Read excerpts from the interview.
In an interview on journalist Eddie Trunk's radio show, Down vocalist Phil Anselmo spoke about the famous incident at Dimebash in January, when he made the Nazi salute and shouted "White Power," a slogan of the white supremacist movement .
After the incident, a number of musicians spoke out about Anselmo's behavior. The most critical was Robb Flynn of Machine Head, who released a 10-minute video talking about the event . Scott Ian of Anthrax posted a text on Facebook saying that if Anselmo regrets it, he should donate to a charity that fights anti-Semitism and racism.
See Anselmo's statements regarding the accusations:
"Those who call themselves my colleagues, who criticized me, need to take a good look in the mirror. Anyone who speaks the word 'racism' or 'racist' so lightly needs to understand the implications of that word. It's a heavy thing to accuse me of, especially if you know nothing about me except that you've seen me at some shows, music videos, interviews, whatever."
“Everyone out there who’s watched Robert [Flynn] over the years knows that this guy keeps watching me, watching me. He sits in the corner watching me, and when we’re on stage together, you know? That’s it, he wants to benefit from my success. He wants to take advantage of my success (…) So he made an 11-minute video, and this is a guy who knows nothing about me except Pantera and this or that. I believe in freedom of speech, whether it’s a joke or not.”
“This whole thing about me being racist is infuriating because it’s false. It’s absolutely false. And I’d like to turn around and say, ‘Hey, what have you done for our community, Robert? If you’re going to criticize me for this supposedly absurd act, what have you done? I know what I’ve done.’”
“The day after it happened, Scott Ian said, ‘Phil…’. He wrote me an email saying, ‘What I saw was ugly,’ and so on. And this is coming from the guy who in 1985 released an album called ‘Speak English Or Die’ (Stormtroopers of Death album). If that album had come out this year or last year, forget it. Do you think it would be criticized? Of course it would be, and he knows it. ‘If you’re sorry, donate to this charity,’ or whatever. And I did it, right then and there. Did you even know about that? Of course not. And you know why? Because it’s not a good headline. I donated right then and there, if not in that second.”
The full interview video can be viewed here:
