Zakk Wylde thinks Pantera changed extreme metal.
During a recent appearance on Full Metal Jackie’s weekend radio show, the guitarist said after he had gone through the music and learned more, he realized that Dimebag [Darrell] was even greater than I ever imagined. He thinks it is about how he wrote music:
“To me, I always say with Dime’s legacy, it’s almost kind of like with Lord Iommi – how with Tony’s writing how Sabbath just changed. It’s almost like you have jazz, country, blues, and then you have Sabbath. That’s it’s own category of music.”
Zakk Speaks On Pantera’s Role As A ‘Catalyst’
Wylde went on to talk about Dimebag and Pantera’s legacy:
“And I’m with Pantera. As far as extreme metal goes, they’re the benchmark and the catalyst. All the other bands are compared to them. So I think that’s Dime’s legacy. It’s not just because you could play fast solos and things like that. It’s just he had great technique. It’s more than that. And I think with all the players that Dime loved, with Eddie [Van Halen] and Randy [Rhoads] and Tony Iommi and Jimmy Page and everything like that, it’s what he wrote. That’s his legacy.”
Wylde Feels Connected To Pantera’s Music
The new Pantera lineup had their first shows in 21 years in Latin America in December 2022. In a March talk with Chuck Armstrong of Loudwire Nights, Zakk shared his thoughts on Pantera getting back together and why it’s important:
“The beautiful thing about music is, all the bands that we love, whether it’s [Led] Zeppelin or [Black] Sabbath, The Allman Brothers or Elton John or Pantera or whatever, everybody has their connection to that music. That’s the most powerful thing about music. I mean, you hear stuff, it just transports you back to when you were 13 years old, 14 years old, where you were and what you were doing when that music was going on.”
Wylde also previously said he felt signs from Dimebag to reunite Pantera. He mentioned seeing signs like license plates with ‘333’ or ‘Dimebag’ when they were rehearsing. He feels like Dimebag was always around and pushed for the reunion to happen.