dimebag and his drummer brother Vinnie Paul a few times through the years and they were nothing like the hellions onstage. When I called Vinnie the day "Far Beyond Driven" shocked everybody by debuting at No. 1 in 1994, the rabid Cowboys fan was more concerned that Jerry Jones had just fired Jimmy Johnson.
Being fans themselves, the members of Pantera were always down-to-earth when they met their followers. When Pantera got off tour, Vinnie and Dimebag would hang out at hard rock clubs in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and they even bought one. They'd drink there at the bar or hold court in a booth and it was nothing for anybody to go up to them and talk metal. They'd struggled for years in glammier bands (Dimebag's original moniker was Diamond Darrell), so it was a big deal to them to know they were connecting.
But with all those protons and neutrons of aggressive emotions flying around the band, the threat of the energy turning negative in unspeakable ways was higher than with groups that didn't push the rage as far.
It seems like it would've happened before, that a deranged fan would bring a gun to a concert and in the heat of the moment — is there any time more intense than the first few seconds of a concert? — he'd point at a former hero and make him dead. There goes the fourth wall, the imaginary line that separates the act from the audience. It's been shattered to bits and the only ones to benefit will be the companies that make metal detectors. |
