tgstk

THE GREAT SOUTHERN TRENDKILL
Pantera

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by maTTf00

7/5/05

Year Of Release: 1996
Standout Tracks:
Floods
Drag The Waters
Title Track

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It's been about seven months since the world was robbed of one the most influential guitarists of our time, the late,great Dimebag Darrell. To this day it still seems like the whole thing is just a prolonged, shitty dream. The fact of the matter is that Dimebag never died. His musical legacy is what keeps him alive. On that note, Pantera's album The Great Southern Trendkill displays some of Dimebag's most innovative guitar wizardry, and his brutal riffage lays the foundation for one of Pantera's most ferocious albums.
Trendkill may not have had the commerical success of its predecessors (Vulgar Display Of Power & Far Beyond Driven to be exact), but Pantera still decided to create one of their most extreme albums. In 1996, the music scene was riddled with trendy alterna-rock and other trite radio fodder. Logically, Pantera may have been expected to follow suit by creating a radio friendly album to contend with their "peers". However, the band created their least "accessible" album to date. The Great Southern Trendkill was truly an album for the diehard fans. Trendkill has all the visceral aggression of any death metal album, yet Pantera still keep their patented "Power Groove" intact, and manage to blend in tinges of southern style, courtesy of King Dimebag.
     Trendkill kicks you in the sack right off the bat with the opening title track. Phil Anselmo's uber agressive vocals display why he is renowned as one of the premier vocalists/frontmen in the world of Heavy Metal. The track blasts off with a punk/metal intro which shifts gears into a power grooving southern metal riff. The most memorable track off of the album is Floods. The brooding epic is quite a departure from Pantera's other songs. It also contains one of Dimebag's most emotional and melodic solos.
     Pantera easily set a new standard for modern metal during thier all too short existence. Trendkill will always stand out to me as an unabashed artistic expression and a super heavy, pissed off slab of ultimate metal.
                      RIP DIMEBAG DARRELL ABBOTT

     "All the money in the fuckin' world couldn't buy me a second of trust or one ounce of faith in anything you're about"

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