Goddamn! I just got done reading every one of the over 500 letters you’ve sent to my “Feedback Sack.” Thanks for all the cool things you’ve said about the column.

Over the past 19 issues, we’ve covered a hell of a lot of techniques, ideas, riffs and licks. Now, because a bunch of your letters included some really good questions, I’m gonna spend the next few columns answering some of them.

The most common one of all was about my gear and how I get my tone, so let’s kick off with that bad boy.

I really dig your column; it’s got megs gonads! How about some advice on getting ripping sound like yours? I’d also like to know exactly what pickups, strings, amps, pedals and rack gear you use. Thanx for all the killer lessons. Walk! – Matt Loene, Syracuse, NY

I’m more than happy to let everybody know exactly what I’ve got going on in my rig, but I’m not gonna tell you how I’ve got it all wired up! The order in which you put your shit definitely makes a big difference, and that’s something you should dick around with for yourself. For example, if you run your wah before all your forms of gain, it’ll sound different than if you place it after a distortion or EQ pedal.

It won’t sound as ferocious or effective. It also makes a big difference if you put certain units in front of your amp instead of in its FX loop and vice-versa.

For example, my bud Kirk Windstein from Crowbar uses basically the exact same rig as I do, but he wires it up in a completely different way, and he’s got an awesome sound that’s way different to mine! So I suggest that you take some time and try to wire up your shit in all the ways you can think of until you get the tone you dig best.

Another thing I recommend you dick with is using different forms of gain. There are very few amps that you can get as distorted as you want by themselves, so you’ve usually got to heat them up a little bit with a pedal of some kind.

Anyway, even if your amp has all the gain you need right out of the box, if you put another form of gain in front of it then you’ll get a completely different type of crunch or distortion. It doesn’t have to be a distortion unit either; anything that can give you more gain cool – like a clean boost or EQ pedal.

I use a little blue MXR 6-band EQ pedal I got from a pawn shop for some of my gain. The cool thing about using a graphic EQ is you can decide what frequencies you want to add crunch to by pushing those particular EQ bands up more. With a distortion or overdrive box though, the overall tone tends to get distorted. That’s why I like to use gain units rather than distortion pedals.

Altogether I run three types of gain before I even hit the amp – a hot pickup (a Bill Lawrence XL500L lead humbucker), my MXR graphic EQ and a Furman PQ-4, which I use for EQ and gain. Because I’ve got all this gain going on, my Rocktron Guitar Silencer is very important to me. I’ve got to have something that’ll shut my shit down or there’s too much hiss and uncontrollable feedback – kinda like my Feedback Sack!

Anyways, in addition to the stuff I’ve already mentioned, here’s what I use: modified Dean ML guitars; Randall Century 200 125-watt solid-state heads; Randall 412JB straight 4x12” cabinets loaded with 80-watt Jaguar speakers, for my dirty sound; and Randall 412CB straight 4x12” cabs loaded with 70-watt Celestion speakers for my clean sounds; DR strings (.009-.046 for regular and drop-D tunings; .009, .011, .016, .028, .038, .050 for guitars tuned down a whole step); an MXR Flanger/Doubler rack unit; two Digitech Whammy pedals – one on stage, one backstage – see next question); and a Vox wah. I also use a Yamaha SPX90, and a Korg G3 for my clean shit.

Just so you know, even if you get all the gear I use and wire it up the same way I do, it won’t be my sound exactly. Having said that, the rig’s there, and it’s definitely doing something! The bottom line is this: try to emulate your favorite player’s sound only as a basis to find your own tone.

“And don’t be afraid to experiment with different amps, pickups, effects, wirings, axes, etc. Try anything and everything – give it all a chance. Most important, get your rig set up the way you want it to sound. [Editor’s Note: The date of Dime’s answer to the above question was November 1994.]

I thought you used a pedal to get that high squeal during the main riff of Becoming, but when I saw you playing the song live you weren’t stepping on anything. What’s the trick there, bro?! – Ken “Z Man” Zemanek, Chicago, IL

The trick is to have a bad-assed tech like Grady Champion and let him work the Whammy pedal back there for you, so that you can dance and jam to the groove, instead of being strapped to a pedal.

That riff smokes, man, and there’s no way I could just stand still on stage in one place and play it. Grady, if you’re reading this, you @#$in’ rule 88 bud! Jimmy Johnson plus DDS pushing 12 with your name on it. Right back at ya!

I’m completely blown away by your sound and technique, and, like any guitarist, I wish I could do more on the fretboard than I can. Like you, I’m a spazzer who can’t sit down for shit and teach myself scales and things. I just like to jam! Are there any tricks of the trade you know that could give me some new lead ideas? – Wayne “Farm Boy” Farmer, Coppers Cove, TX

One word, Farm Boy – chromatics! I think a lot of people are really intrigued by all those different modes and shit, whereas I’m kinda more inclined to take a lick and then try and move it up or down the neck chromatically, one fret at a time. It’s the simplest thing in the world to do, and it can sound killer!

Try it, man – sit there and burn on a lick like the simple A minor one shown in the first bar of Figure 1. Then, start moving it chromatically up the fretboard, toward the bridge, like in bars 2 and 3.

Although I take this lick up an entire octave (12 frets) here, you don’t have to do that; you can start and stop wherever you like ’cause, for the millionth time in Riffer Madness, there are no rules!

I mean, you could just stop at the 10th fret, like in Figure 2. Moving a lick chromatically down the neck works really well too. Check it out. Figure 3 is just me flipping the previous lick around on its head.

Moving a riff chromatically can also be a good way of adding tension to a song. I do this sometimes, like in the middle of Shedding Skin (Far Beyond Driven), for example.

How did you make the cool-sounding chirping noise that ends your solo in Hard Lines, Sunken Cheeks [Far Beyond Driven]? – Tom Gillis, Seattle, WA

What I’m doing there is bending the G note on the high E string’s 15th fret and then tapping the same string at the 22nd fret with the edge of my pick, while gradually releasing the bend. I start off making a straight up and down ‘chopping’ motion with my pick that gets smaller as the ‘chirp’ gets faster.

Then, once I’m ‘chopping’ as fast as I can, I start going back and forth with my pick, kinda like I’m sawing the string. If your pick is beat up a bit and has some small grooves in it, that’ll help too. To make the trill jump out a little more on the album, I overdubbed a harmony part to it.

I think it’s great how you use part of your songs to make points in your column lessons. After listening to This Love [Vulgar Display of Power], I’m curious how you control such wide bends. I tried to figure it out but was unsuccessful. Help! – Jake Kouns, Centerville, VA

To be accurate when you’re doing big-assed bends like the ones in This Love, you’ve gotta use your ears, man – it’s all a matter of pitch and control. Another thing that will help give you more control over your bending is using more than one finger to do the bend.

For example, when I bend a note with my little finger, I help it out with my other three fingers. The guys at Guitar World tell me that the correct term for this is reinforced bend fingering.

Do you use your pinkie a lot? I haven’t been playing long, and whenever I use mine, the tip of it hurts like hell. I’ll work on it though, if you think it’ll make me play better. Thanx, man, lata! – Scott Scholze, Silvedale, LA

I’d definitely advise you to use your pinkie, bro. I use mine all the time! On wide-stretch ideas, you’ve gotta have it there, and it comes in real handy when you’re jamming on a riff on the low E and A strings too. If you don’t use it much, try throwing it in there ’cause you might come up with something cool that you’ve never done before.

I mean, the A minor blues lick in Figure 4 would be pretty tough to play if you don’t use your pinkie. Using your little finger definitely opens up the neck more, so why limit yourself? Don’t be one of those people that goes: ‘Oh, my pinkie’s weak; I ain’t gonna use it.’ It’s there, so why not use the #$%*er?

My all-time favorite Pantera cut is Use My Third Arm [Far Beyond Driven]. It totally crushes! I’ve managed to figure out how to play all of it except for one single *#$in’ chord, and it’s driving me crazy! What’s the shape you use during the intro and verse? I’ve tried everything, and nothing sounds right. Please help me before they lock me in a padded cell and throw away the key! – Wayne Stevens, Phoenix, AZ

That’s a real *#$$ed up chord and, to be honest I don’t even know what it’s called. For that song, my guitar is tuned to D standard (low to high: D G C F A D), so everything sounds a whole step lower.

The chord shape you’re talking about is shown here in Figure 5 [below]. I guess it’s an inverted Eb power chord with an F, the 2nd, on the low E string, if there is such a chord! Remember, there are no rules! If something sounds good, run with it, bro!

If you have any tips on getting a record deal or anything else to do with making it in the business, I’d be grateful if you shared them. Thank you, from an aspiring guitarist. – Jason Tousignant, Corinth, NY

Two words, man – time and perseverance. That’s what it takes to get anywhere in this business. My bandmates and I were jamming together for eight or nine years before we got signed.

“So hang tough, and give your shit to as many people as you can! The main thing is to have your own style, and that kinda thing doesn’t happen overnight. Hell, it took us nearly eight years to find ourselves and get our Cowboys from Hell identity together. It is possible to get a deal though, I swear – I’m living proof!

I’ve been playing for just over two years now and can wail on pretty fast riffs, like the ones in Cowboys from Hell. But I have trouble nailing some of your slower, simpler-to-play power grooves. I don’t understand this, man! Slow riffs should surely be easier to play than faster ones, right? – Terry Herrington, Sydney, Australia

That’s a good question, bro. Some people think that playing fast takes a whole lot of talent, but I’ll tell ya: playing real slow and being able to keep in the groove while not rushing the beat is the shit too!

My buds in Crowbar jam on some really slow, heavy riffs, and they definitely ain’t as easy to play as they may seem. You gotta pay real close attention to the groove and resist the tendency to rush. Hang loose, hold back and let your ears decide when you should hit the next note, not your fingers!

Could you please explain how you do that cool “cross-handed sliding trick” in the second half of your epic solo in Walk [Vulgar Display of Power]? – Tommy Himes, Angola, IN

A bunch of you have written in, asking about the fake echo technique I use about two-thirds of the way through my Walk solo, so here goes.

It’s real simple, actually: all I’m doing is repeatedly sliding up the G string from the 2nd fret to around the 14th fret, alternating hands. Figure 6 is an A minor lick similar to the one in Walk that incorporates this fake echo technique. Here’s how it goes:

• While you’re doing the bend at the beginning, reach over with your right (pick) hand and “capo” (barre) the G string at the 2nd fret with your middle finger (see PHOTO A), before you do a pull-off with your left (fret) hand.
• As soon as you pull-off your LH, start sliding your RH middle finger up the G string towards the bridge.
• While your RH is sliding, fret the G string at the 2nd fret with your LH index finger.
• When your RH slide gets to around the 14th fret, pull-off your RH finger off the string and then start sliding your LH finger up the neck.
• While your LH is sliding, fret the G string at the 2nd fret with your RH middle finger.
• Pull-off your LH finger when it reaches around the 14th fret and start sliding your RH finger up the G string.
• While your RH is sliding, fret the G string at the 2nd fret with your LH index finger.
• When your RH slide gets to around the 14th fret, pull-off your RH finger off the string and start sliding your LH finger up the neck.
• Stop your LH slide at the 14th fret and add some vibrato.

Got it? If you don’t, check out the Walk video ’cause there’s a close-up of me doing it during the solo. And remember, there are no rules, so dick with shit, experiment and let’s get it out here. Lata!

But first, a brief backstory by Nick Bowcott! Back in 1993, GW’s editors decided to run with an idea that would become a mainstay of the magazine to this day – monthly artist columns.

Two bona fide guitar heroes, Kirk Hammett and Eric Johnson, agreed to do six installments each, but the editors wanted to enlist one more columnist, ideally an up-and-coming player.

Because I had been commissioned to work with said artists on putting together their columns, I was asked if I had any suggestions. My answer was instantaneous – “Diamond Darrell of Pantera. He’s the one!”

I had previously interviewed the guitarist for a one-off lesson article for the magazine and was blown away by his playing, personality, passion and unique and colorful way of explaining things, which the guys at GW and I came to lovingly refer to as “Dimebonics.”

He and I had also become good friends, so I knew working with him would be a blast. Editor-in-Chief Brad Tolinski agreed and, thankfully, so did the Texan Tornado. And so Diamond Darrell’s “Riffer Madness” column was born.

NOTE: Up to and including Pantera’s pivotal sophomore major-label album, 1992’s Vulgar Display of Power, Abbott’s nickname was “Diamond Darrell.” But when Far Beyond Driven was released in 1994, his name was listed as “Dimebag Darrell.” Said album reached Number 1 on the Billboard 200 chart, and the rest is history.

As already mentioned, the initial plan for Riffer Madness was a six-issue run. But due to the enthusiastic reader response to the first few installments, he was soon asked if he’d like to continue the column.

Thanks to all the positive feedback he was getting, plus the fact that he genuinely enjoyed writing the column, he happily agreed. As a result, that first run of monthly columns totalled 28, all bearing his Diamond Darrell name.

Then, in 2000, the celebrated guitarist-turned-columnist returned with another 14 installments, this time as Dimebag Darrell. His plan was to return for a third run in 2005, but, tragically, that never happened.

To celebrate the amazing 42 Riffer Madness episodes that Darrell selflessly gifted us with, here’s a collection of column highlights that focus on the all-important arts of riffing and rhythm work. So, as Dime stated when Riffer Madness debuted in the April 1993 issue of Guitar World, “Let’s plug in and start wailin’!”

Without further ado, I hand the pen over to Mr. Abbott.

Riff rap

To me and my band, guitar riffs are what it’s all about. We know that every time we jam on a great riff, we’ve got a fighting chance of writing a great song. You don’t have to go to G.I.T. or know a bunch of weird-assed chords and scales to come up with killer shit, Jack.

But, you’ve gotta be totally into what you’re doing. Check out Judas Priest’s British Steel if you don’t believe me. It’s packed full of god-like riffs, and most of them aren’t hard to play. If you don’t already own this album, buy it – it’s essential shit, man! Here are a couple of ideas that might help you get the most out of a good, heavy riff.

Octave repeats

One of our audience’s favorite riffs is the main one in Cowboys from Hell. It’s a pretty easy one to play ’cause it’s made up of one of the first rock scales we all learn – the E minor blues scale (see Figures 1 and 2).

The first time you hear this riff is in the intro, where I play it an octave higher than I do during the rest of the track. Hearing it an octave higher is like an appetizer – it introduces you to the riff and makes you hungry for more. It also makes the full-blown version sound really heavy when it kicks in. I guess you could say the intro is the “body blow” and the main riff is the “knockout punch.”

My buddy Jerry Cantrell from Alice In Chains does the same sort of thing on Would? [from Dirt]. He starts off by playing the verse riff in a higher register then slams you in the teeth when the vocals hit by playing it an octave lower.

To give the main Cowboys riff even more power, I play open-string root-5th power chords on the E and A notes (Figures 3 and 4) instead of just playing single notes, as I do in the intro. I also add some low-end “chunk” to the riff by applying some heavy-duty palm muting (P.M.).

I use the idea of repeating a riff in different octaves during the bridge of Cowboys, too. This definitely makes that part sound cooler than if I had just played that [descending] run in the same register twice.”

[EDITOR’S NOTE: Dime also often used this compositional technique of repeating a musical motif an octave higher or lower when playing lead, like at the start of his epic solo in the aforementioned Cowboys from Hell and also the one in Psycho Holiday (Cowboys from Hell), to name but two. Check them out. It’s an idea well worth embracing!]

Texas-style half-step bends

Using string bends instead of just playing regular, unbent notes can definitely help give certain riffs a cooler, heavier vibe.

• Note: For Figures 5 to 13 guitar is tuned down one whole step D-G-C-F-A-D

Take the opening riff to Walk, for example. I guess you could play the notes “straight” without the “greasy” string bend-and-release (Figure 5 illustrates said “straight” approach), but the “real way” sounds way better to me, man! It’s much heavier and nastier, and that’s what we’re looking for, bud – weak riffs are out!

I do the same kinda thing on the opening riff to Revolution Is My Name (Reinventing the Steel). Here’s the twist I put on it… I call it “Texas style!” What I do is scoot back a fret from the notes I heard in my head and then bend up to each one from a half step below while also adding a pick squeal (Figures 6a and 6b).

When I was jerking around with the original riff idea, I figured it would sound way more interesting if I did a slow, deliberate half-step bend up to each one, because as soon as each bend starts, your ear wants to hear the note come up to pitch.

Some people do this sorta thing a lot when they’re playing lead, but most of ’em don’t bother to do it at all when they’re riffing out on the low strings.

For some reason, a lot of guitarists who can play killer leads get real sterile on their rhythm stuff; they don’t bend notes, and they’re all too careful about playing their chords dead straight. Then, when they cut to lead, they start bending notes and adding vibrato all over the place.

Lead rhythm and bending chords

The way I’ve always looked at my rhythm playing is almost like I’m playing lead on the big strings anyway. Because of this I use vibrato and bends on the big strings as well as one the little ones… and not just on single-note stuff, either. Sometimes throwing down a bend or some vibrato on a power chord is cool, too! For example, let’s take a fairly mediocre riff like Figure 7a.

To make it more evil and interesting sounding, try this: instead of using a regular G5 power chord, bend an F#5 shape up to G5, like in Figure 7b. Bending two different notes up exactly half-a-step at exactly the same time is kinda difficult at first, but stick with it ’cause it sounds great when you get it down. You can hear me doing this at the end of Hollow (Vulgar Display of Power).

Don't skitz – hang tough!

The breakdown riff at 2:05 in We’ll Grind that Axe for a Long Time (Reinventing the Steel) has got some [root/5th power] chord bends happening, too, and they’re actually whole-step bends. To do each bend, I pull the low E string (which is tuned down to D) with my index finger and the A string (tuned to G) with my pinkie, with some help from my ring finger (Figure 8a).

The bend raises the pitch of the chord the same as if you were to slide it two frets up the neck (Figure 8b), but it’s smoother sounding. That’s why I chose to go with the bend instead of the slide. Half the trick of this move is trying to keep the chord decently in tune while you’re bending it.

If your 1st finger bends more than your pinkie, then the chord is gonna go sour. Don’t get me wrong – it’s cool to get a little out of whack, but at the same time you’re trying to hold the chord in tune as much as possible while the bend is going on. It’s a total ear/feel thing – your ear is wanting to hear something and is telling you where to go while your fingers are feeling and controlling the bend.

Don’t freak if you can’t nail these chord bends right away. Just keep hanging with it and it’ll come. Because you’re bending the big strings here, you might have to do it a few times to build up some strength in your fingers, if you’re not used to doing it. There’s a lot more mass down there, compared to the thinner strings!

Also, you obviously have to bend the low strings by pulling them into your palm rather than pushing them upwards, like you normally do with the little strings, so that might take some getting used to, as well.

The fact that my guitar is always tuned down a hair lower than a quarter step below concert pitch, plus down an additional whole step in this case, helps with the looseness of the strings. But it’s still a pretty big bend. It doesn’t have to be perfect, though. So just catch a vibe and roll with it.

Unique tuning offset

Editor’s Note: Per Darrell’s renowned, long-time guitar tech, Grady “Dragon” Champion, here’s the scoop on Dime’s unusual guitar tuning offset: Whether it’s down a half step (Eb standard), drop-D, drop-C# or some other variant, it was always an additional 60 cents flat of concert pitch (slightly lower than a quarter tone, which is 50 cents).

Says Grady: “To us, E is really D# plus 40 cents. Likewise, A is really G# plus 40 cents, D is really C# plus 40 cents, and so on.” Now you know why it’s so hard to tune to a lot of Pantera songs.

Sinister slides

Sliding from one power chord to another can also help make a riff sound more sinister. I got the idea from listening to Tony Iommi in Black Sabbath, and I do it a lot.

For example, check out Mouth for War (Vulgar Display of Power). So, if I wanted to make a riff like Figure 9a sound nastier, I’d probably throw in a chord-slide and maybe a chord-bend too (Figure 9b).

Which one sounds better? C’mon, there’s no contest! Figure 9b kicks Figure 9a’s sorry ass! Like I’ve said before, sometimes even the simplest shit can be really bad-assed… as long as it’s played aggressively. It’s all about attitude, man – meaning playing it like you mean it!

Long, single-note slides

There are two things you have to remember when doing really long slides that don’t have a set starting place, like this one, “from nowhere in particular” to the 10th fret on the 6th string (Figure 10), which is along the lines of what I do in the verse riff of Goddamn Electric (Reinventing the Steel).

First, you’ve gotta let off the strings a tad with your fret hand and just let them slide under your fingers. If you press too hard on the strings when you’re doing a long slide up or down the neck, it probably won’t come out right.

It's about the destination, not the journey

The other thing to remember when you’re sliding a long way is this: it’s the destination that’s important, man. It doesn’t really matter how you get there or where you start the slide.

The trick is knowing where to stop and making sure that you don’t get there too early or too late. So, keep your fret hand loose, use your ears and eyes and, with a bit of practice, you’ll be nailing long assed-slides like the ones in the Goddamn Electric verse every time.

Rules? There are no rules

My musical knowledge is pretty limited, scale-wise. I know the major scale, the minor scale, the pentatonic blues scale and the chromatic scale, but that’s about it, man! If I can learn a new scale somewhere I’m definitely open to it. I’m not down on scales, it’s just that I’m more into riffing and jamming as opposed to book-school theory reading.

“Be raw” – that’s what I always say. I’m always experimenting with new note ideas because in my style there are no rules. Always remember this, and never be afraid to cut loose.

Hell, if you find yourself hanging on a bad note, you can always tighten it up by bending, sliding it, or dumping or yanking your whammy bar… don’t skitz on this though, just keep an open mind and experiment. Whatever the song calls for and whatever you’re hearing is fair game.

Chromatic man

In case you don’t know what chromatic means, let me explain: it means every goddamned note! So, to play chromatically, all you do is move up or down a string one fret at a time.

Simple shit, but it can sound really cool. I use chromatic movement a lot in my riffs because it adds a pushing/pulling kinda tension. It almost reminds me of running up and down a flight of stairs, one step at a time – 12 steps to the top, and 12 steps to the bottom.

A chromatic passage can add mood and aggression to a part. If you’ve never dicked around with this idea, then check this out. Say you have a simple riff like Figure 11. Instead of just going from E to G and then back to E, try moving between them chromatically, like in Figure 12.

You can do this between any chords or notes. It just depends on what you wanna create. This is a simple idea, but it kicks ass.

Scope it out and then take it further. Good examples of riffs based on chromatic thinking are the main one in A New Level (Vulgar Display of Power), the pre-chorus of Cowboys…, the first bridge riff of This Love and pretty much all of the riffs in We’ll Grind That Axe for a Long Time. That last cut is big-time chromatic.

Hopefully this will inspire you to jam out some cool chromatic-based riffs of your own. Keep shredding ass and hang raw!

Palm muting tips

Palm-muting a note or power chord by resting the heel of your picking hand on the strings as they go over the bridge is a pretty basic and essential metal guitar playing technique that, if done correctly, can add a shitload of ballsy chunk to a riff. But there are a couple of things you have to watch out for when doing this.

For me, the best place to palm-mute the strings is right where they go over the bridge or just a hair in front of that. If you go too far forward though, you’ll choke the string so much it’ll just be dead-sounding and will make a racket rather than a note. Also, you don’t want to go too far back the other way either, otherwise you’ll end up muting jack shit. So, dick around until you find the sweet spot that hums – you’ll definitely know when you find it.

Don’t be too heavy handed when palm-muting, especially if you’re using light strings and you’ve got your action set low. Some nights when we’re playing live, I’ll be really fired up and will be playing so super-hard that I won’t even be aware that I’m just crunching down on my muting so hard that it doesn’t even sound like I’m playing notes anymore.

This happens because I’m pushing the strings down so far that they start kinda hitting the frets and making a weird, clanking noise. Whenever this happens, I’ll walk back to my rig and my tech Grady [Champion] will go, “Ease up, son; you’re killing it!”

Seeing as guitar playing is either muscle or finesse, if you’re gonna strangle it then use heavy-assed strings with an action that’s set high enough, so you have more room to lean into the strings. If you choose to go this route, you’ll be able to pretty much mute as hard as you want. Keep in mind though, that setting your guitar up this way will also make it much more difficult to play.

If your axe has a whammy system, like a Floyd Rose, and it is set up to be “floating,” so that you can pull notes up as well as push them down, that’s another trick you’ve got to master.

With a floating bridge, you have to be real careful when palm muting because, if you rest your hand too far back on the bridge, then you’re gonna push the back of it down and make your strings go sharp. Of course, this isn’t a problem if your guitar has a fixed bridge or a non-floating tremolo setup.

Choking up on your pick

Another thing to watch out for when you’re chunking on a fast riff is not to stick your pick too far into the strings. Think about it. You can’t really haul ass if you’re pulling a big piece of the pick across the strings, can you?

Also, doing this can make the string start flapping too much and, if you’re not careful, that starts messing up the pitch of the note.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not suggesting that you pitter around and play wimpy. I’m just saying that it’s a good idea to “choke up” a little bit on your pick, clasping it a little bit closer to its pointy tip, so that too much if it isn’t sticking out past your fingers.

The ups and downs of picking

To make sure I get maximum chunk happening on the palm muted low-string sections of a riff, like the pre-verse riff of Revolution Is My Name (Reinventing the Steel), I play ’em using downstrokes only.

Actually, that first bar, which is eighth-note triplets played at around 140 beats per minute, as in Figure 13, is pretty close to my breaking point. If it were any faster, I’d probably switch to alternate (down-up) picking. I’d imagine that’s true for most people… unless, of course, you’re James Hetfield! That dude is the king of down picking, no question about it.

As I’ve said a lot of times in interviews, I don’t necessarily try to play everything using just down picking as a rule anyway, because I do a lot of up picking in songs like Cowboys… and whatnot. Although downstrokes are more consistent, mechanical and machine-gun like.

But sometimes I feel I can get more chunk and grind by using upstrokes too, so I’ll alternate pick. Upstrokes definitely have a different attack than downstrokes, and this can suit certain riffs better.

One of the cool things about upstrokes is, when you’re doing them on your low E string, you can dig in deep with your pick and hit the string real hard without having to worry about hitting another string.

Also, the way I do upstrokes is almost like I’m doing a pick scrape. As opposed to just picking straight across the string, I kinda drag the pick across it to get a “scrap” happening just before the note sounds.

Pick scratching, not scraping

When I play live, I jump around like an idiot for 90 minutes under a lighting rig that’s hotter than hell. This makes me sweat like a pig and makes it really hard to keep a firm grip on my picks, even those that are supposed to be non-slip.

Losing control of your pick on stage sucks, so either I or Grady scratch some deep Xs into both sides of my pick (see photo above) with something sharp like a dart. Doing this makes your picks look like shit, but at least you won’t look like a nincompoop when you drop one in the middle of a solo!

Learning from others by listening

Some folks tend to get really intimidated when they come across someone who really rips on guitar. But not me, pops. I get inspired! As far as I’m concerned, playing is not a competition. Hearing someone smoke always lights my fire and makes me try out new ideas and learn new shit.

I don’t sit down with a pile of records and try to cop licks, though. What I’m into is checking out the player’s overall vibe and approach and learning from that. Use your ears and learn all you can from anything. Listen!

Pinkie power and EVH

When I first started playing guitar, one of my biggest influences was Eddie Van Halen. I kept seeing pictures of him doing big-assed left-hand stretches, and that inspired me to start dicking around with some wide-stretch ideas of my own, like the two E minor licks in Figures 14 and 15.

Another thing I learned from studying those pictures was the importance of my little finger. It’s there, so use it! It definitely gives you more reach!

Awkwardly cool symmetrical runs

As I got to know my guitar neck better, I realized that there was an E note at the 19th fret on the A string – HOW ’BOUT THAT! Then, when I was jamming around one day, I thought to myself: “Hey I know some wide-stretch E minor licks (like the one in Figure 15) that also use the 19th fret, why don’t I try moving that fingering pattern idea across each string, from high to low, until I finish up on the E note at the 19th fret of the A string (Figure 16)?”

Since the fingering pattern in Figure 16 is exactly the same on each string, a lot of guys call this kind of thing a symmetrical run. It’s simple, but cool. To be honest, I have no idea what the hell scales this run uses because I’m not a cat that’s heavy on theory.

All I know is it sounds awkwardly cool in the key of E minor, and that’s all that matters. Listen closely and let your ears decide what notes are right or wrong! Anyway, because this idea worked, that’s how I got into futzing around with symmetrical runs in a major way.

Rut busting

Whenever you feel like you’re stuck in a playing rut, always try and remember two things: one, you ain’t the only player that gets hit with this shit; we all go through it from time to time. And two, you’re not always gonna be stuck there, so don’t freak out!

The only way that’ll happen is if you let it. So don’t get bummed out and go, “Fuck it, I quit!” That’s a dumb-assed, loser attitude. Instead, get to work, man. If you want to get out of a rut bad enough, you will. But it’s up to you. No-one else is ever gonna do it for you.

Fatherly advice

One day, when I was learning to play guitar, I was stomping around the house all pissed off because my playing was in a bit of a rut. My dad, who’s a great guitarist, said something that I’ve always remembered.

He asked me, “can you learn a new lick today?” I said, “of course I can.” Then he said, “well son, if you decided to learn just one new lick a day, how many would you have at the end of the year?”

Think about it, man! The possibilities are staggering. Shit! If I knew a lick for every beer or Black Tooth I’ve had, I can’t even imagine how much extra knowledge I’d have!

The importance of others

To me, a sure-fire way to get into a rut is to sit around and play by yourself all the time. You’ve gotta get out there and jam! You don’t have to necessarily be in a band. All you need is a couple of buddies who play.

And they don’t have to be guitarists either, jamming with a bassist or a drummer is cool. Jamming with other people creates energy and excitement. You can feed off that, and it will help push you to do things you’d never dream of by yourself.

Be yourself, by yourself

If you have no buds to jam with, you can always record a rhythm part yourself and then wail a lead over it. I used to do that all the time. Don’t always jam over the same sort of stuff though, or you could fall into a rut.

Whenever I’d get tired of soloing over heavy riffs in E, I’d come up with something in a completely different key that had a completely different feel to it. Sometimes a change of mood and key can help you find fresh lead ideas. This laid-back, bluesy B minor riff in Figure 17 is a good example of what I’m talking about here.

Signing off

Hopefully I’ve helped open some ears and eyes! Let all the ideas I’ve put in your heads come as they will – subconsciously and naturally. And remember. It’s all good; everything goes; and there ain’t no damned rules nor boundaries. So, get off! Tear it a fresh ass. Tear it hard. Rip gaping holes in it. Make tracks – leave marks!!!

Forever, Stronger Than All.

“With Pantera the thing is that their crew was such an important part of the band,” says legendary Pantera producer Terry Date. “They were like family, too.”

If you’ve seen the infamous Pantera “Home Videos,” you know just how true Date’s statement is.

As you can see below, we managed to track down a few of the original Pantera road crew to ask them what made Dime a true one-off.

Grady Champion (Dime’s guitar tech)

“Dime was just so special – not only as a guitar player, but also in the way he treated people. It was always next level. Nobody was a stranger, everyone was a friend. And his playing was pure passion and skill.

“He always played from the heart and soul, and I don’t think that’s lost on anybody who listens to him play. As a guitarist and a guy, he was absolutely the complete package.”

Guy Sykes (tour manager)

“I think the biggest thing is the way Dime plays with so much feeling. Every note just resonates. It’s as if he took Jimmy Page, Brian May, Eddie Van Halen, Randy Rhoads, Ace Frehley, Billy Gibbons and so many more and threw it in a blender with his own unique playing style and a bit of Texas shuffle. His playing seems vaguely familiar but is absolutely unique.”

Sterling Winfield (ex-bass tech, engineer and co-producer of Reinventing the Steel)

“As Eddie Van Halen said, Dime was an original. It takes an original to know an original; Eddie recognized that, and I think we all knew it, too. I think things like that endure; they stand the test of time.

“All these people you hold in high regard – Eddie, Hendrix, Page, Clapton and Iommi – they’re originals; and I think there’s a continuing timelessness to any original, when you hear them, you immediately know who it is.

“The same is true of Dime; when you hear that sound and that style you immediately know it’s him. That’s why Dime endures; no-one did it before him. A million afterwards, but no-one before him.”

Sonny Satterfield (lighting director)

“I first saw him at a very young age. He was 16 or 17, and he was already jumping on people’s tables with cocktails on them, flipping the guitar backwards while playing it; what a showman and an amazing player he was. He was doing all these tricks while playing the songs and licks perfectly. So, even back then I knew he was destined for greatness.

“I think that just like Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Randy Rhoads and Eddie Van Halen, his legacy is going to carry on for generations, because Dime is in the same category as the other four gentlemen I just mentioned.

“His playing and his music stand the test of time – you can see it at the Pantera Celebration shows today. Me and Grady are there, and we see guys our age with their kids and their grandkids! And the 9-year-old is rocking out with their 60-year-old grandpa!”

• Special thanks to Rita Haney for her help gathering quotes.

In 1990, a band from Texas unleashed their debut major-label release upon an unsuspecting metal-loving world. That band’s name? Pantera. The album? Cowboys from Hell.

The result was a sizable and powerful wave that quickly grew into an unstoppable tsunami once the band’s next two long-playing salvos – Vulgar Display of Power (1992) and Far Beyond Driven (1994) – hit the streets. At the epicenter of this Texas tornado was a six-string whirlwind who many consider to be the world’s last true guitar hero, a guy named Darrell Lance Abbott. He was better known as Dimebag.

Armed with a solid-state stack, an ungodly amount of gain and an angular Dean ML ax adorned with a lightning bolt, Dimebag took the guitar world by storm with the help of his fellow cowboys from hell, Vinnie Paul (drums – and also Dime’s brother), Rex Brown (bass) and Philip H. Anselmo (vocals).

And as jaw dropping as his highly creative, lightning-fast chops; innovative whammy bar work and searing yet soulful soloing was, the ace up Dime’s sleeve was his world-class riff-writing ability. Coupled with Pantera’s patented and genre-creating “power groove,” riffs-ridden songs such as Walk, Mouth for War, Becoming, 5 Minutes Alone, Cowboys from Hell and This Love are rightly hailed as timeless metal classics.

Sadly, after a live album – Official Live: 101 Proof (1997) – and two more studio offerings – The Great Southern Trendkill (1997) and Reinventing the Steel (2000) – Pantera unceremoniously imploded and parted ways in 2003. Dime and Vinnie went on to form the criminally underrated Damageplan.

Then, on December 8, 2004, a previously unthinkable, inexplicable nightmare happened. A deranged lunatic managed to get on stage with a firearm and take Dime’s life while he was playing. Millions of metal fans across the globe mourned in a state of shock and disbelief.

Thanks to his influential playing and timeless riffs, Dime’s legacy not only lives on, but continues to inspire new generations of aspiring guitarists. Darrell’s work also still impacts many of his friends and peers, to whom we posed the following question: “Why is Dimebag still so far beyond relevant 20 years after his death?”

Here are their answers.

Alex Skolnick (Testament)

“Dimebag is relevant for many reasons, but I think the one that best describes it is Pantera’s album title, Reinventing the Steel. By the time the band broke through in the early ’90s, most heavier bands were following the Judas Priest/Iron Maiden/Scorpions template of twin guitars.

“This included the ‘Big Four’ of thrash (Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth, Anthrax), related acts (Testament, plus Exodus, Death Angel, Overkill and others) as well as the extreme-metal scene spawned by another fallen guitar hero, Death’s Chuck Schuldiner. Yet Dime figured out a way to match the heaviness and intensity of all of our groups – not just in the studio but live – with just a single guitar, creating a whole new approach to riffs and tone.

“Two guitars is still the norm because it’s still so rare for anyone to achieve that kind of heaviness in a single-guitar band. Yet Dime managed to do so, inspiring generations of players in the process.”

Mark Holcomb (Periphery)

“When I first heard Pantera in the ’90s, Dime was the first guitarist I’d ever known of that had the virtuosity to hang with the super-shredder, G3 crowd if he wanted to. Instead, he played in the heaviest band on the planet, and the emphasis was 100 percent on these massive riffs and songs. Then, when he had a window to show off his technical prowess via a solo, he’d just floor it – and it was a reminder of just how insanely gifted he was as a lead player.

“He epitomized the idea of writing powerful riffs and memorable songs, all against the backdrop of having this insane technical ability that he always had in his back pocket. That was a rare combination in the ’90s, but nearly all modern metal bands chase that duality now. It’s cool to be good at your instrument and write really heavy, caveman music, and I think it’s fair to attribute that, in large part, to Dime.”

Zakk Wylde (Ozzy Osbourne, Black label society, Pantera Celebration)

“Pantera is and always will be the gold standard of the extreme metal/power groove genre they created. Obviously, Saint Dime sits at the table alongside the likes of Jimi Hendrix, Randy Rhoads and Eddie Van Halen because, just like them, his playing will always be far beyond relevant.

“He breathes the same rarified air as Tony Iommi and Jimmy Page when it comes to world-class riff writing. Ultimately, I think that’s Dime’s legacy, just like with all the great guitar players we love. It’s what he wrote.”

Kerry King (Slayer, solo)

“Once you establish yourself onto the scene, most people can’t get enough of what you’re doing. And there’s generally a bunch of young axe-slingers looking to unseat you. But with Dime, not only was he taken away from us way too soon, but I’ve yet to see that next ‘it’ guitar guy.

“I’m sure there are some out there, but none that stormed the scene like Dime did. Very much like Rhoads, Eddie, etc., Dime was completely effortless and completely crushing, all at once.”

Rob Halford (Judas Priest)

“Darrell’s style of playing was a badly needed game changer in the guitar world. He created a powerful magnet that drew all kinds of guitarists into his uniqueness. His flair for breaking the mold will appeal to countless generations.”

Richie Faulkner (Judas Priest)

“In addition to having a perfect blend of melody, technique and feel, the whole sound of the band was a massive contrast to the hair metal that came before it. Pantera’s music never felt over produced and was always raw sounding.

“There were some exceptions, but for the most part it was the solos over crushing bass and drums. No rhythm tracks. I think it just made it raw and real. Along with his melodic sensibilities and technique, it stands up to this day.”

Glenn Tipton (Judas Priest)

“Darrell is still relevant because he helped pave the way for a new style of lead guitar playing, influencing many players along the way.”

Phil Anselmo (Pantera, Down)

“Why is Dime still relevant? Because he is one of the greatest players of all time, hands down.”

Rex Brown (Pantera)

“Dime is one of the most recognized guitar players of all time. From his tone to his phrasing of his riffs, to the way he incorporated all of it together, it was in a class all of its own. It was so special being there in real time – and that spirit is still shining bright. He was a glowing beacon of light in so many people’s lives with his personality and generosity.”

Marty Friedman

“Dime is more than just a guitar player. He represents a good dude, a happy and fun guy to be around, a bro who lives and breathes guitar and heavy music. He was the opposite of the stereotypical egomaniac guitarist, and that’s what all of us hopefully aspire to be.

“On top of this, his playing is capable of melting your face beyond recognition! He left us with music that brings people immense joy, even when channeled through other super musicians who are compelled to spread his music throughout the world. That makes him extremely relevant in my book.”

Nita Strauss

“I can’t think of another guitarist who has the combination of stellar technique and reckless abandon that was exhibited by the great Dimebag Darrell! That’s something that so many modern guitarists aspire to but can never duplicate.”

Jim Dunlop (Dunlop, MXR)

“He was completely dedicated to his craft – his playing, riffs, arrangements, solos and tone. It was almost like you took Eddie, Randy and Jimi and put them in a blender, but what came out sounded like Dime and no one else.

“He was a master of not only his guitar but his entire rig; he’d take things like the MXR Flanger/Doubler and use it in a subtle but unmistakable way that was instantly recognizable as his sound and no one else’s. His playing took you on a journey, from the brutal sledgehammer world of Walk and Domination to the brooding beauty of This Love and Floods. He’d not only take you there; he’d leave you there – and you were all the better for it.

“Just like Randy, Dime was a master of crafting a melody within a melody, but in his own way. No one sounded or played like him, and no-one ever will. He was so damned pure and honest in everything he’d do.

“He was also one of the coolest people I’ve ever been lucky enough to hang with, and he genuinely loved and respected his fans. He never phoned it in, no matter how tired or hungover he was. He was always ‘on.’ The glass was never half-empty with Dime; it was so full, it was overflowing. You could see it in his eyes at every single show. No exceptions, ever.”

Mark Morton (Lamb of God)

“Dime’s relevance is rooted in his authenticity. Of course, his technical skills were top notch; but it was his ability to blend elements of Black Sabbath power, ZZ Top swagger and Van Halen fireworks into a voice that became uniquely his own that sets Dime apart as one of the greats. We love you, Dimebag!”

Blues Saraceno

“Dime represented all the best parts of all that music we love. The phrasing, passion, imagination, aggression, execution, tone, kindness and fuck-yeah attitude with just the right amount of Texas swing mixed in. Unduplicatable. The Abbott brothers were originals. Anybody who had the good fortune to have them in their lives was better for it. I sure know mine was.”

Jose Mangin (Satellite radio metal ambassador)

“His spirit. His attitude toward life and metal. He left a lasting legacy and was truly the most unique metal personality to ever come from our 54 years of music. His riffs, his music, his passion is what makes Dime still relevant. He’s the greatest metal guitar player of all time, and after all these years the world still feels the same. In fact, I think his reputation is even greater now than it was 20 years ago.”

Cody Jinks

“What will live on, along with Dime’s incredible music, is his love for his fans. As a fan, I saw how important it was to him to treat everyone right. Every day, I try to show my fans the love that Dime showed us. That’s as beautiful as his music.”

Matt Heafy (Trivium)

“Great guitar playing is typically measured in terms of what one can do on lead guitar; but rhythm guitar needs to be equally weighted in importance. Dime had written some of the most iconic rhythm riffs – whether as simple and understated (yet perfect) as Walk or as intricate and unique as the rhythm parts in Shedding Skin or New Level. Dime also wrote some of the most powerfully heavy riffs, like Domination and This Love. The list goes on.

“That doesn’t even scratch the surface of Dime’s lead playing. He was capable of shredding and out-shredding any of the virtuosos of the time while having this incredibly soulful solo style that was emotional, memorable and singable. He was masterful with tone, gear, showmanship, writing, rhythm/lead… He had it all and then some.”

dUg Pinnick (King’s X)

“With Walk, he made one of the most incredibly simple yet complex and groovy riffs that anyone has ever come up with. 20 years later, he’s still inspiring the next generation.”

Gary Holt (Exodus, Slayer)

“The riffs. Riffs live forever. Some of the most gloriously heavy breakdowns and so much more. The man could take three notes and create one of the most memorable riffs of all time, Walk. But also the way he lived – always up for a good time, always positive. People remember that.”

Terry Date (Pantera producer)

“Darrell was an extraordinary talent, somebody whose guitar was part of their body and who was miles above any other player of that genre. When you combine that with Dime’s charismatic personality, that made everybody feel like they were his best friend; it translates over generations. The legend carries on. Dime was totally unique. He was a one-of-a-kind guy.”

Charlie Benante (Anthrax, Pantera Celebration)

“Dime was continuously learning and developing skills and Ideas. He was so ahead of his time that guitarists are still blown away when they hear him for the first time. I don’t think anyone doubts that Dime was one of the last guitar players that revolutionized guitar playing and guitar style.

“For me, he was the rockstar guitar player. Besides Van Halen, it’s him. Dime’s personality was this larger-than-life party figure, but he was one of the warmest, generous and loving people I knew. That side of him comes out a lot in his playing too."

Ola Englund (YouTuber, the Haunted)

“There are guitar players that rip and tear, but few did it like Dime, and that’s why he’s always going to stay a legend. He lived and breathed guitar and poured his heart and soul into his craft. And with that he left a true legacy.”

Bill Kelliher (Mastodon)

“Dimebag will go down in history as one of the most badass Southern metal guitarists of our generation. His distinctive testosterone-driven riffs and face-melting solos will inspire legions of future metalheads to pick up the guitar. He was ahead of his time, bending strings and notes beyond the limits of human aptitude.”

Scott Ian (Anthrax)

“Darrell’s ability, tone, style, approach, musicality, aggression, rhythm chops and smile changed guitar playing in the same way Eddie did a generation before him. Darrell’s sound is unmistakable and his influence on the four decades that came after is inescapable.”

Tommy Victor (Prong)

“The technical proficiency of his playing is undeniable. It was pretty much spot-on consistently. A lot of guys through the years practiced to Dime because he was so good – his rhythm playing and his solos. But beyond that, I think he fused a lot of styles together.

“If you really listen to all his work, there’s blues, there’s old-school metal, there’s thrash and there’s hardcore punk there. Some of that New Orleans sound is in there as well. He accomplished the pure elements of rock into one package.”

Frank Bello (Anthrax)

“Dime was a gift to all us metal fans. I’m proud to say I was a friend of his and got to gamble, drink and tour the world with him. He was a really great person, and I think that’s what I think people miss. I’m glad there are those great videos [that show] how much fun he was to hang out with, because that was all in one package!

“Imagine this: an amazing guitar player, world-class riff-meister and great soloist – and then he’s this great guy on the other side. It draws you in; you were always drawn to Dime.

“It’s fun watching the new generation be turned onto Dime, because there’s a whole new flock of guitar players and metal fans that are finding out about him and wanting to know everything about him. And they should, because Dime was the real deal.”

Dean Zelinsky (DBZ Guitars, luthier, designer of the Dean ML)

“Darrell is one of the most influential players of all time and was also the most genuine person I ever met. He was kind to the core, had a huge heart and loved to entertain. While fans were watching this incredible guitar player onstage, they were falling in love with his infectious persona and smile.

“This transcends the music, it transcends time. He clearly inspired hundreds of thousands, possibly millions around the world to want to play guitar. Everyone wanted – and wants – to be like Dime. He was a pioneer in what metal became. His playing is unmatched, even today.”

Jake Bowen (Periphery)

“We’re living in an age where it seems legendary artists are getting harder to come by. By legendary, I mean artists who breathe unique energy or a signature sound into the scenes they inhabit. Darrell ‘Dimebag’ Abbott was a force on guitar very much in the way Jimi Hendrix, Eddie Van Halen and Randy Rhoads were.

“Like the aforementioned, Dime played his instrument in a way that is instantly recognizable, when you hear one note, one bend, or even just the guitar tone you know exactly who you’re dealing with.

“While we wait for the next generation of legendary artists to take hold, I believe people will look back to the past and realize that we had something amazing when Dime was with us. Hopefully the younger generation realizes this and figures out the formula to their own unique sound the way Pantera was able to.”

Satchel (Steel Panther)

“Why is Dime still so relevant? This is a subjective question, and I’m going to give my very opinionated opinion on this, because speculating is what we do when given speculative questions… and also, I give no ducks. And that right there, I believe, is the answer: Dime gave no ducks.

“And he played guitar like he gave no ducks. And that, you kids out there, doesn’t mean Dime didn’t care; he cared about the music, the tone, the riffs, the bends, the vibrato and the motherduckin’ conviction with which he played. That’s why he sounded like a beast every time he picked up a guitar. That’s why he put the time in to become a virtuoso and also why he never hit a bad note – because he played every note with so much conviction that it was impossible for it to be a bad note.

“He ducking cared a lot, but when he started playing, he gave no ducks. He didn’t give a duck who didn’t like it. He didn’t give a duck if it sold a million records. He didn’t give a duck if he never won a Grammy. He gave zero ducks. And he still sounds ducking killer 30 years later. We can all learn from Dime after all these years. Play guitar like you give no ducks. When your teacher asks where your homework is, tell her you have no ducks to give about homework.

“When your mom asks you to clean your room, tell her you ran out of ducks to give about cleaning your damn room. When the IRS shows up at your door looking for your receipts for 2018, tell them to ask someone who gives a duck. Then crank up some Pantera.”

Kayla Kent (YouTuber)

“The vibrato, the hick bends, his insanely clean legato and pick attack. Couple that with his original style in his music with the groove metal, and his original style aesthetically – using exclusively ML‑shaped guitars. He was original at his core in the best way possible, and he always stuck to his guns.”

Ben Eller (YouTuber)

“Attitude will never go out of style! Players like Dime and EVH had a sincerity and ferocity to their playing that will always be relevant and timeless because it’s the real deal, and people can hear, feel and smell [it]!”

Chris Caffery (Trans-Siberian Orchestra)

“There are very few guitarists who actually attached a sound to their legacy. Tony Iommi, Michael Schenker, Eddie Van Halen, Yngwie Malmsteen and Angus Young all had that special quality where it changed the history of guitar and almost created its own category. This is why I use the term ‘un-Dime-niable.’ After he came along and Pantera rose to the top of the scene, there was a new sound.

“Dime placed himself among Hendrix and Jeff Beck and any greats that can be used as one of the ‘he sounds like’ guitarists! Or the ones people will say, ‘I was inspired by…’ 20 years from now I can only see this legacy growing. There is and always will be a Pantera sound and style. Very few bands can say this.”

Chad Kroeger (Nickelback)

“Every generation needs a guitar hero to inspire the new flock of players. Thank God every generation will be able to look back at what Dime did for guitar playing and be able to call him a hero.”

Rabea Massaad (YouTuber)

“His approach to ‘heavy’ is pretty much timeless. The tight, palm-muted chugs and tonal choices in his riffs still don’t sound dated, they just sound heavy! On top of that, I think his style and attitude toward his playing is infectious.

“It was more than just ‘shred,’ he had soul in his playing, attitude and a charisma that made me wanna learn the parts and experience feeling what it’s like to try to play those parts. He influenced a lot of guitar players from more than one angle. Riffs and lead, writing and how to be a stand-up dude with a good attitude to being a guitar player.”

Chris Broderick (In Flames)

“1. His playing had so much of his personality and bravado in it that you can’t help but connect with it in a guttural way.

“2. Between his technical prowess and the unique blend of Texas shred, he and his brother could groove so hard!”

Dave Davidson (Revocation)

“As I sit here listening to Vulgar Display of Power, pondering Dime’s legacy, a few words come to mind. Attitude. Virtuosity. Soul. Dime had all those qualities and more. His blend of aggressive riffing and guitar acrobatics were combined so perfectly that his music continues to resonate with fans of metal, young and old.

“Dime had a unique voice on the guitar; you can hear five seconds of a riff or a solo and can just tell it’s him by his tone and feel. If you’re just picking up a guitar today and want to play metal, you’re going to be influenced by him in some way. His influence was that great on the genre. Thanks for the inspiration, Dime; you changed the way I looked at the guitar.”

Sully Erna (Godsmack)

“Most people would say Dime is one of the best metal guitarists in the world. That’s a bit vague for me. I’d put Dime in the top three against any metal guitarist. But it’s beyond his playing that makes him an icon.

“His character and loyalty as a friend, brother and human being is what separates him miles from any other person I’ve ever met. And when you have talent and genuine care for people and life, that’s what makes you unforgettable!”

C.J. Pierce (Drowning Pool)

“Dime was a one-of-a-kind, natural talent, a completely original musician like no other. His writing style and solos define Southern metal at its finest. I believe it says in the dictionary the definition of metal is Pantera! The music Dime created with Pantera pushed the limits and will forever live on and be relevant.”

Eric Peterson (Testament)

“Dime’s riffs are still heavy hitting, perfect riff frequencies that abduct you to the bone and reflesh you! My favorite thing about his solos is they don’t 'over shred'. They fit the vibe of the songs, and he wasn’t afraid to make some noise, either! Don’t get me wrong though; there is shredding going on when needed, it’s just very well-controlled and always fits the demeanor of the songs.”

Attila Vörös (YouTuber)

“It’s the way in which Dime could express himself through his playing. His riffs and leads are like a language everybody can understand, simply because it’s never just notes being put after one another; it’s always done with intention and depth. Dime was totally real and honest, and people feel that.

“Then, of course, there’s the person he was, which, needless to say, touched and resonated with so many – and still does. Dime was like a big brother, even though I never met him.”

Jon Donais (Anthrax, Shadows Fall)

“Dime is what a I call an MVP guitarist. He had the riffs, songs, solos and the rockstar charisma and presence. It’s rare to find someone who can check all those boxes.”

Phil Demmel (Category 7, Kerry King)

“Dime, EVH, Rhoads, SRV and Hendrix were dedicated to their craft from all angles, including technique, note selection and performance. But it’s the instrument and the equipment that is their conduit to the listener and makes him so relevant. Players are chasing his guitar setup and his tone, and that’s all thanks to him putting in the time to develop that signature sound.”

Billy Graziadei (Biohazard)

“In 20 years, there hasn’t been a single person who comes close to touching Dime. He is to our generation what Jimi Hendrix was to his! Beyond his killer guitar skills and style, Darrell put so much heart and soul into everything he did! He set the bar so high that there will never be anyone that can come close to filling his shoes! He is the best there ever was.”

Rita Haney (“Dimebagzhag”)

“I think it was his outlook on life and his way of life. He was totally genuine, and that came out in every single thing he did, including genuinely caring about people. To me, his 333 percent genuine heart is why he still matters so much today.”

Pantera began life in the early ’80s as a glam metal band, before recruiting Phil Anselmo on vocals and becoming the much heavier band that forged the groove-metal genre. 

Much of the band’s weight can be attributed to Dimebag’s rhythm guitar work. His combination of aggressive tone along with precise muting made way for tight, powerful phrases. 

To fill out the sound, Dimebag interjected high melodic motifs and low, chromatic power chord sequences alongside the main riffs. This brought variety to his rhythm parts while giving the impression of a second guitarist filling in the gaps.  

Get the tone

Amp Settings: Gain 7, Bass 5, Middle 3, Treble 8

For an aggressive tone, use your bridge pickup and add a decent amount of gain on your guitar amp. Dimebag had a lot of bite to his sound, so leave your bass setting at 12 o’clock, cut some of the middle and boost the treble on your amp’s EQ. To keep things tight, turn your reverb off.

Example 1

This study uses swung eighth notes to create a heavy shuffle feel. Alternate picking is used for the main phrases, as this helps to maintain the groove at high tempos. Down picking is reserved to add weight to the chromatic powerchord sequences or single-note lines at the end of each phrase.

Example 2

This study uses eighth-note triplets to establish pace, while the blues scale brings familiarity to the fills.

To get the pinched harmonics in the fourth bar, angle your pick at 90 degrees towards the floor, and brush against the string with the side of your thumb after the plectrum strikes the note. Experiment with where along the string the harmonics jump out best.

Take note of the slides within each phrase, as they maintain the fluidity while changing fretboard position.

February 10, 2024, marked the 20th anniversary of Damageplan’s New Found Power – the only album by brothers Dimebag Darrell and Vinnie Paul Abbott outside of Pantera. It began as Dimebag’s solo album but grew into a band effort when Paul joined on drums, and the siblings brought in vocalist Patrick Lachman and bassist Bob Zilla.

New Found Power was recorded over 18 months at the Abbotts’ Chasin’ Jason studio with help from producer/engineer Sterling Winfield, who had years of experience with Pantera. He’d met the musicians in 1993 and came to know them as colleagues, friends and family – a personal and professional relationship that he describes as “a seamless melding of the two things.

“One minute we were living the rock ’n’ roll lifestyle; the next we were playing putt-putt, going to the movies, or having dinner at home – Vinnie was an unbelievable cook. Dime and Vinnie walked and talked rock ’n’ roll. They were consummate professionals, but they were everyday people, too.” 

Winfield considers New Found Power one of his most difficult projects for many reasons. It received minimal label support and came to a close with the tragic death of Dimebag Darrell on stage with Damageplan in 2004.

20 years on, Sterling Winfield has looked back at the making of Dimebag’s final album, and his friendship with the brothers. What follows are his recollections in his own words.

The making Damageplan’s New Found Power, by Sterling Winfield

Dime had wanted to do a solo project for years. He’d been stockpiling songs and had some good demos. Originally he was going to have guests play on it, and I was excited about the prospect of working with all these different musicians. 

We’d get together at Chasin’ Jason and Vinnie came by every night to see what we were up to. He was like, “I sure want to play drums on this.” Dime would say, “I don’t want it to sound like a Pantera record. This is my record.” They would have these brotherly discussions.

We used a drum machine for some of it and one of Dime’s buddies drummed on one or two songs. Finally, Dime told Vinnie, “I need you, but we’re going to do this my way.” Vinnie was totally onboard.

Whenever Dime and Vinnie got together in the studio, there was an unspoken organic thing that happened. They each knew how the other one worked and which musical direction to head in if one of them got stuck. As soon as Vinnie came in, things started moving forward at a quicker pace.

In 2002, we were about four songs into the project. Down was on tour; Philip Anselmo and Rex Brown weren’t answering calls. It was very odd and it got worse and worse. Things were said in the press; we didn’t know what was going on. 

That was the turning point: the brothers knew they couldn’t move forward with Pantera, and they made the very difficult decision to dissolve Pantera and continue with a new band, which became Damageplan.

It went from, “This is a fun thing we’re doing” – and Dime saying, “This is something I need to do on my own” – to, “Everything just got real serious. This has to be the best we can do.” Which it always was when working with Dime and Vinnie.

The atmosphere in the studio went from jovial to headstrong, tenacious and determined. They wanted to show the world, show the fans, that they could do this on their own.

At the same time there was a lot of sadness. Pantera was Dime and Vinnie’s baby. They nurtured it for a long time, and to not have it there anymore was difficult. On top of that, in the midst of the sessions one of our very best friends, Dave Williams of Drowning Pool, passed away.

We took a month off to deal with the loss, grief and sadness surrounding us. It was a tumultuous time, but musicians and artists know how to channel those emotions into their art.

The album took a long time to finish because there was so much second-guessing and worrying about sounding like Pantera. Dime and Vinnie were unbelievable musicians who could play anything they set their minds to, but many times we had to steer away from what sounded even a little like Pantera. 

We did things intentionally to take the guys out of their comfort zones, but that took longer than what they had done normally for decades. We tried different guitars and amps, along with Dime’s usual Washburns and Randall RG100s, different rig setups, and a smaller drum kit for more punch in the low-end. We tried sequencers and effects for flavors. It was a conscious effort to steer away from anything Pantera would have done.

When the album came out, it had no critical success and it certainly didn’t get any help from the record label. They wanted another gold album from Pantera, but Dime and Vinnie told them at the listening party that there was no more Pantera; this was the direction the Abbott brothers were moving in.

The label did the minimum, probably thinking it would lead them to reform Pantera to continue making money – but that wasn’t going to happen. Dime and Vinnie weren’t doing it for money. They were doing it to prove a point and doing it for the fans.

Pantera fans are brutal. They’re rabid, honest, loyal – and they felt wronged and betrayed that all this bullshit had gone down and they were left with Down and Damageplan. So there was little support for the album from fans or label, with people thinking, “Pantera will be back.” And boy, they were not.

To this day, New Found Power is one of the best things I ever worked on. It’s some of Dime and Vinnie’s best playing, period. I believe it stands the test of time. As disliked as it was by loyal fans back then, today I run into some of them and they’ll say, “I went back and listened, and it’s a badass record. It’s one of my favorites.”

That album is like a time capsule for me. I listen to it and immediately go back to sitting in the studio with those guys. It didn’t sell a whole bunch or get a lot of attention – but I don’t care. I got to be a part of it and I’m still honored.

Dime was taken away from us that year and it was a bad time for all of us. It’s not something you want to remember; it’s not something you want to deal with, but you do. You have to talk about it, otherwise you’ll never get through it.

There’s nothing we can do about the past except try to move forward in a better way, and that’s where I am now. I look back and remember all the fun, happy stuff I got to be a part of. I’m grateful that they welcomed me into their world.

A version of this story first appeared in the June 2006 issue of Guitar World.

“Fuck it, Hitchcock,” drawled Dime, downing the dregs of his beer.

“We’ve been hammering this for hours and we’re out of booze. Interview and lesson over… we’re hitting a bar, goddammit! Put the camera and tape machine away, I’ll film me playing the riffs we went over when I get home and Fed Ex a tape to ya.”

The date was Saturday, December 13, 2003; the time: 3:30 A.M.; the place: an upscale New York hotel room with an empty mini-bar and a case’s worth of empty Heineken bottles filling every flat surface. The occasion? The interview and planned private guitar lesson for the ‘King Dimebag Returns!” cover story for the March 2004 issue of Guitar World.

I didn’t need any prompting, I hit “stop” on my recorder and we ventured out into the heart of Manhattan. Even at that hour, finding a bar that was still open in “the city that never sleeps” was an easy task. In typical Dimebag fashion, the goateed guitarist was immediately adopted as everybody’s new best friend, especially the bartender, and also in typical Dime fashion, we drank until dawn.

Later that day, Dime did a beyond stellar in-store appearance for Dunlop at a Long Island Sam Ash store (despite “one bitch of a hangover!”), and we went our separate ways...

True to his word, within a few days of Dime returning home to Texas, a Fed Ex package containing a videotape arrived. By this time, though, Darrell had agreed to come back for the third run of his wildly popular "Riffer Madness" monthly column as soon as Damageplan’s 2004 touring cycle was over, so I put the video, lesson interview and hand shots away until that time.

Sadly, for the tragic reason we are all still painfully aware of, Dime’s return as a columnist wasn’t to be, and I forgot all about the video tape he’d sent me until a couple of weeks ago when I stumbled across it.

Intrigued, I put the tape in my VCR and watched with anticipation. What I saw blew me away – 30-plus minutes of Dime in magical form ripping through Damageplan riffs and some scorching, off-the-cuff licks! Even though the tape was marked “For Your Eyes Only” and was a one-take home video recorded after one of Dime’s all-nighters, I knew I had to share it.

That said, we obviously wouldn’t dream of doing anything with the footage without the permission of Dime’s nearest and dearest. So I called up his brother, Vinnie Paul, and his life-partner, Rita, to tell them what we’d got and what we’d like to do with it. Their response was immediate and identical: “Hell yeah! Run with it!” We’ve since edited the tape down to 13 minutes and, with the blessing of Dime’s family, Guitar World is proud to bring you “The Lost Lesson: Dime’s Instructional Destructional Home Video”.

I should clarify two things about the video below: first, Dime never intended this footage to be released; as stated above, it was recorded specifically to assist me with Dime’s column. Yet, despite its low-tech quality, it blows away most instructional videos, thanks to the man’s personality and playing.

Second, Dime’s wisecracks about “cholesterol level” are a reference to my doctor’s warning that I lay off red meat and beer. Needless to say, that wasn’t going to happen on Dr. Dime’s watch; his staple diet was booze and beef.

Nick Bowcott and everyone at Guitar World would like to express our sincere thanks to Vinnie Paul and Rita for allowing us to use this precious footage of Dime. Much respect and Big Love, guys...

When he wasn’t tearing up stages with a Dean ML slung over his shoulder, Dimebag Darrell was probably drinking. And he loved to make new drinking buddies.

That’s how Pantera’s paths first crossed with Nickelback. Introduced by Jerry Cantrell, who was supporting the then-ascendent Canadian rock outfit back in 2002, the two bands struck up a whiskey-fueled friendship.

“We’d known the Pantera guys since a really early time in our career,” bassist Mike Kroeger recalled in a 2020 interview with Australian Guitar. “They were fans of ours from the beginning, and we would always see them out on the road or whenever we would go through Dallas; they would come out and ply us with alcohol.”

Naturally, Dimebag’s brother and partner in groove metal Vinnie Paul Abbott partook in these drinking sessions, and after a few too many, admitted he listened to Nickelback “every day”, frontman Chad Kroeger told MTV back in 2005.

“[It] really surprised me,” Kroeger said. “But I guess they come from that whole Southern-rock background, and we're a hard-rock band with Southern-rock influences, so they liked it a lot.”

This unlikely bond was fortified when, after a 2003 show in Dallas, Chad played Dimebag a demo of Nickelback’s take on Elton John hit Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting. The band were in the process of recording a studio version for the Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle soundtrack, featuring Kid Rock.

Dimebag ended up liking their rendition so much, he tracked a solo for the collaborative effort, which showcased his ability to deliver astonishing Southern-fried pentatonic flurries at the drop of a hat.

Darrell’s career was in flux at the time of the high-profile guest spot: Pantera had disbanded, and he was just starting over with new outfit Damageplan, alongside his brother.

But as Damageplan sought to build their own fanbase with a US club tour, tragedy struck: on December 8 2004, Dimebag was gunned down onstage in Columbus, Ohio by a crazed fan. He was 38.

The murder hit the music community hard. The likes of Jerry Cantrell, Zakk Wylde and Corey Taylor attended Dimebag’s memorial, and Eddie Van Halen donated his original black-and-yellow-striped 1979 Charvel, aka “Bumblebee”, to lay beside Dimebag in his casket.

Chad Kroeger was also devastated. “I was very upset, and for two months, if I saw his picture somewhere I would get angry,” he told MTV. “I hadn't lost somebody to a shooting before – it wasn't as though he'd been killed in some sort of accident. He was taken in such a horrible, malicious way that just made it more painful.”

The frontman was inspired to address his feelings in a song he titled Side of a Bullet, written from the perspective of a Pantera fan who seeks revenge on Dimebag’s killer.

Kroeger played the Southern metal-inspired track to Vinnie Paul, and invited the Pantera drummer to retake the drum track recorded by Nickelback sticksman Daniel Adair. Abbott ultimately concluded that there was nothing he could add – but there was something Dimebag could contribute.

With the permission of Dimebag’s girlfriend Rita Haney, the drummer sent Kroeger a number of solo outtakes from classic Pantera albums Vulgar Display of Power and Far Beyond Driven, recorded between 1991 and 1993. The gesture meant a lot to the band.

“They were our brothers,” Mike Kroeger said. “And then when Dime was murdered, we wanted to pay tribute to him. We were able to get some of his unused solos and a few other bits of his playing that we would actually lay into the track… It was a really special thing for us.”

Despite being stitched together, the resultant lead serves as a potent reminder of the gifts Dimebag had to offer the guitar world: his groaning bends, whammy dives and ferocious legato gels surprisingly seamlessly with Kroeger’s stomping metal-edged riffs and Adair’s double-kick drum grooves.

The song was released on Nickelback’s 2005 album All the Right Reasons, and became the record’s seventh and final single. It was a surprisingly heavy pick for radio play, particularly given it followed good-time singalong Rockstar and saccharine ballad If Everyone Cared.

All the Right Reasons became Nickelback’s best-selling album and went on to rack up sales of 11 million copies worldwide – nearly eight million of these were from the US, making it one of the best-selling albums of all time in North America (at the time of writing, it sits above Eric Clapton’s Unplugged, and just below Led Zeppelin’s Physical Graffiti).

Given Nickelback’s reputation as mainstream rock’s ultimate love ’em or hate ’em artist, their success continues to mystify non-believers. But that’s precisely why Dimebag’s friendship – and musical contributions – meant so much.

“The guy was a legend, as well as his brother – that whole band was,” Mike Kroeger says.

“A lot of people didn’t like the fact that they were friends with us, or fans of our music – but the metal world can be a little intense to its own, y’know? So it was just really cool that they didn’t care about that, and they just wanted to be friends with us because they liked what we did.”

Alrosa Villa, the Ohio nightclub where legendary Pantera and Damageplan guitarist Dimebag Darrell was killed in 2004, has been demolished.

The venue – which had been active for 45 years prior to its closure in June of this year, and had hosted a huge range of acts from Slipknot and Dream Theater to Dio in that time – was the scene of a mass shooting on December 8, 2004.

25-year-old Nathan Gale opened fire on Dimebag as he performed with Damageplan, killing him instantly. The band's head of security Jeffrey "Mayhem" Thompson and Alrosa employee Erin Halk were killed as they tried to restrain Gale, and 23-year-old Nathan Bray was gunned down as he attempted to resuscitate Dimebag and Thompson.

In the years following the shooting, Dimebag's brother and Pantera/Damageplan bandmate Vinnie Paul sued the Alrosa Villa, saying that had Gale been denied entry the tragedy could have been avoided. The suit was settled out of court in 2007.

In a Facebook post announcing the venue's closure earlier this year, staff wrote: “We've seen stars born here, unfortunately we've had stars pass away here, but the one thing that can never be taken away from us is the amazing memories we've all created along the way with magical people inside of this magical place.”

The statement went on to address the negativity associated with the venue regarding the killing of Dimebag Darrell.

“I don't personally like how the media always chose to portray the venue when talking about it because they always chose to drag it down with negativity because of the unfortunate passing of Dimebag Darrell.

“But that shouldn't be what defines Alrosa as a music venue. [It] provided so many people with so many amazing opportunities throughout the years and we are happy to say that a lot of the best musicians in the country got their start right here.”

Footage of the demolition site has been uploaded to YouTube – you can check it out below. The uploader says that “The Dime Rock” – a large rock outside the venue painted with “RIP Dime” has “either been replaced with a different rock, or they buffed the artwork off”.

Earlier this week, Guitar World met Nick Norton, a local shredder who became the last person to play Pantera's Walk solo on Dimebag Darrell's guitar, less than 24 hours before the guitarist's tragic death.

December 8 is not a date remembered fondly in the great calendar of heavy metal. For the best part of two decades, it has served as the painful reminder of Pantera guitarist Dimebag Darrell’s untimely passing – gunned down in cold blood only one song into Damageplan’s set at the Alrosa Villa nightclub in Columbus, Ohio. The metal world would never be the same again.

Universally loved both onstage and off, he was a cartoon-like character who encapsulated everything about what it takes to be a guitar hero. From his brilliantly rhythmic riffs, which inspired generations of groove metal hopefuls, to his electrified virtuosic leads, which he often laughed off as unstudied guesswork, the man born Darrell Lance Abbott was – and very much remains – a godlike entity larger than life itself.

24 hours prior to his murder, however, Dimebag was very much in good spirits, remembers Buffalo-based guitarist Nick Norton, who currently plays in melodeath quintet Of Desolation. Back then, Norton was performing in a Pantera tribute called Driven, which led to him being invited up on stage to perform the solo for Walk, in turn making him the last person to play that solo on Dimebag’s guitar before the guitarist’s tragic murder the following night.

“I remember Dimebag took a really cool and long guitar solo halfway through the show,” says Norton, when asked about his main recollections from the legendary guitar player’s final full set. “This was unfortunately before the days of camera phones, so I didn’t get to film anything, but it sounded really awesome… he just nailed it. We were watching from pretty close. I never got to see Pantera live, so it was my big chance to finally see Dime performing right in front of me.”

So how exactly did you end up getting on stage with Damageplan that night?

“Back in 2003, my buddy Leo [Gastle] came up with the idea of getting a Pantera tribute going. He wanted to call it Driven and have me on guitar. We got some gigs and had a lot of fun, drawing some good crowds. We came to find out that Damageplan were due to perform at this place in Buffalo called the Icon. 

“Two bands we knew got to open, one called Stemm and another called Herod. Leo wanted to get there early before the show to see if he could meet the band. I was in the shower and then had all these voicemails from Leo saying I had to come down and that Dimebag was having problems with his amps. He’d just switched over to Krank amps after some years playing Randall. Apparently he was asking every guitar player in the area to bring down their heads!”

Did you make it in time? 

“When I got there, I’d just missed the guys. But Dimebag had caught one glance at Leo and was like, ‘Holy shit, I thought you were my brother!’ Back in the day Leo had the tiger-striped sideburns and everything – he looked just like Vinnie Paul. So Leo ended up telling them we’re in this Pantera tribute and Dime said he'd get us on stage. 

“We took it with a pinch of salt and thought that would be awesome, but even if it didn’t happen we’d have so much fun watching these guys jam. A few songs into the set, they call Leo up on stage and get a picture of him and Vinnie Paul together. They looked like twins – it was really funny. 

“Then they started doing some Pantera songs and right before Walk they call Leo back up, parking him behind the kit. Vinnie grabbed the camera and started filming. Me and my bass player were watching from the side and Dimebag pointed at us saying, ‘Hey, get up here!’”

A man true to his word!

“Yeah! We started doing the backing vocals for the chorus. Right before the solo, Dime turns around, points at his guitar asking, ‘Hey, you wanna jam this?’ He went to get me a pick but I already had one and was ready to go, which made him laugh. Dimebag grabs another camera and starts filming me, while Vinnie Paul was fanning me with a towel like I was smokin’ hot! I did the solo and finished off the song with a little improvising at the end. 

“When I handed Dimebag his guitar back, he told me it sounded awesome and gave me one of his Black Tooth Grins [an alcoholic beverage invented by Dimebag]. The Icon actually had a dry bar but the band had plenty of alcohol! Unfortunately I never got to talk to him after that, but the whole experience was so much better than a conversation. It was pretty wild!”

Where were you when you heard the news the following day?

“We were so thrilled about what happened that night… we’d just jammed with our idols! So we went out for some drinks after. We tried to see Dimebag after the show but he was already on the bus. His bodyguard [Jeff ‘Mayhem’ Thompson], who was also unfortunately killed the following night, came out to say, ‘Sorry boys, Dimebag’s on the bus and has his slippers on, he’s done for the night!’ Apparently they’d been partying for three days straight. 

“I wish I had stuck around because we had some friends that did and Dimebag got a second wind, and they ended up hitting a casino [laughs]! Needless to say, I slept in pretty late the next day. And later on I started getting all these very short voicemails asking me to call them back…

“One person said there was some news I was not going to take too well, so I called them back and found out. I was just at home, kinda in denial to begin. I didn’t believe it at first and then after the news ended up on more and more websites, it hit home. It was very tragic, of course, especially when you think you were on stage with the guy 22 hours earlier.”

What do you remember about the rig you got to play that night?

“Honestly, I was more focused on not messing up the solo or crapping my pants [laughs]! But from what I remember it was his Krank amp, which sounded really good. He must have fixed it. I can’t remember about the pedalboard because I didn’t have to change anything. 

“The guitar I played was his white, black and grey Urban Camo Dean. Funnily enough, I was wearing camo pants that night, so I matched the guitar. The playability of the guitar felt really cool and it had a great tone.”

Walk is an incredibly well-written solo, with some beautiful blues lines before that ascending diminished climb and the final big bend…

“It’s one of my favorites for sure – that’s why I had to nail it! He had his eye on me during the tapped sliding bit, just to make sure I pulled it off properly and smiled when I did. It’s one of those songs that’s often tabbed out incorrectly – without the proper bends or in the wrong tuning like drop D when it should be a whole tone down. 

“You have to remember some of those original recordings were done like a quarter step below standard. We did it the same way they did live, tuning down a half step for the standard stuff and then down a whole step for the heavier tracks. We’d try to follow the live versions of those tunes.”

What would you say is the main trick to sounding like Dimebag?

“For me, it’s all about the vibrato. He had that very wide and unique-sounding vibrato. That was always the main thing for me to emulate, as well as the tone and general phrasing. Learning all that stuff meant there were a lot of things to watch out for – some of it is pretty challenging! We learned a lot of stuff in a short period of time to get playing gigs.

“You see a lot of YouTube guitarists these days, and yeah they can shred or sweep and have those techniques down, but a lot of them can’t bend a note. The vibrato might not be that good. That was always important to me from day one, listening to guys like Dime and Zakk Wylde to get the phrasing just right and drawing influence from that. It’s just as important as the shred technique stuff.

“Those solid-state amps were also a big part of his tone. It was really interesting when he switched over to tube amps towards the end. It was a bit like, ‘Woah, wait a minute… that’s a pretty left-field turn!’”

And what would you say was the hardest Pantera song to perform live?

“We never got to play it as a band, but we were working on Floods towards the end of the band. The reason we broke up was because we couldn’t keep our singer – we’d already had to find one replacement. 

“But yeah, that solo in Floods is very Randy Rhoads-like… it’s a song within itself! That’s probably the most tricky. I'm Broken also has a run that was always tabbed wrong, so it took me a little while to decipher what he was doing and get that right. It was such a great example of his lead style, which was always very musical and tasteful.”

Dimebag seemed to favor legato over alternate picking, but out of choice rather than necessity…

“I agree. I think the legato thing was just more his sound, but when he wanted to alternate pick, he definitely could! He’d often combine the two and mix them up a lot. He used his right hand a lot for those brutal riffs, though! Songs like Fucking Hostile and Slaughtered have some pretty intense picking.

“And as for the left hand, there were some really crazy wide-stretch things he’d do, like in the Cowboys From Hell solo. There’s a line that goes down the 11th, 12th and 15th frets on all strings and eventually stretches from the 12th and 15th out to 20! I remember reading an interview somewhere where he said it did not come from any theory book; it was just a symmetrical run that sounded cool in E. It’s a big stretch, so it’s actually a good left-hand exercise for anyone wanting to learn this kind of style.”

This Prime Cuts feature is from the March 1993 issue of Guitar World. The original headline was "Diamond Darrell's Dirty Dozen."

Pantera's six-shooting Texas tornado pumps up his 12 favorite hair-raising, fist-pumping metal classics that every self-respecting guitarist should know.

You won't find a shred of jazz, blues, classical, country, funk or alternative guitar playing on any of Pantera's six albums, including their recent breakthrough efforts, Cowboys from Hell and Vulgar Display of Power. What you will hear is plenty of metal – mean, ornery metal, in the great headbanging spirit of the genre's forefathers.

Leading the Texans' assault is guitarist Dimebag Darrell, who spent his early years carefully studying platters by metal's most respected giants: from Black Sabbath and Judas Priest to Iron Maiden and Van Halen.

"The harder stuff has always done it for me," said Darrell. "Man, if it rips, I'll give it a thumbs up!"

At Guitar World's request, the guitarist compiled a list of 12 tunes he regards as pivotal to his development as a player.

After he'd completed his list, Darrell commented, "One thing holds true for each of these bands: They all jammed. If kids today want to put a band together and kick some serious ass, it's important for them to go back and check out these songs, because, when it comes to metal, it doesn't get any better than this."

1. Ozzy Osbourne – Crazy Train

Album: Blizzard of Ozz (1981)
Guitarist: Randy Rhoads

"The first time I heard Crazy Train I was crashed out in bed, definitely not wanting to get up and go to school, when my brother Vinnie Paul came in and cranked it up.

"I heard that opening bass line and Ozzy going 'I-I-I-I,' then Randy coming in with that classic riff. That song just busted me in the ass. I was out of bed, dressed, and in school-on time for the very first time! Randy played a lot of cool slurs, where he would slide his pick down the top E string, and I definitely picked up on that."

2. Judas Priest – Rapid Fire

Album: British Steel (1980)
Guitarists: Glen Tipton, K.K. Downing

"Glen Tipton and K.K. Downing are the gods of double-guitar axemanship.

"They almost fit into the Jimmy Page mold as classic guitarists. Again, they had great tones and unique styles. And I love those quick little fill leads in Rapid Fire. A lot of the guitarists we're talking about weren't just great lead players, but were real band-oriented players. And that's how I approach playing in Pantera."

3. Deep Purple – Smoke on the Water

Album: Machine Head (1972)
Guitarist: Ritchie Blackmore

"You don't need to say much about that song. It's the ultimate simple tune; it was actually the first song I ever learned. I learned it on the E string, then my dad taught me a chord and I thought it was as heavy as shit. It's simple, but totally bad-ass. It proves that you can play three notes and still make it killer."

4. Def Leppard – Rock Brigade

Album: On Through the Night (1980)
Guitarists: Steve Clark, Pete Willis

"Man, that first Leppard album really jams, and their original guitarist, Pete Willis, was a great player. I was inspired by him because I was a small young dude and he was a small young dude, too – and he was out there kickin' ass. He made me want to get out there and play. Def Leppard used the two-guitar thing much more then than they do now."

5. Black Sabbath – Children of the Sea

Album: Heaven and Hell (1980)
Guitarist: Tony Iommi

"We used to play that song live. The acoustic intro has some great dynamics, and then Tony kicks in with this simple but hard riff, kind of like Smoke on the Water. Iommi had a monstrous guitar sound on that album. And he had that skidding vibrato technique that was so quick and killer. He hardly ever does a slow vibrato. He started all that de-tuning stuff, which I really learned from him."

6. AC/DC – Beating Around the Bush

Album: Highway to Hell (1979)
Guitarists: Angus and Malcolm Young

"I can't say enough good shit about Angus' playing. He really stands out from other players. He has a very original guitar sound, and a killer vibrato. He plays totally clean, like he's playing through a Marshall on 12 without the gain kicked in – it's pure distortion, not fuzzy. Beating Around the Bush highlights all of that."

7. Iron Maiden – Children of the Damned

Album: The Number of the Beast (1982)
Guitarists: Adrian Smith, Dave Murray

"Both Smith and Murray are real bad-ass players. Both have that rhythm pickup tone happening, and the Children of the Damned lead really shows that. They don't play too fast, but they play choice notes and work great together. And they have great tones. They also had the ability to play delicate acoustic stuff when they wanted, and could shred with the best when it was appropriate."

8. Kiss – Shock Me

Album: Love Gun (1977)
Guitarists: Ace Frehley, Paul Stanley

"Ace is god, and the Shock Me solo is killer. The studio version has so much production just in the lead section. I also love the effects on it, especially the phaser on the last note. Man, I get all wound up just talking about Kiss! Ace's vibrato is what really grabbed me, and I always try to apply that to my playing. He could squeeze so much out of a single note that one note could take the place of 12."

9. Metallica – Motorbreath

Album: Kill 'Em All (1983)
Guitarists: James Hetfield, Kirk Hammett

"I love Hammett's lead playing, but Hetfield's rhythm playing is truly phenomenal.

"He's the god of chugging riffs, and Motorbreath is a good example of tight, chunky, galloping speed playing. Man, when I first heard that song, I didn't know what it was! It was so heavy, but real clean. That song really taught me how to play clean, driving rhythms. I don't know any guitarist that can down-pick like Hetfield, and Motorbreath is a prime example of his expertise."

10. Slayer – At Dawn They Sleep

Album: Hell Awaits (1985)
Guitarists: Jeff Hanneman, Kerry King

"Those guys have a real unorthodox style of playing – it's totally not normal [laughs]. They have unbelievable rhythm chops. Their songs taught me how to play with guts and aggression.

"The half-time feel on At Dawn They Sleep is really cool, too. I like how they just start and stop out of nowhere, using no time to build up or wind down. They never give you a chance to get into a song: as soon as it starts, they're battering you over the head, hard and fast.''

11. UFO – Lights Out

Album: Lights Out
Guitarist: Michael Schenker

"This song is played in F#, my favorite key to wail in. It's like E – it's real common, but you can't beat it. You can write every song on an album in E and not hurt a thing. Your straight E to F# is pure power, and playing leads in F# is awesome because you can do it down in the second fret position. Tunes like Lights Out showed me how to do that.

"The rhythm section behind the lead in that song is really driving – it's fire, it's guts, it's live, it's totally jamming! We try to maintain that in Pantera. Even though we don't use a rhythm guitar track behind my leads, Rex and Vinnie keep things going when I solo – like a rhythm section lead behind my lead."

12. Van Halen – Eruption

Album: Van Halen (1978)
Guitarist: Eddie Van Halen

"Van Halen was a huge influence on me, and Eruption was the song that really leaped off that first Van Halen album.

"I was a little kid when I first heard it, and I couldn't believe how Eddie just ripped the strings off his guitar. He played with a fierce aggression – and his guitar sound was unbeatable. That dive bomb sound effect at the song's end sounded like the world was coming to an end. Because Eddie was so hardcore about his guitar, he made me look at the instrument in a different way – more as a tool to screw around with than something you must play very carefully."

EDITOR'S NOTE: Although the original 1993 GW story promised 12 songs, there actually were 13 songs in the piece. Here's the bonus 13th song:

13. ZZ Top – Tush

Album: Fandango! (1975)
Guitarist: Billy Gibbons

"I'm not a super blues player, but I was exposed to the Texas blues sound while I was growing up, and that definitely rubbed off on me.

"To me, blues is more of a feel and a vibe, rather than sitting there and saying, 'Well, I'm gonna play bluesy now.' And Billy definitely plays with feeling on Tush. My favorite thing about it is where he lets that one note ring out until it dies off, then gets that rattling noise on the frets."

Shortly before his tragic death in 2004, Dimebag Darrell wanted to reform Pantera.

In a new interview with the Landry.audio podcast, longtime Dimebag friend Daryl “Bobby Tongs” Arnberger, who also served as a videographer for Pantera and Damageplan, said the electric guitar player told him he was going to “do whatever it takes” to reunite with singer Phil Anselmo and bassist Rex Brown and get his former band back together.

Pantera had gone on hiatus, acrimoniously, following 2000’s Reinventing the Steel.

According to Arnberger, the conversation took place less than a month before Darrell was murdered onstage at the Alrosa Villa in Columbus, Ohio during a Damageplan show.

“The last time I saw him was in November of 2004,” Arnberger said. “I went over to his house. I was just talking to him briefly about everything. He was, like, 'We're gonna go out and do this tour through December, and I'll see you for Christmas and everything. After that, we're gonna have some new shit going on. And it's not gonna be this. Whatever it takes, we're gonna get these guys back together and do it right.’”

Arnberger continued, “He was saying he was gonna do everything he could. He was pretty much done with what [Damageplan] were doing at that point. He wanted to move on and go back to Pantera."

Regarding the state of Damageplan, which also included Darrell’s brother and Pantera drummer Vinnie Paul, Arnberger said: "He didn't think the other guys were as into it. He obviously didn't feel the magic as much as he did with the other two guys [Anselmo and Brown].” 

A few years back, as part of the expansive Dimebag Darrell coverage that appeared in our February 2015 issue, Guitar World was invited into Dime's home and recording studio—and we got to bring our cameras.

Above, enjoy our exclusive video tour, which offers a private look at Dime's impressive guitar collection, not to mention his home, memorabilia, kitchen, bathrooms (Note: Dime's bathrooms are more interesting than they sound) and a lot more.

This is a two-part column; part 1 is below, and part 2 is right here.

Commandment 1: Honor Thy Van Halen

... and ZZ Top, Kiss, Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, Ted Nugent, Pat Travers, early Metallica (Kill ‘em All, Ride the Lightning, Master of Puppets) and Randy Rhoads. Van Halen’s impact on Dimebag’s playing is unmistakable. The “vibe” of early Van Halen is by far the most recognizable influence in Dimebag’s playing. From the grooving rhythms played like leads of their own, to the tone, to the phrasing in his lead playing, Dimebag took the inspiration of Edward Van Halen and forged his own identity.

Pieces such as “Eruption” and “Spanish Fly” were favorites of Dimebag, who would play them in his unaccompanied guitar solos back in Pantera’s early club days. Dime has been noted as being Texas’ “Van Halen clone,” the local hotshot who could play all of the most impressive licks of his hero. Further, the brotherly bond of the Van Halen brothers (Eddie on guitar and Alex on drums) was mirrored in Pantera (Vinnie on drums and Dime on guitar).

Van Halen’s impact is further felt as the words “Van Halen” were actually Dimebag’s last words spoken before he was tragically murdered. “Van Halen” was something Dime would say to his brother Vinnie before a live performance to inspire them both to play a fun, lively, rocking show. Also, Dime was actually buried with the guitar that inspired him most—Eddie Van Halen’s yellow and black striped guitar featured on the back cover of Van Halen II. To truly understand Dimebag’s playing, it is crucial to absorb the “Van Halen” feel, as well as the techniques and attention to tone that were such a part of the early Van Halen experience.

Commandment 2: Thou Shalt Use the Major 3rd

Always wearing his Van Halen influence on his sleeve, Dimebag was never one to shy away from using the interval of a major 3rd in his heavy playing. Shunned by most “metal” players, the major 3rd was an essential tool in Dime’s bag of tricks. When playing in E (minor), the major third is G#, which adds a unique feel to riffs and licks that also utilize the minor 3rd (G).

Theoretically, this major 3rd lends lines a Mixolydian quality, though it essentially gives a bluesy type of sound and adds tension/dissonance to minor key tonalities (For more information, check out Guitar Strength Volume 1: Mastering the Modes.) EXAMPLE 1 is a Dimebag-inspired riff using this major 3rd in a minor key.

Notice also how Dime gets extra mileage out of the interval by using it in a pattern that also makes use of the flat 9 (F in E minor). EXAMPLE 2 is another Dimebag-inspired riff using the same intervals. (For another riff using the major 3rd, which was clearly an influence on Dimebag, check out the end of “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath” by Black Sabbath.)

The major 3rd was not just essential to Dimebag’s riffs, it was also extensively used in his lead playing. EXAMPLE 3 is an E minor fingering of the “Dimebag Scale,” a minor pentatonic scale with the addition of a flat 5, major 6th (omitted on the A string and used only on the B string, 14th fret for ease of fingering), and major 3rd.

EXAMPLE 4 is a Dimebag-inspired lick using this scale.

When attempting to conjure the influence of Dimebag in your own playing, experimentation with the integration of this major 3rd into more “standard” minor phrases is highly encouraged. Don’t be afraid of sounding “happy”; play the note like you mean it and you’ll be amazed at its versatility and its ability to make your playing substantially more interesting.

Commandment #3: Embrace Symmetry

Another Van Halen-inspired technique employed by Dimebag was the use of symmetrical fingerings. This technique is extremely easy to learn but requires taste and skill for successful implementation. To perform this technique, simply devise a fingering shape on one string and apply it across all six. EXAMPLE 5 is a Van Halen-esque lick, based on a root, major 3rd, 5th shape in E, continuing down to the A string and resolving on a B string bend from D to E (and back down to D for some minor 7th tension).

Clearly inspirational to Dime, EXAMPLE 6 is a variation in the same (12th) position, this time using the minor 3rd (G), 5th (B), and a slide to and from the flat 6th (C). This expanded symmetrical shape still uses a simple 1-2-4 fret hand fingering across all six strings, yet the pinky slide gives it some extra range and movement.

Further examples of simple, yet effective symmetrical patterns used by Dimebag can be seen in EXAMPLES 7 and 8. EXAMPLE 7 is another shape, this time using the major 7 (Eb in E), the root (E), and the minor 3rd (G) as its basis. In this case, the pattern is an ascending climb combining both picking and legato phrasing, again using the 1-2-4 fingering.

In EXAMPLE 8, which is based on one of Dimebag’s favorite patterns, the shape uses a 4-3-1 fingering in a descending sequence on the top three strings. This shape in this position is a throwback to the playing of Pat Travers, and can be quite effective when playing over rhythms in A minor and E minor.

Feel free to transpose it into other keys and use it often, just as Dime did. It is important to notice that though Dimebag possessed astounding picking technique, he tended to favor executing most of his lines in a legato fashion (another homage to Mr. Edward Van Halen). Dimebag’s love of legato gave his lines a fluid, lively quality, and his powerful left hand technique was extremely important when effectively implementing these symmetrical patterns into his lead licks.

Commandment 4: Give Chords New Found Power

Never content with “standard” guitar techniques, Dimebag was an avid user of the “other” power chords. Instead of relying on normal root-5th and root-4th (inverted 5th) power chords (though he was an obvious master when it came to using them), Dimebag would often come up with and use alternative dyads (two-note chords) in place of standard power chords. These chords were usually major or minor thirds stacked on top of the root. EXAMPLE 9 is the two basic versions of these chords with 6th and 5th string roots. The first is the “major 3rd” variation and the second is the “minor 3rd” version.

EXAMPLE 10 is a figure using the minor 3rd power chord. Notice how the chords act to add texture and movement to the riff, as they work well when used in the same riff as the more pedestrian root-5th power chords. The chords also add a nice tension, as they are not as “homogenous” and “neutered” sounding as the standard root-5th chords. Also, when used with a rocking distorted tone, these chords have an extremely powerful sonic fingerprint with their unique overtones.

These overtones are, in fact, what makes these chords so special and useful. With usual major or minor chords and triads, playing them with distortion often results in a cluttered, un-musical noise. There is just too much information present to allow sonorous, musical sounds when using the standard major or minor chord shapes. However, by just playing the root and 3rd, a vibrant, tense, rich sound is created, really putting the “power” in power chord. Experiment often with substituting these root-3rd power chords for standard root-5th chords in your riffs. Also, try varying your usage of major and minor 3rds, as often times the “wrong” (out of key) 3rd will sound most interesting in a riff. EXAMPLE 11 is a Dimebag inspired riff using these harmonically “wrong” power chords.

Commandment 5: Know your Nodes

No discussion of Dimebag would be complete without mentioning his penchant for playing with harmonics. Dimebag’s playing was peppered with any and every type of harmonics: natural, artificial, tapped, etc. Playing with an overtone-rich, distorted sound, harmonics (whether naturally or artificially produced) are an integral component in the beast of electric guitar. Harmonics can occur almost anywhere and can be produced by a myriad of means, and can occur many times as an accidental consequence of playing with a loud, distorted sound.

Dimebag, however, excelled at controlling the beast, and was able to skillfully use harmonics as one of the most expressive elements in his playing. To understand how Dime would use harmonics, we’ll first look at the naturally occurring harmonic nodes that occur across the fretboard. EXAMPLE 12 is a basic depiction of the most common, “easy” harmonics that occur when a fret hand finger is used to lightly touch a plucked string (without actually pushing it down and fretting it) and produce a harmonic.

EXAMPLE 13 shows some more difficult to produce harmonics along the same string, many of which were used extensively by Dime.

Dime was never content to just play the harmonics, though, as he would often use a variety of techniques to produce and manipulate them. The most famous of these techniques was Dime’s signature “harmonic scream” technique. The basic maneuver is depicted in EXAMPLE 14.

To perform this technique as Dimebag would, a floating tremolo bridge (able to bend a note below and above) is necessary (preferably a locking Floyd Rose or its equivalent). First, get the string moving by “plucking” it with a silent fret hand pull-off while simultaneously dumping/depressing the bar and bending the tremolo down. As the open string is lowered in pitch and its tension is reduced, lightly tap the selected harmonic node with the fret hand “bird”/middle finger. Next, after the harmonic has been sounded, slowly return the bar to pitch, pull it up higher, and apply vibrato with the whammy bar. Note that the actual time the open/dumped string rings is only a fraction of a second, it is only sounded so as to allow the string movement enough to produce the fret hand “tapped” harmonic.

Also note the importance of fret hand muting, being sure to use the fret hand thumb (wrapped over the top of the neck) and fret hand fingers to mute any unwanted noise from the unused strings. Experiment with different harmonic nodes, as some will be easier to execute and some will sound more interesting than others. While Dimebag was also quite adept at using Zakk Wylde/John Sykes/George Lynch/Billy F. Gibbons-style “pings” (artificial harmonics, A.K.A. pick harmonics) he was especially adept at using multiple, combined harmonics as a way to spice up his rhythm playing. EXAMPLE 15 shows this technique at play.

Notice first that Dime loved using “in-between” harmonics, those that had a particularly shrieking/squealing sound. Also notice that in combining two or more harmonics, an extremely cool set of screaming, dissonant overtones is created. Try any and all combinations of harmonics on various string sets and at various node points, and also experiment with manipulating the combinations with your whammy bar and/or effects pedals. EXAMPLE 16 is several available combinations.

The possibilities are endless. Check out Part 2!

Scott Marano has dedicated his life to the study of the guitar, honing his chops at the Berklee College of Music under the tutelage of Jon Finn and Joe Stump and working as an accomplished guitarist, performer, songwriter and in-demand instructor. In 2007, Scott developed the Guitar Strength program to inspire and provide accelerated education to guitarists of all ages and in all styles through state-of-the-art private guitar lessons in his home state of Rhode Island and globally via Skype. Visit Scott and learn more at www.GuitarStrength.com.

While Dimebag Darrell was touring Japan with Damageplan, he took time out during the band's Tokyo stop to shoot an impromptu lesson video.

The video, which focused on what he considered his trademark licks, was shot in honor of the 35th anniversary of Young Guitar, a Japanese guitar magazine.

You can watch the complete clip below. Although it's all good—especially if you're a huge Dimebag fan—the best and most useful content kicks off at 1:16, where the guitarist starts to explain "the old trademark Dimebag high-pitched squeals and stuff."

"That one's gonna cost ya right there," he says, after a solid, squealin' demo. "You can catch that two different ways," he continues.

"You can go with the Steve Vai technique—whip the bar back and work it out—or you can just go with the straight technique." Anyway, if you've got the time, you can enjoy five minutes' worth of pure Dimebag, doing what he did best.

One of the highlights of this year's NAMM Show was the introduction of a new Dimebag Darrell model from Dean Guitars.

In the video below, Dean Guitars' Eric Stewart shows off and explains the features of the new guitar.

First and foremost, the guitar was created by Dean in collaboration with Dimebag Darrell's estate. The guitar, which is limited to only 200 individually numbered pieces, features an oak razor blade inlayed directly into its body.

A total of 200 razor blades were cut from a branch of an oak tree just outside the studio window in Darrell's back yard — the studio where Pantera recorded most of their albums.

For more information about this model, visit Dean's Dimebag page right here.

[[ Guitar World at NAMM 2014: Gear updates, photo galleries, videos and more! ]]

Here's an interview with Pantera's Dimebag Darrell from the May 2000 issue of Guitar World.To see the complete cover, and all the GW covers from 2000, click here.

"Come on, dude!" shouts Dimebag Darrell. "We've got steaks to eat, booze to drink and tits to see.”

For the last hour, Dime bag has been hanging out in a Hilton suite, answering a continuous barrage of questions about Pantera's new album, Reinventing the Steel (Elektra). It's been four long years since Pantera's last studio effort and there has been a lot of catching up to do. But it's a Saturday night, Guitar World is in town and new adventures are waiting to be had.

What seems like only seconds later, we're in a swank SUV speeding down a freeway on the outskirts of Dallas, heading toward Dimebag's pad. Dime pulls out a freshly mastered CD of songs from the new album, pops it in the player and cranks up the volume. Although he did a pretty good job of describing the intensity of the tunes earlier in the evening, his commentary can't compare with the sensation of listening to the album at 120dB while cruising at 100 mph.

A four-year hiatus can be dangerous for many bands, but Pantera fans can rest assured that the band has not mellowed with age — they haven't done anything foolish like cut off their hair or discover the "genius" of Andrew Lloyd Weber. Although the definition of metal has changed in Pantera's absence, the band is back to show everyone how a heavy rock record is supposed to sound. "We're the full-meal deal," says Dimebag. "This album is fresh and updated, but it's still us. It's full of fuckin' lead guitar playing, lead singing, drumming up the ass, bass lines that walk and move you, and songs, man, songs. We're reinventing the steel."

By the time we pull into the Bat Cave like secret entrance to Dime's digs, our brains and bodies have been numbed by songs like "Hellhound," "Goddamn Electric" and "Yesterday Don't Mean Shit." Inside the house, Dimebag gives the CD a second spin, and it sounds even more ominous on his home system. The low end of Rex's bass and Vinnie Paul's machine-gun drums rumble like a sonic boom, Phil Anselmo's screaming vocals sound menacing and energized, and Dimebag's guitar wails, chunks and roars. Reinventing the Steel is the first studio album that the Pantera boys have produced on their own, but even without their longtime producer Terry Date behind the desk, they've managed to outdo themselves.

The beer is poured, the steaks are served, and now it's time for more entertainment. Anyone familiar with Pantera's long-form videos knows that Dime is pretty handy with a camcorder. It is, in fact, rumored that his rowdy backstage footage of the band had a profound influence on Steven Speilberg's bloody battle scenes in Saving Private Ryan. But little prepared us for the guitarist's self-produced and -directed opus, Y2Gaines.

As Dime bag pops the video into his VCR he explains that "Y2Gaines is a moving story about a father who searches for milk for his baby boy, Clim." The father is played by a striking fellow with unusually green teeth, and Clim is a plastic doll that sports a crude hand-painted goatee. As you might guess, the boy and his pappy have no trouble finding any number of ladies who are more than ready, willing and able to deliver the milk.

After the movie reaches its climax (several, actually), we're back on the road and headed toward the Clubhouse, a classy and comfortable gentlemen's club owned by Dimebag and his brother, Vinnie Paul. Having "invested" a substantial amount of their hard-earned income at various Dallas strip bars in-between tours and while making albums, they realized it would probably be cheaper if they bought one of their own before taking their extended vacation. The Clubhouse is a classy, comfortable lounge filled to the brim with Dallas debutantes gone wrong. In addition to the requisite catwalk, there's a "secret" shower room where patrons can hose the girls down with fluorescent paint.

Settling into a plush, overstuffed chair, your intrepid and intoxicated reporter commissions a three-girl lap dance, only to realize that he has just two bucks in his wallet. But before the lap dance turns into a slap dance, Dimebag comes to the rescue with a wad of $20 bills, and once again life is good.

Considering all of Dimebag's extra-curricular activities, one would assume that the band just kicked back and took it easy during their downtime, but anyone familiar with Pantera knows that the word "easy" doesn't apply to them. Over the last four years they have gone out on several tours, played opening gigs for Black Sabbath and Kiss and released a live album. They've recorded songs for the Detroit Rock City and Heavy Metal 2000 soundtracks, composed a theme song for the Dallas Stars hockey team and collaborated on an album with David Allan Coe, the country outlaw legend who penned "Take This Job and Shove It."

And the band relaxes as hard as it plays: Dimebag mentions that he's gone through three La-Z-Boy recliners over the last four years.

"My last La-Z-Boy got ragged and busted up from us getting all drunk, turning on loud music and pile-driving into each other," says Dimebag. "I just replaced it a few weeks ago with the deluxe model that has the vibrating back massager in it. You've got to have that comfort rig after your belly is full of cow and cold beer and you want to watch some Y2Gaines."

But now that Reinventing the Steel is completed, Dime won't have much time to break in his newest chair. The band takes off for Europe immediately after the album comes out, before returning to the States this summer to play OZZfest. After that, they're touring Japan, and the live action will probably continue well into next year. "We're ready to get on the road," says Dimebag. "Everybody's got the itch. This record is geared for live performance. We're sitting on the best record we've ever written, and I can't wait to play these tunes in front of some rabid, hungry fans."

GUITAR WORLD: Why did Pantera take the last four years off?

Let me go all the way back. Way before we got a record deal, we were playing clubs seven nights a week, three one-hour sets a night. Then we got the record deal, and we took off on the road and stayed out. On the Cowboys from Hell tour we were driving around in an RV, fuckin' ragged out. If you've seen our first home video you have an idea what that was like.

Then we went right into making Vulgar Display of Power and doing another tour. It's been bam, bam, bam — nonstop. Most bands don't make it past two albums and tours, if that. We pulled it off, and everybody's been happy and cool, but we got to the point where we knew it was time to take a break. So we took a fuckin' break. But we started working on the new record last summer, and we've been kickin' ass ever since. That's where our heart's at, that's where we belong and here it comes. And here we go. Off the recliner!

What did you do during your time off?

I met the great, country-punk western legend David Allan Coe. What we are to heavy metal rock and roll, he is to country and western. I was just going to see him play, but I met up with that cat and ended up shooting the shit with him for two hours backstage. I've come to find out everybody loves ol' David Allan Coe, even people like Kid Rock. I had a copy of our third home video on me, and I gave it to him, saying, "Hey, man, you probably ain't heard of us. That doesn't matter. Here is what we do. We're pretty much in the same boat. We're both rebels."

We ended up talking about all the stuff we had in common. He called me up a day later and said, "Hey, Dime. It's David Allan Coe. I'm gambling, and I just hit $50,000 on a slot machine. I want you to play on my new record." David had a week off, so I invited him to fly in and stay at my house. We started cutting shit, putting together this crossover project called "David Allan Coe and the Cowboys from Hell." It's a rebel-meets-rebel kind of thing. We've finished eight songs and we have two more to record. That took the whole summer, because we were mostly partying and hanging out.

Collaborating with a country and western legend like him is cool. I love the idea that he's an outlaw and sticks up for people like Kid Rock and Pantera. He opens his show playing Pantera songs and shit like that. Sometimes he goes into medleys of our tunes. He's always up there talking about hanging out with Dimebag, getting drunk. He reads more rock and roll magazines and owns more rock records than most kids I know. He's on top of it.

Are we going to hear you do some chicken pickin' on that record?

It's got quite a bit of Southern twang on it. But there are some pretty cool heavy metal moments on it, too. There's quite a bit of bluesiness too. And there's some Bob Seger-type rock and roll. It's a wide spectrum. It's good party music. It's crazy how many country and western people love hard rock and how many rockers get off on David Allan Coe outlaw shit. We'll be talking to these kids, and they'll say, ''Ah, dude. I saw you at the Coe show." It's not alien to them at all.

Speaking of outlaws, have you been listening to any of the new metal bands, and did they have impact on how you recorded Reinventing the Steel?

We've watched what's gone on around us, and we've been like a steel rod in the center of it all. All these different forms of music have come along that are cool, but the worse thing we could do is go, "Oh, wow! Maybe we'd better get a little piece of that." The next you'd know, the record company would applaud us, and we'd start becoming something we weren't. What would that do to the fans who are sitting there rock-hard, waiting on the next piece of goods to come their way?

So we looked at that and said, "Up yours, motherfucker. This is who we are, and this is what gets our blood boiling." We realized that we were one of the only bands that stuck to our guns, so we decided to go ahead and kill this motherfucker dead three times over. And we did.

If you are honest and stay true to what you believe in, you can't fuckin' lose. I'm still the same cat I always was. I don't get all caught up in that rock star shit. I don't sit at home. I go out. I'll hang out with whoever, wherever and whenever, and probably drink them under the table, if I can. If I can't, then I'll have them drive me home. If you get ahold of something and that's your angle and what you're shooting for, don't bend. Watch, and it will pan out. Put your money in the stock market and don't move it, because if you fuck with it, you're going to lose. Don't try to get too much. Just take what you've got and let it be what it is. [sings] Let it be! Let it be!

Why are there just 10 songs on the album?

Do you really think you're getting more when you buy a CD with 17 songs on it? Kids think that, but they're kids. They don't know any better at this point. They ain't getting Black Sabbath. They ain't getting Led Zeppelin. They're getting what they're getting — a bunch of the same type of stuff through the whole CD. This album is only 10 songs, but they're all good. It's not 29, 17 or 15 songs, with just two good songs on it. We're old school. We cut the fat off of everything. There ain't one ounce of fat on this record. It's 10 solid ass-kickers. It was hard for us to pick the opener because there are 10 killer songs. I don't have to boast my own band up because it will speak for itself, but we're damn proud of it.

Every Pantera record is available on vinyl. Did you use a side one/side two approach when sequencing songs for this album?

We'll always think of our albums as records. I've still got a turntable and all my old Deep Purple records. But I don't scratch 'em. The only way I scratch 'em is when I get drunk and bump into them. And, trust me, they're all scratched. Actually, you should call that a scar.

How did you get Kerry King from Slayer to play on "Goddamn Electric"?

The song is about the vibe that we get when we crank up or play loud music, when we're in our element. Music heals the soul. It's goddamn electric. That's what we call it. Phil called me up with these lyrics that go, "Your trust is in whiskey and weed and Black Sabbath. It's goddamn electric." I said, "Dude, you hit it. You struck the nerve." The second time that line comes around, Phil sings, "Your trust is in whiskey and weed and Slayer." Phil was calling out all these bands that stuck true to their guns. They're our kind of guys.

It just so happened, when were getting ready to record that song last year, Slayer was coming through town on the OZZfest with Sabbath, and Kerry called me up. I said, "Dude, I'm bringing something out there, so get ready." I didn't let him know what it was. We brought a DA-88, a tape with a rough stereo mix of the whole tune on it, an SM-58 and a mic cord. I caught Kerry before he went onstage. He was warming up, and I said, "Do you want to play on this tune? We rag on Slayer."

Kerry's always pumped up and ready to kick ass on anything. They went up onstage and played their set. The whole time I was yelling, "Kerry! Rip it!" They were tearing it up. After the set was finished I saw the Marshall stack come rolling through the door, and here comes Kerry. We plugged him up. Vinnie was back there and he had it all wired up. He hit "record," and the first thing Kerry played was awesome. You can hear me at the end of the take yelling, "Don't touch that! Fuck, that's hot!" He recorded it right there on the spot, backstage at Starplex in Dallas, in a bathroom. Kerry packed his shit up and fuckin' flew somewhere else and jammed some more.

How did you get started on the album?

I'd accumulated a shitload of guitar riffs. The ideas get inside your head, and if you're smart enough to have a recorder sitting near you, you end up saving a lot of good ideas. Riffs just come out when I'm jacking around playing. I went back through those tapes, and there were a lot of them — more than I've ever had. I took it to the next step and went upstairs to my studio, which has a 24-channel Mackie board and some electronic drum pads. I started piecing stuff together, and that started to open up other doors. I had a bunch of ideas that I put together back to back, and I recorded them on a CD.

I sent one to Phil, and he had ideas and riffs that he wrote on the guitar. He's a hell of a player. He's in a league of his own with the death metal and black metal fast-hand rhythm playing. He'd hear a riff on the CD and he'd go, "That riff's cool, but that note has got to be sour." Or he'd tell me to bend a note up. He'd work on me, just like I do with him when he's working on his pipes.

On top of that, Rex brings in his ideas. He can always make parts fit together better. He's good with key changes. He's the backbone of a lot of our stuff. And Vinnie Paul always comes up with those over-the-top drum grooves where we build songs around him. How many bands write a riff around the drummer? We all milk each other. We get the best out of each other, and that's how it should be. We're all brothers.

This is the first record that you've made at your home studio.

I built a studio in my house. It's just a little box. It was my original dream to buy a house that had an extra barn or something that I could renovate so I could have a room to jam in with friends and with the band. I just wanted to keep my chops up while we had some down time. Vinnie dragged all the live recording gear into my practice room one night. We started doing demos, and they came out pretty good. The next thing I knew, I had my carpenter down there. It had already been through a three-month process of being soundproofed. All we needed to do was build a control room. I had my boys come over and build a 6-by-8-foot guitar box for my amps so there's some air for the mics, but the sound is isolated. We did the same thing for Rex's bass. Everything is sitting out in this open room that isn't even all that big. Instead of driving an hour to Dallas to go to a studio and sitting there, trying to get pumped up again after driving, it's so much cooler to have everybody come to my house.

What did you use to record the album?

We did it on a 48-track Otari Radar hard-disk recorder. My dad turned me on to the Radar. He said that we could do anything we wanted with it. It's a lot easier than rolling the old tape and splicing things together. You can do all of that inside the box. I've got Mackie boards that give me 100 channels of mixing, quite a bit of outboard shit, and our amps and our drums. We just have to plug it in, make sure it sounds kick-ass and then we go.

Vinnie Paul and I produced the album, and it was co-produced by our boy Sterling Winfield, who engineered 99 percent of everything. It was just we three. We did things on our own terms. It was like having your nuts on the chopping block, but that's not such a bad place to be if you can slide your sack off the block before the blade comes down. There's not a better feeling than knowing you beat the chopper.

Your guitar tone is more lively on this album.

Dude, it's a battle to capture the live sound on tape. The signal has to go through a lot of shit before the listener finally gets it. It's easy to lose that live feel by the time the guitar goes through all that. It's easy to sit there and get your guitar sound close to a final mastered sound when you're recording it to tape, but by the time it's gone through everything else it can end up sounding skinny or flat.

The trick is in the mastering. Mastering is the final stage, and a lot can get fucked up if you're not careful. When you get to mastering, you've got to find the magic mix that works once it goes through all the compression and eq'ing. We worked with Howie Weinberg, and he's a fantabulous motherfucker. We told him what we were going for, and he did what he does by his own ear. I guarantee that this is one of the loudest, if not the loudest, CDs you'll ever hear. This motherfucker is loud and stormin'. It's on the verge of breaking open. We rode it right to the edge, and then a little bit over it.

How do you feel about the new styles of heavy rock that have become popular over the last four years?

A lot of people think metal is metal, and that's all it ever was and that's all it ever will be: Let's put it aside and just strip elements from it. Let's rap over it. Let's turn on the record scratcher. Let's do all this crap to try to form some kind of new music. But it's not really new music. It's just ripping pieces from music that's already been done and piecing it together in a different way. But it's diluted.

When you get something that's pure, it's 10 times as powerful. It's like the difference between nonalcoholic beer and real beer. They're promoting it like it's beer, and it's not beer! Get the real deal.

A lot of dudes play a seven-string guitar that's tuned to an open chord, and they've got just enough strength in the first finger to chord it. There's power in that, and I can see how somebody can get off on that. But if you want to make the guitar sing and talk for you, grab a hold of those high notes and bend that motherfucker over the neck. Pull it down and wiggle it until it won't wiggle no more. Pull that vibrato bar, feed it back and throw it through the fuckin' amp. That's expression. That's speaking how you feel, if that's how you feel. Now, if you only feel like lifting your finger up and down on the neck, that's cool too, and you should enjoy it if that's all you feel.

• A lot of people have seven-string guitars, yet they only play two or three strings. If you're only going to use three strings, why not just use a three-string guitar? Scott Ian of Anthrax has a four-string guitar, so he tells it like it is.
• I'm not saying I wouldn't play a seven-string. It's just that I've never needed one. Most dudes who play seven-strings don't sound any different than someone playing a six-string that's tuned down.

What is the key to getting that tight but heavy low end?

Randall just made me this new amp called the Warhead. I used prototypes on the record. The regular Randall head kicks ass, but I always wanted a lot more grit, grain and saturation, so I had to put something on the front end to get the gain up there. My dream was to be able to plug into an amp and have it sound out of control. The Warhead has the extra gain that I like.

I also could never get the tone I wanted on an amp that just had mid, bass and treble knobs. This one has a midrange scoop on it where you can dip that nasty midrange frequency out, or if you want to go for some twang you can get more midrange out of it. A lot of amps don't let you get rid of the midrange. Even if you turn it to zero, it still honks at you. The last thing in the chain of the whole head is a nine-band graphic eq, which gives you complete control over your tone.

The amp is also 300 watts, so it's louder than fuck. It has a 4x12 on top and a 2x15 on bottom, because when you're starting to get around 100 to 50Hz, 12-inch speakers start to fart out. Everybody tries to get a mastered guitar sound off of a record to come out of their amp, but the eq on an amp can't get deep enough. I had the amp set up so you could get that tone out of it.

You also have a new Washburn signature model guitar.

My new guitar is called the Dime Stealth. Basically, it's the regular Dime III signature series model, but the wings are sharpened up and beveled off. It looks like a Stealth bomber. Only a Stealth bomber is silent but deadly, and this thing is loud and deadly. It's pretty mean lookin'. It ain't no candyass shit. The Stealth has the Bill Lawrence pickups, which have some killer harmonics. It's set up for all those high squeals, low-end chunk and whammy bar shit. I'm also playing the Culprit and my regular Washburn guitars.

Pantera is making a bold statement by calling this album Reinventing the Steel.
Every record we put out has a bold statement. Folks say, "You people from the South talk a mean game." Yeah, but we back it up, and we ain't even halfway where we're going.

Here's an interview with Zakk Wylde and Dimebag Darrell from the March 2003 issue of Guitar World.To see the cover — and all the GW covers from 2003 — check out our 2003 GW covers gallery.

“Okay, Zakk, it’s time!”

As the morning sun begins to break over the Texas hills, Dimebag Darrell thrusts the keys to a waiting sports utility vehicle in Zakk Wylde’s enormous hand.

All through the night, over countless shots of Blacktooth Grin — the particularly potent and tasty mixture of Crown Royal and Coca Cola that flows like water at Dime’s Arlington-area compound — the Pantera guitarist has been psyching up Ozzy Osbourne’s right-hand man for this very moment. Zakk once nearly destroyed a large metallic Christmas tree placed on Dime’s decked-out lawn, and now that the holidays are here again, Dime just won’t be satisfied until Zakk finishes the job.

While Zakk loudly and repeatedly plows the hulking vehicle into the tree, a bespectacled gent in tie and khakis looks on with resigned amusement. A driver for the local limo service, he’s been summoned to take Zakk to the airport in time for the first flight of the day back to Los Angeles. Unfortunately, Zakk is in no hurry to leave. He’s too busy shredding the bottom of the driver’s SUV on the tree’s twisted metallic corpse.

"My truck sure looked nice today," the driver says, "before I brought it over here." He shrugs. "Of course, this sort of thing happens all the time at Darrell's. It's okay — he always pays for it."

Crazy shit seems to happen whenever Zakk Wylde and Dimebag Darrell get together. Zakk's rough bark bears ample evidence of a New Jersey upbringing, and Dime's drawl is pure Dallas. But these guys are bonded by a mutual respect that's totally impervious to geographical differences — and each is impressively capable of egging the other on to perform incredible feats of derring-do, be they musical or alcoholic.

The two met in the late Eighties, around the time that Zakk signed on for his initial tour of duty with Ozzy, and Pantera were first wowing headbangers across the land with their vicious brand of Texas metal. But their hard-working, hard-rocking, hard-drinking, straight-shooting aesthetic still resonates deeply with metal lovers everywhere: not only was Zakk voted Most Valuable Player in this year's Guitar World Reader's Poll but Zakk and Dime finished in the two top slots of the poll's Best Metal Guitarist category.

Don't expect either of these longhaired wildmen to rest on their laurels, however. Having spent much of 2002 on Ozzy's most high-profile tour to date, Zakk has begun mixing a new album from his own band, Black Label Society; titled The Blessed Hellride, the record should hit the racks sometime in spring 2003. The follow-up to 2002's highly acclaimed 1919 Eternal, The Blessed Hellride, Zakk promises, will be "some serious sick shit."

With the future of Pantera currently in limbo (singer Phil Anselmo and bassist Rex Brown have spent 2002 touring with Down, and Anselmo is preparing to return to the studio with Superjoint Ritual), Dime and drummer brother Vinnie Paul have busied themselves with New Found Power, a crushingly heavy project featuring the powerful vocals of former Halford guitarist Pat Lachman.

The brothers have also recorded Rebel Meets Rebel, a country-metal offering, with legendary country-western outlaw David Allan Coe. The album is due out in 2003, as is Riffer Madness, a veritable encyclopedia of Dime bag licks and lessons compiled by Guitar World contributing editor Nick Bowcott. "I just don't want anyone to think that ol' Dimebag Darrell's been sittin' here on his ass," Dime says, chuckling.

In an hour or so, Zakk will stroll down to Dime's garage studio to lay down an incendiary, off-the-cuff solo on one of New Found Power's latest tracks. "I didn't think it would be a problem or nothin'," Dime will say, admiring his pal's spontaneous string-bending display. "He's always so ready to go, man!"

But right now, as Dime's saintly girlfriend Rita pours a round of Zakktooth Grins (a Blacktooth Grin with ginger ale substituted for Coke, as per Zakk's preference), the two friends are convening in Dimebag Manor's memorabilia-packed living room for an animated Guitar World summit on guitar playing, the current state of rock and the future of Pantera. Pull up a chair, grab a cold beverage and try to stay out of the line of fire.

GUITAR WORLD: Guitar World's readers have voted Zakk Wylde Most Valuable Player and Zakk and Dimebag Darrell Best Metal Guitarists for 2002. What do you think that says about our readers?

ZAKK WYLDE: That they love heavy shit and drinkin' booze — that's why they like us!

DIMEBAG DARRELL: I say thanks a fuckin' million, right out of the chute. And I just want to say that Zakk Wylde is easily the best, most well-rounded player in every category, and he wholeheartedly deserves the Most Valuable Player award, hands down. He's the hardest workin' motherfucker in rock and roll, period. He does double duty — he does Black Label, he does Ozzy. He's been nonstop since he showed his face in the first place, and he keeps taking it to a new level. He's done scared everybody else the fuck off, so nobody else is even gonna try, you know? [

laughs

]

ZAKK: The first time I heard Pantera, I thought, Jesus Christ! I still think that, to this day, Pantera is the heaviest fuckin' band on the planet, but it's not just heavy for the sake of bein' heavy; it's got groove to it, and it's pure musicianship at the same time. And what I'd say about Dime is, you can't get that good unless you work at it. You can tell he put the hours in and the practice in, and drew from so many of the great players. You surround yourself with greatness — the Randy Rhoadses, the Van Halens, the Tony Iommis — and you'll be in the right ballpark. Or the right zip code, anyways!

DIME: Maybe that's kinda what ties us in — we come from pretty much the exact same school.

ZAKK: When I was growin' up, to be the big gun on the block you had to know how to play Randy's stuff, Eddie's shit, or anybody that was cool. I mean, I'm not a big Dokken fan, but I'll tell you right now: George Lynch can throw down. It wasn't like superheavy metal shit, but you listened to George Lynch's solos, his vibrato and everything, and it was like, "What the fuck's he doing?" Me and Dime came up at the end of the Eighties, when all that stuff was kind of fizzling out.

DIME: [laughs] The three-handed technique was goin' out of style!

ZAKK: Guitar, with Yngwie and everything like that, kind of hit a ceiling where it couldn't go any further and had to start over again. And that's when GN'R came out, and Slash brought it back to more feel and more rock and roll, you know? Which was awesome. And then, of course, the grunge thing came in, but Jerry Cantrell was still doin' solos. The guitar thing is comin' back around, too. I mean, you'll always have me and Dime playin' solos on our records. But what's gonna happen is, some 19- or 20-year-old kid is gmma come out with some cool kick- ass band, and he's gonna make some 15-year-old kid wanna pick up a guitar and learn how to do a solo.

When Van Halen first came out with "Eruption," every town had some kid who knew how to play the song in its entirety. Nowadays, no one seems to be coming up with solos that inspire kids in the same way.

ZAKK: Put it this way: I love Ozzfest because Ozzy and Sharon started the whole thing to promote metal. But two summers ago — I was actually laughing — I was telling Freddy McTaggart, who does my guitars," I think Dime and I are the only motherfuckers on this whole tour that actually can get up from low E to high E and back safely!" [laughs] We were sitting out there watching Pantera just blow the fucking stage up and Dime just shredding all sick and fucking insane. I was watching the other bands, and no one else was playing solos! And it's just like, why wouldn't you want to get better? I don't understand that.

DIME: I'm into the whole song-as-a-piece-of-music thing: if it literally doesn't call for it, if it already has enough stuff going on, then it's okay not to play a solo. I've tried to force a solo before, but sometimes it's like, "That thing don't really fit, man! " You know, you end up on a groove part that's powerful, I understand that. But let's have some fuckin' action out there! There's more to it than two or three strings on the low-end side, you know?

I mean, I could see how some people might hear some of the shit Zakk does and say, ''I'm not ever gonna catch up, so why even try?" And that's the wrong way to look at it, if you ask me, man. You ain't gonna catch him, but why not do your own thing? Like I always say, the thick strings are a fuckin' nut in themselves, what with all that chugging and grinding. But to really express yourself, you have to get out on them high strings and bend them motherfuckers. Get out there and play some shit! There ain't nothing wrong with it. I can never understand how a solo could ever be "uncool." Play something good and it won't be uncool, you know?

ZAKK: When you listen to Randy Rhoads do a solo, or Eddie, or Jimi Hendrix or Jimmy Page, it brings the song to another spot. It's not like he's just going, ''I'm the guitar player — I've gotta put a solo here."

DIME: That's not what we're saying — we're not saying, " Play the solo for the fuck of it, dude, just so you could say you did it!" But goddanm, you can't tell me that on a whole CD, from start to finish , there's no place for somethin' badass to be played over the top. And for music lovers, man, where we come from, I'm wantin' to hear some of that shit, you know'

This past year, a number of popular guitar bands like the Hives, the White Stripes and the Vines seemed to take pride in playing few, if any, solos at all.

ZAKK: The only thing I think is really cool about that stuff is that it's guitar based. They're not doing solos, but thank fuck it's not, like, tons of Pro Tools. The bands are actually performing live, and the shit's actually kind of a little out of tune, but that's how it is — that's how a fuckin' rock and roll band sounds, you know? It shouldn't be perfect.

At least the Hives have two guys plugging their guitars right into the fuckin' amp, and the bass player's got a P-Bass or whatever, and they're just grinding it out. It's just meat-and-potatoes shit, like the Kinks on steroids. But at least they're a band, and they're writin' their own shit, as opposed to songwriters writing their music for 'em. The whole joy of being a real musician is writing your own music, you know what I mean? Backstreet Boys, 'NSync, all those bands — in Black Label, we call 'em "skin puppets," man, because that's what they are. They ain't real musicians.

DIME: But that's for somebody else, man. It ain't something for real music lovers at all. It's just a form of entertainment for some kids, you know what I mean?

ZAKK: I agree. But you look at Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page… I mean, Jimmy Page wasn't exactly Al Di Meola, but you can't take his songwriting away from him. Like "The Rain Song" — you can't take the fucking "Rain Song" away from Jimmy Page! He wrote that! Or Randy Rhoads playing "Over the Mountain." Or Eddie Van Halen playing "Eruption" or "Hear About It Later" -- not only did he perform it, he wrote it and played it! That's a real fucking musician. Bach, Mozart — all the greats always write their own shit, I don't care what anybody fucking says.

In our poll, among the Biggest Disappointments of 2002 was “No new albums by Metallica, Pantera, Van Halen or Guns N' Roses." Discuss.

ZAKK: The Guns N' Roses thing: I think Ax! should call up the old guys. No disrespect to the new guys, but the original Guns N' Roses lineup was flat-out one of the greatest bands that's ever been. It's just like, call the guys. I mean, how hard could it be to get Slash on the phone? Get the original lineup together, and make a fucking album that pisses all over Appetite for Destruction, and get it on. End of story, you know? That would be my biggest disappointment for the past year, and now that he's canceled all the fucking shows… the world's waiting for it to happen, you know? I think he's a great guy, and I think it could be massive. But then again, it's up to him.

DIME: Well, all I can say is, it's a touchy thing for me. If it's a disappointment that there ain't a Pantera record, I just want to let everybody know that it ain't because Dimebag Darrell ain't sitting here with a fucking cocked-and-loaded shotgun, ready to pull the fucking trigger. I've been waiting, ready to roll; so's my brother. Them cats [Phil and Rex] want to go do their thing. I've got a prepared statement I wanna lay on you, and I'd appreciate it if you'd print it verbatim, just like it is. That'll clear up the situation.

ZAKK: Pantera is the heaviest fuckin' band on the planet, brother!

DIME: Man, it's the only goddamn thing I ever gave a fuck about in my life, and it's an odd situation right now. It's not me holding anything back, that's all I can say. I respect the Pantera fans with all my heart. They've been so great to us for so long. Tell you, this last year has sucked the fucking biggest dong in the world for me and my brother. Since 9/11, it's just not been a good time. There's been a ridiculous amount of horseshit, and we're just ready to let this year pass on by I've had to reach inside, find my strength, get my shit together, figure out what I've gotta do, what I was born on this earth to do. It sucks, man. I miss the fans, I miss the music. But that's all right; we're gettin' some shit rolling, and it's coming.

What are your hopes and dreams for 2003?

DIME: Hopes and dreams for 2003? To have a better year than 2002! I'm looking forward to a better year, period -- gettin' back out and fuckin' rippin', comin' out with a kick-ass new record with New Found Power, and not lettin' anybody down, just goin' out there and throwin' down, doin' what I fuckin' do. This is what I'm meant to do, you know?

ZAKK: You wanna tell them about the album we were talkin' about doin' with you, me and Eddie Van Halen?

DIME: Break it out, dude!

ZAKK: We were sittin' there talkin' one day, and my wife just goes, "Why don't you and Dime make a guitar record together? I mean, you are guitar players, you're old friends. Why don't you just make a record together?" I said, "Yeah, it'd be a fuckin' piece of cake. We could put this thing together and then tour venues like the House of Blues, or whatever. We'd need a third guy, though." And my wife goes, "You're gonna have to call Eddie Van Halen for this one!"

DIME: Zakk done rang his ass and woke his ass up in the middle of the night! [laughs]

ZAKK: When we were on the Ozzfest, I'd call him up loaded. [laughs] I called him, he hung up; called him, he hung up; called him, he hung up; called him, he hung up. Then finally he goes, "What the fuck do you want?" I said, "Dude! We're gonna do this fuckin ' album — me, you and Dime from fuckin' Pantera!" He just goes, ''I've gotta figure out what the fuck's goin' on. I don't even know what's goin' on here at the fuckin' house! What are you fuckin' talkin' about?" It'd be like, everybody writes four songs on the record, and I'll just go, "Dime, what key is this fuckin' thing in?"

DIME: Send things back and forth till the shit's put together.

ZAKK: [to Dime] You've got the studio. We could do it up here, for fuck's sake!

DIME: Hey, strap Eddie down in Dime's compound! Hey man, no disrespect to Ed; if it weren't for Van Halen, I wouldn't be here.

ZAKK: There wouldn't be a fuckin' Pantera, and there wouldn't be a Black Label.

So you're still waiting to hear back from Eddie on that one?

ZAKK: Yeah, but it'd be fuckin' awesome.

DIME [laughs] Let's call him right now!

Back in 2000, Guitar World asked the legendary Pantera and Damageplan guitarist Dimebag Darrell to give our readers the best ways to stay fit when slinging six strings. Here's what he came up with.

01. Keep a positive outlook.

A lot of bands whine about the road and how tough it is. Fuck all that. With the right outlook, you can learn to entertain yourself and entertain each other so you can enjoy doing what you’re doing. There’s obviously gonna be highs and lows, and the trick to it is to be able to maintain composure and stay high even when you’re in the lows. That way when you hit the highs it’ll be twice as killer.

02. You’ve got to have booze!

Booze is the healer and booze is the feeler. Whenever you’re getting into rock and roll mode, nothing kicks it in better than a couple of shots of whisky and a cold beer. It kinda takes some of the distractions away and helps bring things into focus. You know the difference between listening to a record sober and listening to it after having a couple — it’s immaculate … it’s goddamned electric. So you’ve definitely got to have booze to survive. And, before I forget, the occasional, green “behavioral modification device” is also a necessity every now and again!

03. Stay hydrated.

On the same note: When you wake up and you’ve got a gig to play but you’re still half drunk and hurtin’ big-time, you’re gonna be dehydrated. The best thing to re-hydrate yourself isn’t Gatorade — it’s Pedialyte, the stuff they give to kids when they’re shitting in their britches! So, get yourself some Pedialyte, get yourself some water and then go for the cheap Mexican food. That’s a survival trick that’ll get you back on the right track.

04. Bring a recording device.

When you’re on the road, you’ve got to have your four-track — or some kind of recording device to jam on and have a good time. That way, you can work on new riffs, or write a cheap song about some jacked-off experience that just happened to you—something everybody can catch a nut on the next day.

05. Bring your favorite CDs.

Always have a collection of your favorite CDs with you. Music drives you. It wakes you up, it gets you pumping. And, at the end of the day, the correct tune will chill you down.

Here's an interview with Pantera's Dimebag Darrell from the June 1996 issue of Guitar World.To see the Dimebag cover, and all the GW covers from 1996, click here.

A man’s home may be his castle, but for Pantera's Dimebag Darrell, it's also a fully stocked rock and roll playground.

Part crash pad, part recording studio, part wet bar, Sir Dime's palace is littered with Gold and Platinum records and a hard liquor collection that would make a Hooter's bartender blush. A large Seagram's 7 display plaque hangs behind the television, a Coors Light keg sits in the living room, and Washburn Dimebag signature series guitars lurk, ready for action, in every room. There's even a cheap nylon-string acoustic in the bathroom.

"Yeah, nothing feels better than knowing that I can put a guitar in my hands at any time and rip -- even when I'm taking a crap!" laughs the purple-goateed cowboy from hell. "I guess you could just call me a shithouse poet!"

Located in a sedate Arlington, Texas, suburb, Darrell 's home on the range is clearly a source of pride. And despite the dorm-room atmosphere, the house represents the twentysomething Dimebag's first tentative step into (gasp!) adulthood.

"I've always wanted a place to jam," he says. "So, when we had some time off after our last tour, I'd decided that I'd do myself right for a change. Instead of-spending all my money on beer and tattoos, I thought I'd buy something that's worth a shit for once."

Decked out in an Ace Frehley t-shirt and baggy shorts, Dime leads me to a converted RV garage that stands in his backyard. Everything but the vocals on Pantera's new album The Great Southern Trendkill (East/West), was recorded here. (Vocalist Phil Anselmo tracked his parts in Trent Reznor's New Orleans studio.)

"It started off as a jam room," explains the guitarist as we stroll across the brown, unmanicured lawn towards the makeshift recording complex. "But then we decided to do our demos here, so we brought in some gear -- three Tascam DA-88's and a little Mackie board. The demos were so tough and lethal sounding that we were like, 'Man! That's almost it, right there.' Then we got hold of an MCI5OO console -- the board we've used to record all our albums -- and we were set. It's a full studio!

"At the time, we were looking at having to record in Dallas, which is 45 minutes from my place. And I've gotta tell you bro, I wasn't into that idea at all. Y'know, you wake up, you get your dick hard, you jump in your hot rod. But, by the time everybody's made it to the studio, somebody's hungry so you go out and get a bite to eat. That leaves you all tubbed up and unmotivated. So you sit around and watch the big screen TV, play pool and drink beer. I didn't want that to happen so we just did it here."

As expected, Dime's studio has a dark, homey, practice-room vibe. The tiny control room is packed with state-of-the-art gear. But, ominously, in the middle of the floor there is an eerie chalk outline of a body. Was this the scene of a grisly murder? Did a recording engineer cross the line?

"Naw, that's just where I collapsed one night after a heavy session," Darrell laughs. "I'll sleep anywhere!"

After pointing out some of his favorite toys in the humongous pile of beat-up effects pedals he “dicked around" with while making the album, we walk back to the house and settle down in the game room. Darrell sticks a rough-mix tape of Pantera 's eagerly anticipated fourth album into his stereo system. "I'm sorry that I don't have any final mixes yet," he grimaces as he hits 'play' and cranks the volume. "I only finished recording the last of my lead shit yesterday."

As the music kicks in, Darrell pours each of us the first of many Black Tooth Grins we will imbibe during our talk. It is Pantera's official drink of choice, consisting of a healthy shot of Seagram's 7 and a tiny splash of Coke.

"Our fans know that we ain't gonna let them down and we haven't," he bellows over the music. After 11 tunes and as many shots later, all I can do is stagger and agree. Yes sir, once again, Pantera has delivered the goods.

GUITAR WORLD: Describe Pantera today and how you feel the band has evolved since the release of Cowboys From Hell seven years ago.

Right off the bat I'd say that all of us are more in tune with ourselves and each other than ever before. We've been evolving as Pantera the band -- we're not just another one of those groups where one or two guys are in the spotlight. We're a fuckin' band in the truest sense of the word. It takes all of us. We all go over each other's parts together and make sure that we think it's the shit. We give each other a flame -- we rile each other up.

How would you describe The Great Southern Trendkill compared to your previous three major-label releases, Cowboys From Hell, Vulgar Display of Power and Far Beyond Driven?

It's almost like a "best of," man. Some of the riffs on it date back to our Cowboys From Hell and Vulgar Display of Power periods. Hell, a couple of ideas even go back to before we got signed. For example, when we were still playing small clubs, I used to play a 20-minute solo that consisted of everything from Eddie 's "Eruption" to Randy's "(Revelation) Mother Earth" -- plus whatever else I felt like throwing in. A regular part of my solo featured a long-assed, "sing-along" type lead section, which has ended up in a new song called "Floods."

Speaking of lead work, my only grumble about Far Beyond Driven was that it didn't feature enough guitar soloing.

Well, there's definitely quite a few solos on this motherfucker! But beyond quantity, I think that I'm developing more of my own identity, lead-wise. My solos are more focused. Some of 'em even have a melodic, theme-like vibe in places -- like the one in "Floods." Also, I've gotten into doubling my leads, like Randy Rhoads used to do. I'm not panning them right and left in the mix: it's two right on top of each other. To a lot of people's ears it might sound like I'm using a chorus or a similar type of effect, but it's just me doubling my parts.

Yeah, there's definitely some guitar playing on this bitch, and once again man, there's a real live vibe in my rhythm work. If anybody wants to learn how to play these songs right, you can't just learn the main riffs and then merely repeat 'em, you've gotta listen real close to catch all the little techniques, slurs and bends that I put in there. I think it's the subtleties that really add to the depth of our material, much more so than having some outrageous lead guitar jack-off in every damned song!

While there's definitely more leads on Trendkill than on its predecessor, there are still areas where most bands would throw a solo but where you instead opt to lock in tight with the rhythm section and drive the riff home.

Hey, I love wailing out leads as much as the next guy but, as I've already said, only if it complements the track. And sometimes, that means not taking a solo. I don't want to come off like I'm trying to take away from playing lead though, 'cause I play fucking lead, man! I've worked hard on my technique, and it comes from the fucking heart, y'know. To me, though, playing what works best for the song is much more important than trying to impress other guitarists by jerking off all over the neck.

Sure, you can express yourself by stepping out as a lead player, but it's always truly something to see a live band jam together on a riff and hump it and ride it -- it's a jam session and that 's impressive right there, regardless of what type of music they're playing. And we do that kind of shit a lot. When we work a riff, it's not a lead break, it's a band break.

For example, there 's a part in "War Nerve" that was originally gonna have a lead break over it, but we weren't happy with the section I was supposed to solo over. Then, while we were working on improving the part under the lead, we came up with a riff idea that kicked so hard we said, "Fuck the lead, let's ride on this instead -- it'll kill motherfuckers when we jam on it live!" Basically, providing it's a bad-assed part, you're not gonna miss having a lead there. Pantera's a machine, and when we all throw down on a wicked part it sounds real fucking tough.

Is there slide work going on during the title track's solo?

Yeah. That's my favorite lead on the record. There's some nice stuff that shifts from speaker to speaker and, like you spotted, I even broke out a slide at the end, which was a completely spontaneous thing. I've done a little slide work on our music in the past to add some extra brassiness to a part, like on that riff in "Strength Beyond Strength," [Far Beyond Driven] but I've never really tried to use one up on the higher register of the guitar until now.

What made you decide to do it?

Riggs [drummer Vinnie Paul, Dimes brother] was cutting and producing my lead on "Trendkill," and towards the end he said, "Hey man, I could hear some slide in there." So, just for the hell of it, I cranked up the strings on my axe about half-an-inch off the neck, flipped it on the blues pickup, grabbed a slide and went for it. I totally winged it, but I'm a huge fan of Billy Gibbons so I've heard enough slide work to know how it should go. Using a slide is totally outta control because the frets won't save your ass if you're not in tune and right on the money! I have nothing but intense respect for people who can really take that motherfucker and keep every note in pitch.

Your solo on "Drag the Waters" also caught my ear.

Thanks. That lead's kinda like an old Van Halen thing where the band breaks to feature the solo. Actually, on this one I ended up keeping a lot of the original guide-track stuff I laid down while we were cutting the drums. It's funny, man, sometimes you record something that you plan on re-doing later, but then when you listen back to it you decide to keep it because you realize that it's gonna be real tough to beat! In other words, it's good enough. Hey, man, like the saying goes, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!"

You mentioned earlier that a lot of your rhythm work is spiced up with subtle little slurs and tricks. How tough is it for you to double a part when there's so much going on?

It's just a question of kicking back and taking the time to double the part properly. Sometimes it may take a while, but it's definitely worth it. I always go for that live, honest feel when I'm going for that first rhythm track. I'll never hold back on a part just so it'll be easier for me to double it later on -- to my ears it sounds sterile if you do that. I always want to get that initial track kicking and full of slurs, squeals and feel. I'll worry about doubling it later!

And how many rhythm tracks did you record per song on Trendkill?

Just two. I used to try four, twelve or whatever. But less is definitely more, man. If you do too many it just gets cluttered up. The best thing to do is get two guitars doing a tight double and then turn the fuckers up!

As your music is so physical, I'd imagine that you record your parts standing up.

Yeah, I'd say that 97 percent of what I did on this album was done standing up. It just feels right that way. I mean, you don't go to war sitting down!

Do you record using headphones much?

I don't mind 'em but they can make you too particular sometimes, and they also get in the way if you're really fired-up and going for it. I mean, it's difficult to throw down hard when you've got these big fuckin' cans on your head and a huge-assed chord dangling across your back! So, most of the time when we're recording we use live floor monitors instead.

You've got a killer, brittle rhythm tone on this album. Have you changed your basic setup at all since the last record?

Kinda. I ended up using the old, carpeted Randall RG-100 head I recorded Cowboys From Hell with.

What happened to the Randall Century 200's you've been playing through for the longest time?

When we were jamming around and doing the demos I didn't bother to hook up my normal rig; I just wanted something that would do the job. So, we dragged in a bunch of my old shit and set it up. In addition to my RG-100 stack, I used an old Furman PQ-3 parametric EQ, which has a different gain structure from the PQ-4's I've got in my main rack, my blue MXR 6-band graphic EQ and a cheap little Boss Noise Gate. Then, when we did the demos, I was liking the way everything was sounding so I thought, "Don't fuck with it, there it is!"

You've got a huge pile of effects boxes in the studio. Aside from the ones you've already mentioned, what other units did you use?

I hooked up my MXR Flanger/Doubler every once in a while and I used an E-Bow for a real smooth, continual sustain on "10's." I also used one of those little Korg Pandora boxes for a weird, fluttering sound on a short passage in "10's" and a Lexicon Vortex for the shimmering, breathy tone on my theme-like lead in "The Underground in America."

I also used a Roland AP-2 Phase II pedal, a KorgAX30G, a Digitech Whammy pedal, of course!, a Boss CE1 Chorus and a bunch of old Electro-Harmonix shit -- a Small Stone Phaser, an Electric Mistress Flanger/Filter Matrix, a Little Big Muff and a Soul Preacher Compressor/Sustainer. I also used a Korg G1 on the demos and some of that made it on the record. If l can't beat a part of the demo we'II just extract that small section and use it. The G1 is a bad-sounding little unit, man.

There's some wah on the record, too.

Shit, I almost forgot about that! I used my Vox Wah on the earlier part of the recording and then Jimmy Dunlop sent me one of his rack-mount units [Crybaby DCR-1SR]. Man, that thing is incredible, you can literally get whatever you want out of it. I also really like the idea that you can run a bunch of Wah pedals all over the place on stage with it so you're not always tied to that one spot. The only uncool thing about it is that Rex [Brown, bassist] will be dicking me off every night 'cause he'll be jumping on my pedals all the time!

I take it that your main axes on this record were your signature model Washburns.

Definitely. I didn't even think of trying out "old faithful" [his blue lightning-bolt Dean]. That motherfucker is in a coffin right now! I'm real proud of how my Washburn guitars play and sound. I couldn't be more happy or hooked-up better.

Your chops always seem razor sharp. Do you still practice a lot when you're not writing, recording or touring with the band?

Yeah, I've always worked on my chops and shit. Nothing feels better than knowing that, no matter where you go, if a guitar is put in your hands then you're ready to rip. I'm never not playing the guitar. Every different type of guitar I pick up -- electric, acoustic, 12-string -- brings something different out of me. That's how "Suicide Note Pt. 1" was written. Washburn sent me a 12- string acoustic and all of sudden there it was -- another influence and another piece of inspiration. I wrote that riff the very first time I pulled the 12-string out of its case.

Considering that Pantera is obviously a tight, family-type unit, did it bother you at all when Phil Anselmo went off and did the Down album and tour?

No, not at all. Phil 's a musical guy and he likes to stay busy. That's what he does, he jams all the time -- just like me. Hey, when I'm not making records, touring, doing interviews or getting jacked-off in a four-hour photo shoot for a Guitar World cover, you'll find me jamming in my four-track room here at Camp Strapped or jamming with friends. That's the fun we have, just staying musical and shit.

Speaking of musical endeavors outside of Pantera, can we ever expect to see a solo Dimebag album?

One of these days I should probably put out my own record and call it Dimebag: The Original Four-Track King! I was the first dude to buy a four-track that I know, and I've been abusing that motherfucker daily ever since I got it! I'd write a song about anything and everything that happened to me. If I got ripped off at the liquor store, I'd come home and record a song about it. If a close friend had something crazy going on in his life that he was tryin' to keep low key so he wouldn't get busted -- like cheating on his girlfriend or something -- then, of course, I'd have to bust his chops by writing a song about it and then blowing it up in front of him and a crowd. [laughs]

I always take the thing on the road with me, and I've got a library of literally thousands and thousands of four-track tapes. Some of the stuff is hilarious to look back on 'cause they are pieces of my life that I've completely forgotten about but are stuck in stone on tape. If I ever did release a record of this shit, it would have to come with a booklet explaining what was going on and have a glossary in the back for all the fucking lingo! Joking aside, though, Pantera is it for me right now, and I'm looking forward to going out on tour again.

Despite its sales, Far Beyond Driven was pretty much ignored by radio and MTV. The chances are high that The Great Southern Trendkill will suffer the same exact fate. Does that bother you?

Fuck no! We've been around and we will be around regardless of that shit. We're an honest band that just does what feels right to us and tries to do our best at everything we do. And hey, if you wanna play our music, then play it. If not, that's fine too. I was never let down by the fact that Vulgar wasn't played a lot on radio or on MTV. I thought we made some pretty good videos last time out, but fuck, MTV ain't gonna make or break Pantera.

Has the success of your previous albums put extra pressure on you?

It depends. It kinda comes and goes. To an extent it's almost up to me how much pressure I feel because I'm the type of dude that always expects more from myself all the time, anyway. I have a certain idea in my head of where this band is heading and for me to be satisfied I have to hit that mark. I guess that's where the real pressure is. It comes from within. So, it's up to me to screw my head on and get serious with myself and my music, because no one else is gonna do it for me. No one outside of this band is gonna come up with those bad-assed riffs, no one else is gonna do shit for us from a musical standpoint.

Do you pay much attention to what is going on around you in the Nineties rock world?

Yes and no. I'm aware of what's going on around us musically, but it doesn't really concern me because it ain't gonna affect us in any way, shape or form. I'm into what I do and I know what's right. I don't know how to put it any other way, except to say that I feel confident that we can hold our own and move forward.

A lot of so-called "experts" have declared metal dead. As you've often described your music as metal, I take it you don't agree.

Fuck no, man, it's definitely not dead, at least not for us. I know for a fact we can sell out a concert anywhere in the world right now and I know that we have diehard fans that know we ain't gonna let 'em down. Unfortunately, metal as a whole definitely ain't on top right now. I can remember when heavy metal was flamed up and boiling but it just comes down to the fact that there's not a bunch of bands putting out good shit right now. It's been a long time since something new has come out and blown me the fuck away, that's for sure.

What was the last thing you heard that blew you away?

Old or new, man? I keep on going back to my old records and getting a nut on. Like Go For What You Know by Pat Travers -- good God, that's the shit right there! That's what I'm into. A band that can get up and do it live. Pat Travers and Pat Thrall [the two guitarists on the live LP] complement each other perfectly on that album. And, of course, I still jam on my old Judas Priest and Van Halen records. I'm trying to think of the most recent thing that beat me down in the dirt. It was probably Master of Puppets.

And that LP is a good ten years old now!

Like I said man, there's just not enough ass-kickers out there tearing it up right now! But metal -- or whatever the hell you wanna call it -- ain't all used up. I don't know why everybody thinks they need to make their shit sound like somebody else's and follow what's currently considered cool. Try playing with some new ideas, dude. Go buy a new pedal or one of my guitars or something. [laughs] Get a new attitude on and get inspired. Fuck what's "hip," brother -- trendkill!

Hello, everyone. Here's part two of my Guitar Strength blog, "10 Commandments of Playing Guitar in the Style of Dimebag Darrell." Be sure to check out part one right here.

Commandment 6: Change Your “Tune”

One of the things most unique to Dimebag throughout his career was his use of altered tunings. From Cowboys From Hell to Reinventing the Steel, Dime constantly challenged the preconceptions of how a guitar should be tuned. Early on, when tuned “regularly” to E (E, A, D, G, B, E), Dime’s guitars were actually tuned down more than a quarter step. As his guitar tech has noted, that meant that the guitars were tuned to “D# plus 40 cents on his Korg tuner. The A string was G# plus 40 cents, D was C# plus 40 cents, etc.” (Note: The Van Halen influence is definitely in effect here, as Van Halen I and Van Halen II are tuned in a similar manner.)

Dimebag also experimented with “drop D” tuning on Cowboys From Hell (C# plus 40 cents), but later become a fan of tuning the entire guitar down a whole step, beginning with A Vulgar Display of Power. This tuning (D,G,C,F,A,D-a quarter step flat) was used extensively on “Walk” and “A New Level." Further use of this tuning was used on Far Beyond Driven (“Becoming,” “I’m Broken,” “5 Minutes Alone,” etc.), and by Reinventing the Steel it was Dime’s main “standard” tuning.

Never one to be limited, Dime also used a “drop D down one step” (C,G,C,F,A,D), and “down 1 ½ steps” (C#,F#,B,E,G#,C#). The last, which is the same tuning used by Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath, was a favorite of Dime’s on The Great Southern Trendkill (“Drag the Waters”, etc.), and became the new standard by the time of his band Damageplan (New Found Power), though Dime was also known to use “drop D down 1 ½ steps” (B,F#,B,E,G#,C#).

It is important to note that Dime was not a fan of the mid-'90s trend of using 7-string guitars, and his use of alternate tunings clearly reflected a rebellion against this trend while also allowing him to get a sound equally (and definitely more) heavy than that of his 7-string wielding counterparts. Also, these “slack” tunings allowed for a different sound, “vibe,” and feel when playing the instrument, inspiring Dime to create many of the greatest riffs and licks of our lifetime.

Commandment 7: Get Chromatic

As evident in the proficient use of symmetrical fingerings in his playing, Dimebag was never one to shy away from “outside” playing. In fact, he actually shied away from using scales and modes in any traditional fashion. While clearly knowing what and where notes would be in key, Dime would often use the notes “between” scale tones as a way to create a mood and add tension. These chromatic licks, using passing tones between scalar tones, made up a large part of his playing. To demonstrate, example 17 is a lick that Dimebag would often use to bring a solo to a crescendo. Not only does the lick sound good, it’s extremely easy to finger, allowing more musical movement in a limited physical space.

Another thing Dime would often do is take a simple lick like that shown in example 18, and simply move it chromatically.

Example 19 shows the lick moved chromatically up the neck one fret at a time, while example 20 shows the same lick moved chromatically down the neck in the same fashion.

Chromatics weren’t just a lead technique however, as Dime would often use chromaticism in his rhythm playing. This was only one component of his “lead-rhythm” technique, but when used in a riff it was extremely powerful in creating movement, texture, and mood. Example 21 shows the use of chromaticism in a Dime-style rhythm riff.

Another use of this technique, this time moving downward chromatically, is depicted in example 22.

As with all of the other techniques used by Dime, there are countless possibilities available for variation, and experimentation in your own riffs and licks is highly encouraged.

Commandment 8: Go “Off”

In a similar vein to the use of chromatics, Dime made extensive use of the wrong” notes in any given key, often featuring them in his riffs and licks." For example, the notes diatonic (in key) in E minor are E,F#,G,A,B,C,D. Being that there are only 12 notes (A, A#/Bb, B, C, C#/Db, D, D#/Eb, E, F, F#/Gb, G, G#/Ab) in the octave, there are 5 notes that are non-diatonic when in any given key. Therefore, when in E minor, the five notes that are non-diatonic are F, G#/Ab, A#/Bb, C#/Db, and D#/Eb. Theoretically speaking, these intervals (relative to the root) are the flat 9, the major 3rd, the flat 5 (tritone), the major 6th, and the major 7.

Dime was a skillful manipulator of these “outside” notes, often using them as the focal points in his riffs and licks. Unlike other players who would view using these outside tones in the manner of modal substitution (playing lines based on relative modes which use these alternative notes), Dimebag looked at all 12 chromatic notes as part of a greater, more cohesive, all encompassing “super-scale," with no-holds-barred usefulness of all notes relative to the root.

As we’ve previously looked at the use of the major 3rd, and the flat 5/tritone is a metal and blues staple that speaks for itself, we’ll look at Dimebag’s use of the other 3 intervals in his playing. As an excellent example of this use of the “wrong” notes in a given key, example 23 uses the flat 9 (F) and major 7 (Eb) played against/in unison with the E root.

Example 24 uses the flat 5 and major 7th.

Example 25 uses the major 3rd and major 6th as the prominent intervals.

Commandment 9: Play “Texas-Style”

One of the overall coolest aspects of Dime’s style was that he never played in a “normal” fashion. No matter the note or chord, Dimebag always articulated it by putting a little “English” on it. In “Dime-speak,” this was known as playing “Texas-Style." Dime would play notes/chords with any number of techniques (sliding, bending, muting, mutating with the whammy bar and/or pedal, etc.), making them drip with style.

Accomplishing this sort of playing is as simple as throwing a slight bend or artificial harmonic on the notes in a chord. Another method is taking “target” notes written for a riff and then playing them by approaching them from a ½ step below and bending into them. Example 26 is a riff using this technique.

Example 27 is the same riff played non-“Texas-Style." Notice how much more interesting it is with the bends and harmonics?

Example 28 shows how Dime would get extreme mileage out of just 2 notes (E and F) through the use of slides and micro-bends. Palm mute the open E notes for maximum effectiveness.

I suggest really listening in depth to your favorite Dimebag riffs and licks and checking out the nuances that make his playing so special. The personality that Dime put into his playing truly took the Van Halen mantle and raised the bar.

Commandment 10: Find Your Tone

No discussion of Dimebag would be complete without making mention of his most recognizable attribute: his tone. No player since Van Halen (there he is again) has had such a personal, powerful, seemingly unattainable guitar sound.

Dimebag “stumbled” upon his tone when he won a Randall half-stack in a guitar contest. The important thing to note is that Dime found something in this rig that was unique and worth working with. From there, he sought to “clean up” the sound with an MXR 6 Band Equalizer (the blue one). Further tweaks consisted of installing Bill Lawrence L-500 humbuckers in his guitar and adding a Furman PQ-4 (later a PQ-3) Parametric Equalizer. The beauty of all of these outboard devices was a controllable form of preamp gain. Dime used the hot Bill Lawrence humbuckers to push the MXR EQ (set to a mid-boosting “frown face”) to push the Furman (set to boost the highs and lows while scooping the previously boosted mids) to ultimately drive his Randall (solid state Century 100 or 200 heads) into overdrive. By using the unique cascading forms of gain, Dimebag was able to sculpt a tone all of his own.

The conclusion to make here is that Dime favored pushing the front end of his amps with a frequency-specific form of gain, as opposed to all-encompassing overdrive.

With all of this gain running, yet another of Dimebag’s famous tricks comes to play in the form of a noise gate. The noise gate allowed Dime to boost his input levels while eliminating all of the uncontrollable noise and feedback that usually accompanies such high levels of gain. Also, the gate allowed for Dime’s infamous “power-groove” holes of silence in his playing, allowing the instrument to respond naturally to his touch, while controlling all of the extraneous consequences of high-volume, high-gain playing.

Over the years, Dimebag has been associated with quite a few products:

-the Randall Warhead (he never used it on any album, and used it live only for his clean tone. The Century 100 and/or 200 heads were a constant staple of his tone. However, speaking personally as an owner of the amp, the “Dime-tone” is there, as well as many other extremely cool sounds.)

-the Digitech Whammy Pedal: Get one, there’s countless hours of inspiration available.

-the Krank Krankenstein: While never actually used by Dime (he had been helping design it in the months leading to his death), the amp is a departure from the solid state leanings of his past (it’s tube). I will say that as an owner of the Krankenstein, the amp is a powerful tool for sculpting your own tone.

Having said all of that, the most important thing to learn from Dimebag about tone is that it is a personal journey of discovery. There already was a Dimebag Darrell and he owned the tone he played with. Tone is a personal thing and is an individual pursuit that each individual player must constantly strive to achieve. Use Dimebag’s tone as an inspiration to seek your own voice, but find in his own tone the tools to help you discover your own (for example, using various gain boosters).

In closing, the legacy left by Dimebag Darrell should serve to inspire the next guitar hero living among us. Learn from the master, and be inspired to take your playing to the next level. So grab your guitar, crack open a Coors Light, pour yourself a Black Tooth Grin, and “Getcha’ Pull!”…

Scott Marano has dedicated his life to the study of the guitar, honing his chops at the Berklee College of Music under the tutelage of Jon Finn and Joe Stump and working as an accomplished guitarist, performer, songwriter and in-demand instructor. In 2007, Scott developed the Guitar Strength program to inspire and provide accelerated education to guitarists of all ages and in all styles through state-of-the-art private guitar lessons in his home state of Rhode Island and globally via Skype. Visit Scott and learn more at www.GuitarStrength.com.

It was 20 years and change ago that Pantera unleashed Vulgar Display of Power on the world. Today marks the release of a brand-new, 20th-anniversary deluxe edition of the album through Rhino Records, which includes the previously unreleased track, "Piss."

While 1990's Cowboys From a Hell was a radical reinvention for a band that wrote "Ride My Rocket," Vulgar Display of Power was the next logical step in the evolution of Pantera, further refining their signature recipe of equal parts groove and thrash into a piledriving cacophony truly worthy of the tag "vulgar."

Part of the success of the album lies in its ability to capture the band's live energy on tape — no easy feat, considering Pantera were quickly gaining a reputation as one of metal's wildest live acts.

While many of his peers would cower at the prospect of playing a guitar solo with no backing rhythm guitar, Dimebag Darrell embraced this technique fully on Vulgar, and to great effect.

"I did some doubling, but I wanted to capture our live sound," Dimebag Darrell told Guitar World in a 1992 interview. "When I play a solo, there's no rhythm guitar because I'm the only guitarist. I didn't think it was right to go and prettify the guitars on an album called Vulgar Display of Power. I wanted to keep things ... well, vulgar. The are some mistakes here and there, but so what? I'll save the clean and pretty guitarist for some other album."

Thanks to hard-hitting cuts like "Walk" and "Mouth For War," you'd be hard-pressed to make a case for any other Pantera record being the quintessential Pantera record. From the manic hardcore of "Fucking Hostile" to the soaring leads of the pseudo-ballad "This Love," every element of the band's trademark sound is in place and firing on all cylinders.

With all the pieces in place, Pantera's guitarist had just one more little change to make.

"Listen. People have been calling me Diamond Darrell for too long," he said in that same 1992 interview. "It's a mistake. I've always been called Dimebag Darrell by my friends. That's my real name. Dimebag Darrell — got it?"

Yep. We got it, Dime!

This year marks the 20th anniversary of Pantera's Vulgar Display of Power. Celebrate with The Pantera Limited Edition Box Set, which is available from the Guitar World Online Store. Get the whole story of the Texas metal upstarts, plus new interviews, rare photos and cover art by Tim Bradstreet. The box set comes with five copies of the Pantera issue with four covers not available anywhere else, a 15" x 21" double-sided poster and GWs 'Learn the Best of Pantera' DVD. We made only 500 of these!

It's been a big couple of weeks for Pantera fans.

First the band premiered a new music video for a previously unheard track called "Piss" at the fourth annual Revolver Golden God , and now a previously unheard Dimebag track has appeared online — apparently to promote a new Dimebag-themed skateboard from Elephant Brand Skateboards.

You can hear "Twisted" in the below video, which was filmed at Dimebag and longtime girlfriend Rita Haney’s home in Dalworthington Gardens, TX.

The song may be as close to a Dime solo track as we'll ever get, with the man himself handling vocal duties on the cut. It may not be "Walk" — and, in fact, it sounds a bit more like something off Rebel Meets Rebel — but any day you get to hear a new Dimebag solo is a good day in our book!

If you want to own a copy of "Twisted," it's available through CDBaby.com.

Pantera will release a 20th anniversary deluxe edition of Vulgar Display of Power next month via Rhino Records.

Hellyeah -- the supergroup featuring Vinnie Paul, Mudvayne's Chad Gray and Greg Tribbett, Nothingface's Tom Maxwell and Bob "Zilla" Kakaha from Damageplan -- have announced a June release for their upcoming third studio album, Band of Brothers.

"I'm really excited about what we've done on this new album," said vocalist Chad Gray. "I've always separated Mudvayne and Hellyeah as much as I could, even though it was my voice. Melodies, lyrics and just the overall style of writing were different. With 'Band Of Brothers', I just quit being afraid of who I am in relation to this band."

He continued, "I think we've all really gotten back to the original roots of what we've done individually and brought it together on this album. As an artist, as long as you're painting with your own brush, no one can compare or challenge you. I just painted with a bigger, heavier brush than I had with Hellyeah in the past. I think this is what fans have always expected to hear from us, and now were giving it to them."

The follow-up to 2010's Stampede will be released via Eleven Seven Music.

Guitar World visited the Dean Guitars booth -- a few times, actually -- during last week's 2012 Winter NAMM show in Anaheim, California, to get the lowdown on the latest Dean gear.

In the video below, we check out the new Dimebag Concrete Sledge ML guitar.

Actually, you'll notice Dimebag's original ML hanging on the wall. That guitar, of course, was the inspiration for the new Sledge model. The new version features an exact rendering of Dime's colorful airbrush job. It's got everything but the Kiss sticker!

Check out the video below for more about this guitar.

For a closer look at the guitar, head here -- and be sure to visit Dean Guitars online.

Also, don't forget to catch up on all the latest NAMM videos, photos and new-product information at our special NAMM 2012 page.

Nathan Gale.

It's not a household name. And it shouldn't be. It belongs among the ranks of Mark David Chapman and Yolanda Salvidar -- people who forever altered the course of artistic history but who deserve no more than scant vilification and quick dismissal.

Looking back upon Guitar World's covers of yesteryear, it feels pertinent to recall the moments that made up those 12 months of publication -- to reminisce upon events and milestones that shared a timeline with GW's issues. But some events have such monumental impact, they cannot help be the first and last thing a person thinks of when they look back.

Gale injected the cruelest charge into 2004. On December 8, he entered the Alrosa Villa in Columbus, Ohio. Damageplan was playing. Gale stepped onstage during the band's set. Using a 9mm handgun, he shot and killed Darrell "Dimebag" Abbott along with three other innocent people.

Tragedies born of senselessness and lunacy have plagued society since time immemorial. This was no more special or insignificant than any other. But it held a painful resonance for guitar fans. Anyone who knew Dime would attest he was the nicest, most genuine person you'd ever meet. And anyone with a set of ears and a stereo could tell you, hands down, Dime was a master of the guitar; a true virtuoso with seemingly limitless talent.

On December 8, the world was robbed of that talent. It was also robbed of Nathan Bray, Erin Halk and Jeff Thompson. So when looking back upon this week's gallery of Guitar World issues, remember all the great guitar moments of 2004, remember Dimebag and the path he blazed for groove metal devotees -- and remember the heroes who showed courage under fire that horrible night in Columbus, Ohio.

On December 14, The Key Club in Hollywood will host DimeBash 2011, an all-star event honoring Dimebag Darrell Abbott, who was killed in 2004.

This year's show will feature guitarists John 5, Scott Ian, Phil Demmel, Warren DeMartini, Ben Harper, Chris Howorth and Tom Morello; vocalists Jerry Cantrell, Dave Draiman, Duff McKagan, Serj Tankian, Mike Muir and Sebastian Bach; plus Doug Pinnick, James Lomenzo, Ginger Fish, Brian Tichy and Joey Jordison -- and several other artists.

The event will be emceed by That Metal Show's Eddie Trunk with Jim Florentine and Don Jamieson. Kicking off the event will be Kill Devil Hill, featuring Vinnie Appice and Rex Brown. Also on deck are Dio Disciples, featuring Rudy Sarzo and Tim Ripper Owens with a special appearance by Glenn Hughes.

"Today marks the 7th year, which still doesn't seem like a reality to me," said Rita Haney, Dimebag's longtime girlfriend yesterday, the anniversary of Dimebag's death. "Sometimes I think, 'Boy this sure is a long ass tour,' but then I focus back in and realize what I'm working on at this moment and I just have to smile and be thankful for all the amazing people that surround me, thanks to him. I hope everyone enjoys this event as much as we like bringing it to them. It's nothing more, nothing less, than 'About a damn good time!' -- one of my favorite Dime pastimes and phrases."

The event is sponsored by Monster Energy. All proceeds will benefiting the Ronnie James Dio Stand Up & Shout Cancer Fund.

Ticket prices are $20 and are on sale now right here.

Doors open at 7 p.m.; show begins at 8 p.m.

For more information, visit monsterenergy.com or Monster Energy's Facebook page.

Here's a quick interview with Dimebag Darrell of Pantera from the February 1999 issue of Guitar World.

"I’m ready to play, man. I’ve been home long enough -- it's time to get out there and kick some ass again!"

Dimebag Darrell is busting. The Pantera guitarist has just received confirmation that he and his bandmates will be supporting Black Sabbath on Sabbath's upcoming U.S. tour -- a monster thrill for Dimebag, an admitted Sabbath fanatic. "Opening for those guys is definitely the honor of a lifetime," says the goateed guitarist.

After laying low for much of last year, Pantera is looking forward to a more active 1999. Once their cross-country trek with Sabbath concludes, the Texas tornados plan to enter Dimebag's personal studio to begin recording the follow-up to 1996's The Great Southern Trendkill.

Meanwhile, on the guitar gear front, Dimebag is putting the finishing touches on his new signature line of Randall amplifiers. "My goal is to get it to where it is the most out-of-control amp you can buy," he says. "When you plug in, it'll blow your brains out -- that's my guarantee!"

Recently, Guitar World managed to pin down the tattooed wild man just long enough to get the skinny on some of his Pantera-related activities, and to learn exactly what the band has in store for the year ahead.

GUITAR WORLD: You must be excited to be touring with Black Sabbath.

Man, I can't wait. It's gonna be awesome just to sit on the side of the stage every night and watch. That's a pure inspirational factor right there.

Pantera recently recorded two Black Sabbath songs, "Hole in the Sky" and "Electric Funeral," to be used as radio singles.

Our first thought was to do an EP of Sabbath tunes, but we decided to deep-six that idea because so many people have covered the Sabs recently. But then we figured, what the fuck? We're going on tour with 'em, let's do a couple of songs just for radio. Hell, who doesn't like to play Black Sabbath tunes!

Rex [bass] and Vinnie Paul [drums] appear with you as Tres Diablos on the recent ECW: Extreme Music compilation album, performing a cover of ZZ Top's "Heard It on the X." How did that come about?

Me and Rex actually traded off vocals, just like Billy and Dusty do in ZZ. "Heard It on the X" is just one of those tunes that always comes on when you 're sitting around drunk, making you think, "Damn, that'd be a kick-ass song to redo sometime." We were down in the studio fuckin' around while we were cutting our last record, and we ended up recording it just for the hell of it. It turned out great, so we just went with it, building on it in our spare time. Then the album offer came along and it seemed right for it.

When do you plan to begin recording a new album?

After the Sabbath tour. I've already got more riffs than I've ever had before writing a record, and I'm sifting through them right now. I'm figuring on numbering 'em so I can go into rehearsal and say, 'Do y'all wanna work on riff 103 today or would you rather dick around with 68?' There's also a load of cool shit that's been hanging around from soundchecks and jams. Philip's [Anselmo, vocals] got some good riffs too, and Riggs [Vinnie] and Rex have ideas as well. I'm really looking forward to this record. We've had a decent break, we know where we're headed and we're gonna make the best Pantera record yet.

Any idea when it might come out?

We ain't gonna put a deadline on it -- it'll be done when it's done. With every record we've ever cut it's always been a "hurry up, we need it yesterday" kinda thing. As a result we've had to live with a few things that we would've done differently if we'd had more time. So it'll be nice not to be under the gun like that this time. We're gonna do this one at our own pace, at my studio, under the influence of booze. [laughs]

I understand you're working with Randall Amplifiers on a new signature series of amps.

Yeah. We've been working on it for a while now, and we're making sure that everything's right about it. I mean, if I'm gonna put my name on it, it's gotta kick major ass. It's got a really good clean channel and the dirty channel has a nine-band graphic EQ, which gives you unlimited shit you can do with your sound. It's also gonna have 18 preset [digital] effects instead of an old reverb knob that nobody uses. All you're gonna need is a guitar and a chord because everything else you need will already be built into it.

The amp is called the Warhead, the 4x12 cab is called the Devastator and there's also a 2x15 cab called the Subsonic Detonator. This rig is louder than a muthafucker, man . The head kicks out over 200 watts -- it's like a PA! So far I'm thrilled with the stuff. We're real close to finalizing it, so watch out, 'cause it's coming!

When Pantera headed to Mexico City to open for their heroes Kiss in 1997, Guitar World's Jeff Gilbert was there. It was an experience neither he nor you will soon forget.

Mexico City. It's six o'clock in the morning, and the temperature has already climbed to 80 degrees. I find myself part of a team of roadies, every one the size of a small building, unpacking several semi-trailer trucks crammed with rented speakers, billion-channel soundboards, 10-ton lighting rigs, dozens of guitars and enough drums to jump start Mardi Gras. Sweat is beginning to run down my back and torso like an overflowing toilet.

A nightmare? Nope. It's just my latest writing assignment dreamed up by those treacherous bastards at Guitar World. "It's simple," they told me. "Pantera is opening up for Kiss at Mexico City's Sports Palace and we want you to be there. You know, hang with the band and give us a feel of what it's like to travel with heavy metal's finest."

It sounded like fun. What they didn't tell me was that, in order help defray expenses, the deal included volunteering my services with the road crew. One of my co-workers takes five to urinate-on my shoes. As I curse the entire Guitar World staff and their families, my thoughts are mercifully interrupted. "How'd you expect me to do my damn job right if I don't have any beer?" a roadie complains loudly.

Priorities being what they are, the beer is quickly and systematically removed from cartons and packed in personalized ice chests. Bottle openers are brandished like switch blades. The sound of beer caps hitting the pavement is followed by a symphony of unrestrained belching, the sweet sounds of which reverberate in the darkened, cavernous arena. Breakfast is served.

9:00 a.m. Everyone except the first-shift crew is sleeping off last night's performance. Despite being added to the bill at the last minute, Pantera turned in a muscular performance worthy of a headliner, rewarding their young Mexican fans with irreversible ear damage. Though most of this city's teeming millions are already hard at work, it'll be hours until the elevators in the plush, 40-story Presidente Inter-Continental Hotel are filled with groggy rock stars and bleary-eyed guitar techs whose clothes-which conveniently double as pajamas-reek of "Texas Aftershave" (tequila and vomit).

11:00 a.m. Pantera sleeps. A group of teenagers wearing Kiss t-shirts and clutching pens have gathered just beyond the outdoor concierge station and set up an unblinking vigil. Obviously, they're not familiar with the slumber patterns of American rock stars. It will be a long wait.

1:00 p.m. Pantera still sleeps. The kids outside pass the time by singing "Rock and Roll All Nite." When this somehow segues into "Row, Row, Row Your Boat," a few of the waiting taxi drivers join in with gusto. The only thing missing is an Ace Frehley solo.

3:00 p.m. And still they sleep. A few "up at the crack of noon" drum techs bravely venture out into the sweltering heat in search of hangover food. Their efforts are rewarded when they discover that the local El McDonald's has an unlimited supply of greasy fries and Egg McBurros.

5:00 p.m. Pantera are just getting up. They finally come down to the lobby-their rumpled duds and conspicuous sunglasses proclaiming that everyone did, indeed, rock and roll all night. But their slow movements and pained expressions suggest that any attempt to "party ev-very day" is out of the question. Clearly, no one in Pantera is a morning person.

5:30 p.m. Like convicted murderers being transported to the state pen, Kiss is secretly escorted through a side door into heavily-guarded vehicles. Pantera and crew, on the other hand, amble into promoter-provided family vans. There is little conversation, with everyone preferring to yawn and rub last night's whiskey out of their eyes.

6:00 p.m. The van pulls into the arena grounds...and right into an improvised flea market filled with bootleg Kiss and Pantera merchandise-thousands of spectacular t-shirts of every imaginable color, covered with the bands' logos and the likenesses of the individual members. "These shirts look better than the ones Winterland makes," notes Vinnie Paul, Pantera's strongman drummer.

That the life span of a typical bootleg t-shirt is usually three washes on gentle cycle, no bleach, disturbs exactly no one. The salesmen here have no "official" competition; there are no laws governing bootlegging in Mexico, so Kiss and Pantera don't even bother bringing merchandise to the shows.

6:15 p.m. Darrell, a wad of fresh pesos burning a hole in his pocket, says, "Dude, I wanna go out there and get me some shirts." Val-Pantera's intimidating bodyguard and seven-foot mascot-leads the way beyond the relative protection of the arena's chainlink fence. Darrell, Vinnie, a few production assistants and this Guitar World correspondent (valiantly battling a thunderous case of Montezuma's Revenge) slowly wade into a sea of several hundred metal-starved maniacs.

Darrell, with his unmistakable hot-pink beard, is immediately mobbed. At first it's hard to tell whether he is being surrounded because he's a famous guitar hero, or because he is a Texan with a fistful of dollars.

Three very young, virginal Mexican girls approach Darrell, giggling and saying something that sounds like "He has a Chevy in his beard!" Not familiar with local colloquialisms, Darrell shrugs and heads for a wall covered with Kiss shirts.

"What do they mean by `Chevy'?" I ask a kid who speaks English. "Not `Chevy,' " he laughs. "They say he has a cherry beard-you know, all red."

Darrell is on fire. Hundreds of boot Kiss and Pantera shirts are spread out on the ground as the merchants, possessed by the spirit of free enterprise, bark out their prices. Darrell-who's having a bit of trouble converting pesos to dollars in his mind-simply reaches into his pocket and starts pulling wads of money while grabbing as many hats, posters, Kiss clocks and shirts as he can carry. Finally out of cash, their arms sagging with their new wardrobes, Darrell and Vinnie follow the wide swath cut by Val's mountainous form back to the arena, a throng of fans swimming along like pilot fish. Darrell reaches into his pocket and tosses out a handful of Pantera guitar picks, creating a pile of fans battling each other like dogs for the prized souvenirs. Amazed, laughing, he tosses another handful of picks in the air. More scrambling, more dust flying, more heads banging. "It's like feeding barnyard chickens," chuckles a production assistant.

7:00 p.m. Pantera's dressing room is furnished with several couches, a chair or two and a table sagging with Crown Royal, Seagrams, beer and several thousand disposable cups. Darrell walks in with his arms straining with Kiss shirts, taking care not to crease his prized find: a glossy Kiss/Pantera tour poster. "This is so fuckin' cool," he gushes, holding it up for all to worship. Someone calls for a celebration. Styrofoam cups are lined up like firing squad targets, and Darrell, the band's self-appointed bartender, expertly fills seven cups with whiskey and a splash of Coca-Cola. "These are called `Black Tooths'," he grins, handing the potent drinks to everyone in the room.

7:15 p.m. Forty-five minutes until Pantera take the stage. Gene Simmons, a baseball cap on his massive head and a blue denim shirt draping his considerable torso, pokes his head into the dressing room for a quick greeting before being distracted by a stunning young girl wearing a rubber band for pants out in the hall. Ace Frehley wanders by moments later. "Hey, Ace, you gonna watch us play?" asks Darrell. "I'm depressed," Ace frowns. "I'll be putting on my makeup when you guys are on stage."

"That's okay," offers Darrell, unquestionably the most rabid Ace Frehley fan in the entire Southern hemisphere. "We'll be down front watching you!" Ace smiles, bids a mumbled "Okayseeyalater," and meanders down the hall. "Ace Fuckin' Frehley, man!" Another toast is called for. More drinks. "Dude, we're almost out of whiskey," says Darrell to road manager Guy Sykes. A ghetto blaster turned up beyond the point of distortion blares out Biohazard and Black Sabbath, rallying the band's energy.

Everyone begins to pace in anticipation of the show. Singer Phil Anselmo, already a caged animal, positions himself on the floor and proceeds to knock out a rapid series of sit-ups. Each Panteran takes a turn at stretching and loosening up, with Val assisting by realigning everyone's neck and back cartilage with bone-shifting brute force. So physically demanding is Pantera's gut-ripping metal that the members require chiropractic treatment before and after each performance.

More drinks. Darrell pours faster. They listen to one last song before taking the stage-Thin Lizzy's shredding "Thunder & Lightning." Guy Sykes announces, "It's show time."

Pantera is ready to eat rocks and shit asphalt.

8:00 p.m. The house lights go down and a hungry roar shakes the building. Phil grabs the mic and greets Mexico with a guttural growl that would have members of Obituary soiling their death metal diapers. Pantera erupts into "New Level," and for the next hour chaos reigns over the Sports Palace. Gargantuan riffs fly like teeth in a Tex-Mex barroom brawl. A blinding splash of light reveals that nearly every other person in the audience is wearing Kiss makeup.

9:15 p.m. Kiss' dressing room door is open a crack and Gene and Ace can be seen putting on their rock regalia. Paul Stanley, wearing a shower cap to keep his hair from getting in the way of his paint job, puts the final touches on the famous black star over his right eye. Peter Criss is sitting on a couch whacking his leg with drumsticks. Business as usual for the hottest band in the land.

9:30 p.m. With cannons blazing, Kiss hit the stage. With drinks in hand, Pantera rush out and edge themselves into the front row, much to the delight of the crowd. Darrell, high-fiving everyone around him, settles into air guitaring along with Ace.

11:15 p.m. Kiss build to a final crescendo. Peter croons "Beth," the second of three encores, triggering a loud ovation from the delirious crowd. The show ends with Kiss wrapping things up with "Rock and Roll All Nite" amid a Fourth of July display of fireworks and near-miss explosions.

12:30 a.m. Mexico's Hard Rock Cafe is not unlike any of the other Hard Rock Cafes around the world Though the employees speak little English, they all recognize the international "drinky drinky" motion and quickly fetch platters of Coronas and shots of Jack Daniels and tequila for our table.

2:00 a.m. Gene and Ace stroll into the packed restaurant, nearly causing a riot. Gene, spotting the same gorgeous girl he leered at from the stage all night long, corners the lass.

"Ace, dude - pull up a chair," invites Darrell. Frehley seats himself between Darrell and this Guitar World correspondent, who is busy trying to keep from hurling up the several gallons of whiskey, tequila and beer he's recently consumed. The smell of smoldering nachos and chicken wings wafting up from the table is helping things along nicely.

2:30 a.m. In a toxic alcoholic haze, I end up staring at the back of Ace Frehley's head as he talks shop with Darrell. The back of Ace's head is no different from anyone else's head, except that it's Ace's head. And where Ace goes, so does his head, presumably. There are so many things I want to ask the back of Ace's head, but my lips feel like two pieces of bologna slapping together. Ace, a confirmed tee totaler gulps down glass after glass of ginger ale and spoons his way through several strawberry sundaes. If I didn't know any better, I'd swear Ace-his speech slurred, his eyes half-closed-was getting drunk on ice cream.

3:15 a.m. The restaurant manager enters the room bearing gifts-denim Hard Rock Cafe jackets, leather vests and T-shirts for all. Ace tries on several coats until he finds one that fits. Menus and cocktail napkins are passed around for autographs. Seizing the moment, Darrell corrals Ace into posing for a photo with him. "In case you haven't seen it in a while..." Darrell lifts his shirt to reveal a colorful tattoo of Ace Frehley on his chest. Visibly impressed, Ace smiles and wipes some ice cream from his face. "Hey, Gene-man, you guys rocked tonight!" gushes Darrell as everyone prepares to leave. Gene smiles, leans over, and kisses Darrell on the forehead. That's about as much as Gene will get tonight: the young girl he'd been hitting on for the last several hours had to leave; she has to get up early for junior high school tomorrow.

4:30 a.m. The restaurant has been closed for hours, but Pantera keeps ordering more drinks. Only when the bartender brings the tab does everyone decide to pack it in for the night. The bill comes to a whopping 4,100 pesos, and those who are able to stand without assistance make for the door without paying. Sykes hands a giant wad of currency to a waiter.

The kid looks like someone just kicked his pet burro. For all their high-rolling, Pantera and Kiss have stiffed him for a tip. Guitar World to the rescue. "Here," I say, offering every bit of cash left in my pocket. The waiter gives me a funny look and walks away, no doubt unable to express his gratitude for the handsome $6 gratuity.

From the ashes of Pantera rise Damageplan to usher in a new golden age of power- groovin’ metal. In an exclusive interview, legendary guitarist Dimebag Darrell tells the whole truth and nothin’ but the truth, so help him God.

“C’mon! Getcha pull,” Dimebag Darrell roars as he showers a delighted fan with a fistful of freshly minted guitar picks that bear the name of his new group, Damageplan. The recipient, who has waited hours in the bitter cold to meet his hero, cocks back his head and catches several picks in his mouth. “Goddamn, son!” Dime exclaims as he and the watching throng whoop with raucous approval. “I’m hooking you up with one of my signature Dunlop wah pedals for that move!” As the guitarist hands over a freshly signed Dimebag Crybaby from Hell, the overwhelmed fan drops to his knees in classic “I am not worthy” fashion. Laughing heartily, Dime rewards him with what he calls a Black Tooth Grin—a slug of Seagram’s 7 with a splash of Coke—then gets suitably animated with the man for a couple of photos before sending him off in a euphoric daze.

Such scenes of comic mayhem are commonplace at Dime’s Dunlop-sponsored in-store appearance at the Sam Ash store in Carle Place, New York, on this December day. Despite subzero conditions, hundreds of fans happily stand outside for hours without complaint for a moment of face time with the former Pantera guitarist. The goateed one obliges by signing everything thrown in front of him—CDs, guitars, posters, pedals— for more than five hours straight, refusing to stop until the last person in line was satisfied.

Throughout the signing, cuts from New Found Power, the upcoming debut album from Damageplan—Dime’s post-Pantera project—blare through the speakers. The fans waste no time in voicing their approval of the new music, a ferocious mix of hard metal and melodic hooks that features Dime’s brother and former Pantera bandmate Vinnie Paul on drums, Bob Zilla on bass, and onetime Rob Halford guitarist Patrick Lachman on vocals. While the music pumps, fans pepper Dime with questions: “When does the record come out?” “When will you guys start touring?” A few, however, simply want to know what everyone wants to know: What happened to Pantera? How did the little band from Texas that grew to become one of metal’s most respected and revered outfits just suddenly fall apart?

As most metal fans know, Pantera have been strangely silent since the release of their 2000 album, Reinventing the Steel. Shortly after the record’s release and tour, frontman Phil Anselmo and bassist Rex Brown took time off to work on the second album from their side project, Down. What might have been a temporary hiatus for Pantera dragged on as Anselmo then formed numerous additional projects, including Superjoint Ritual, with whom he released albums in 2002 and 2003.

Throughout the break, Dime and Vinnie remained optimistic that Anselmo and Brown would return to the fold to begin work on a new Pantera project, but as 2003 dawned, the brothers accepted the obvious. In the March 2003 issue of Guitar World, Dime announced to Pantera’s fans that Pantera were history, and that he and Vinnie were forming Damageplan.

Guitar World proudly turns the mic over to Dimebag Darrell to tell the full story of Pantera’s untimely demise and how Damageplan rose from its ashes.

*****

GUITAR WORLD Phil has been quite vocal about what happened to end Pantera, but you’ve been fairly tight-lipped on the subject. What’s the story from your side?

DIMEBAG DARRELL

It’s a totally fucked-up situation— that’s the story. In fact, it’s a goddamned novel. I first started to deal with this subject in Guitar World when I released my statement about what was going on [see below], and I want to end it here too. I don’t intend on this spiraling into some cheapassed, smack-talking, Jerry Springer–type bullshit either.

To be honest with you, I don’t like to have to go into this at all, but I’m gonna step up to the plate and tell the truth because I firmly believe that the Pantera fans deserve an honest answer as to what went down and broke this thing apart. They’ve been awesome to us and I want to let them know first and foremost that me and my brother never let them down. I mean, fuck, we would never start an army that would kill for us and then up and betray them—never. We’re embarrassed about what happened but we had no control over it. We tried every goddamned angle we could to make things right but couldn’t. It crushed the shit out of us and took two prime years out of our careers, but at this point it’s totally out of our hands so we’ve accepted it and moved on.

GW How come it took you and Vinnie so long to throw in the towel and say “Pantera’s over”? Were you hoping the band would get back together?

DIMEBAG Yeah, I guess. Even when it looked like it was beyond repair and Phil was talking trash about Pantera and us, we kept hoping that something cool would happen and things would somehow get back under control. Even though we had a bunch of really fucking great times with that dude, he was always doing something to rock the boat. That’s a big reason why it took us so long to figure out what was really up. We just hoped and prayed that the hell we were going through was another bump in the road, even though Phil wouldn’t take our phone calls and blew off everything else that we did to try and put the group back together. Hell, we even arranged a meeting in New York with the president of Elektra to see what it would take, but once again, Philip turned it down.

The main reason Vinnie and me waited around for so long and tried so hard to make it work was because we wanted to do Pantera forever. We were the heart and soul of that band, and it meant everything to us. Like I’ve said in Guitar World before, we honestly thought we were going to be the Rolling Stones of heavy metal, but I guess the two other dudes in the band didn’t see the same value in what we’d built together and chose a different road. And as you can see from how things have panned out, the path they took was a pretty destructive one.

If I had to say just one thing about what went down and how it got dragged out for so long, it’d be this: It would’ve been so much cooler if, when Philip and Rex started recording the second Down album, they would’ve just said, “Dime and Vinnie, our brothers of 15 years, we’ve made five crushing records and we’ve had a lot of great times, but we’re done with y’all.” I would’ve been shocked, bummed out and wouldn’t have understood why. But at least we would’ve gotten the heads-up and known it was time to move on. But no, it didn’t go down that way. Instead us and our fans got jacked-off for two fucking years!

GW Were you against Philip’s numerous side projects because you were afraid that a conflict of interest might result?

DIMEBAG Hell no. In fact, we helped get Philip the green light for the Down and Superjoint Ritual records. He wasn’t getting the okay from our record label to put those records out, so he started threatening to quit the band if he couldn’t do them. I said, “Look man, I’m your brother. I’ll help you with anything. You don’t have to threaten us.” I’ve always gone to bat for him, and so has Vinnie. And that’s what we did. We played a big role in getting him cleared so he could do his thing and get it off his chest, so we could get back to rocking with Pantera and everything would be cool.

GW In a recent interview in another magazine, Philip said you’ve changed and that you have a problem with him that he doesn’t even understand.

DIMEBAG If you look at the [Pantera] home videos you can see that I’m the same dude in 3 Watch It Go [the group’s last home video, released in 1998] that I was in the first video shot some eight years earlier. And I still am today. I still have the same love for life in my heart, and my drive is still there for the same reason—the love of music, the love of playing guitar and the love of jamming for people and interacting with the fans. And my brother’s the same way.

Anyone who’s heard Philip’s recent radio interview, which is all over the internet, or seen him hosting on MTV speaking three octaves down, hardly able to talk or keep his eyes opens, knows that his real problem is with drugs. For some time now he’s obviously been around people that accept that, as opposed to being around me and Vinnie, who have a different standard level. I tried to get through to him and help, because I truly love the dude, but it’s impossible to connect with someone that heavily medicated, and that’s when I became the enemy in his mind.

GW You’ve always struck me as a positive person. Have you managed to see that anything good has come out of this lengthy nightmare?

DIMEBAG Yeah, two things. One was that I got the time to sit back, look at the band, reflect on it and go, “Damn, look what it’s headed for!” Sometimes, when you’re driving at 150 miles an hour, you don’t have time to see the wall you’re about to smash into. I don’t dig the way the breakup went down or the reasoning behind it, but I’m glad it gave me the chance to watch the replay, recognize the warning signs, see all the mistakes that went down, learn from them and make sure history doesn’t repeat itself.

The other good thing that came out of all this is Damageplan. The way I look at it, the misery of the last two years was a test—a big fuckin’ test—to see if I’d got the guts, the balls and the willpower to pick myself up, face what happened and overcome it, instead of running or cowering from it. All of us hit a point in life where we need resurrecting, and it’s up to you to make it happen, straighten things out and let go of the things that are fucked-up. Where I sit, man, I’ll never quit—I love music and I love the fans too much. So I put on my bad-ass shoes and started kicking ass with this band. It’s been a lot of hard work to crawl out of the hole and it hasn’t been easy, but at this point I’ve got my family, my brotherhood, my music and a crushing new band. I’ve got everything back that was taken from me, and I’m in a good fucking place. What was once a miserable nightmare has bloomed into a very sweet, comfortable place. Amen!

GW You seem very comfortable playing in this band with Vinnie, Pat and Bob.

DIMEBAG Yeah, it feels like home again. I’m in a band where all four dudes have the same goals and are very driven. We all live a beer-can’s throw away from each other, and when we’re not jamming we’re hanging out. There’s no drug dependencies, no excess baggage and no dead weight. It’s fun again, man, and it feels great. Everyone’s inspired and on the same page. We all have the same plan… the damage plan!