Pantera-Vulgar Display of Power (album): One of my favs from the 90's

Pantera had some great albums in the 90s and even though Far Beyond Driven sold better and was nominated for a Grammy, VDOP was my favorite of the bunch.

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Pantera had a really unique sound in the 90's and I don't really know how to describe it. It was heavy, it had incredible riffs mixed with very complex solos and leads courtesy of the immensely talented Dimebag Darrel, and the lyrics were brutal as Phil Anselmo has a unique screaming talent as well as a decent melodic voice.

I wasn't really on board when Cowboys from Hell was released, despite the fact that I was already fully entrenched as a fan of metal, particularly very heavy metal including thrash and mostly death metal. Cowboys from hell just didn't do it for me for some reason.

However, Vulgar Display was simply everything I love about metal encapsulated into one package and it was amazing to me that this managed to be mainstream kinda but no one would ever be able to suggest that Pantera sold out, because they definitely didn't.

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I think "Walk" could possibly be considered the most well-known track on the album but for me, my favorite was "This Love" and I still love that song. It is still epic even now 25 years later. The best thing about this album is that nearly every song on it is very very good. This is extremely rare for any album and metal is not an exception. We have all bought an album for one song only to discover that is the only good song on the whole thing and try as we may, you can't start to like the other ones (Helmet comes to mind for me.)

Pantera went on to make a few more albums and unfortunately their cohesiveness started to wane as Phil Anselmo became problematic mostly because of a heroin addiction. Anselmo was removed in 2003 and the boys went their separate ways. Their respective other projects never met the level of widespread appeal that Pantera had and all hopes a of a reunion was destroyed when guitarist Dimebag Darrel was shot and killed by a deranged fan in 2004 at one of his own shows while touring with his band Damageplan. Drummer Vinnie Paul died of heart complications just last year.

If you are a fan of metal, and somehow managed to never hear of this album, i highly suggest you check it out. I don't believe you will be disappointed.