MIKE PORTNOY Explains How PANTERA’s Vulgar Display Of Power Kept Metal Alive In The ’90s

Metal in the ’90s was rough. Grunge came along and killed the hair metal scene, death metal was just starting to bubble up in a significant way, and thrash bands were cutting their hair. So what kept metal going throughout the decade? Well, a few artists. But one of ’em’ was definitely Pantera, if you ask Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy.

According to Portnoy in an interview with Consequence, Pantera‘s 1992 album Vulgar Display of Power was the one that really floored him and cemented his opinion on the survival of metal throughout that difficult decade.

“Vulgar Display of Power came out around the same time as [Dream Theater’s] Images and Words back in 1992. We were actually labelmates at the time. So, we were working on the same label with the same people. And I remember hearing this when it came out, it just floored me. I was already a fan from Cowboys from Hell that came out a year or two earlier, but this took their new sound and style and elevated it to a whole new level. To me, Pantera was the band that kept metal alive in the ’90s.

“By the time I was coming up with Dream Theater in the early ’90s, thrash was starting to go away, grunge was killing all of us. We were all fighting grunge, whether you were metal or prog or whatever, so Pantera to me was the band that carried the flag. When Metallica was going through their changes and Anthrax were going through their changes, Pantera was carrying the metal flag throughout the ’90s. And I have to give credit to maybe Machine Head and Sepultura, as well.

“Pantera, they took the heaviness of the thrash and speed metal world, but they really gave it a groove. I always appreciated that. They had a Texas swing and they had that swagger and they had the riffs and the heaviness of all these heavy thrash and speed metal bands, but they had the swagger of Mötley Crüe or Guns N’ Roses, as weird as it is to say. And that’s maybe why they toured with Skid Row when this album came out.

“Vinnie Paul played with a swing and a groove that a lot of thrash and speed metal drummers maybe didn’t have. And I say that with all due respect, because a lot of those drummers blow my mind and are incredibly influential on me, but Vinnie, like a Mikkey Dee [King Diamond, Motörhead], had that swagger and that groove and really made these riffs that Dimebag was playing just really swing and groove.”