Check out the testimonial.
Producer Sterling Winfield, who worked with Pantera on several albums throughout their career, was asked in an interview with the website Reverb what made the band so special, and why they influenced so many other artists who came after them. Check out his statement:
"Before 'Cowboys From Hell,' Pantera was a cover band. They were doing exactly what everyone else was doing. But there came a point when something changed."
Their last independent album, 'Power Metal', was the first with Phil Anselmo, and even that work was already starting to turn the corner. They had a brutality and heaviness that even they didn't know they had.
They began to distance themselves more from the tutelage of Dime and Vinnie's father, became honest with themselves, and wrote from the heart. They started writing groovy, heavy, and truly badass riffs.
They found their niche after ten or fifteen years playing covers in bars. They toured the country in a van. This makes their attitude and their music heavy. They were rejected by all the major record labels, including the one that eventually signed them [Atco].
Their work ethic was exceptional. I gained a lot of my professional ethics just by watching them on their journey. One of their mottos was 'No matter what it takes'. We got into situations that seemed impossible to overcome, but we came together and made it happen.
There's not much of that anymore these days. It's a guy in his garage or basement, and all he knows is Pro Tools. Either the engineer says, 'You just need to play this riff once, or sing this just once,' and then it's copy and paste everything else. It doesn't leave anything unique. It doesn't create the tension of the music.
And that's a lot of what's missing in music today. There aren't emotional highs and lows. Big metal bands still use 'Vulgar Display Of Power' as a reference, and that album is already 24 years old. What does that tell you?”
