ANSELMO On PANTERA: We Were Supermen, We Could Bounce Off Ground, We Could Walk Through Walls

Revolver TV has uploaded the second part of its October 2010 interview with Philip Anselmo (DOWN, PANTERA, ARSON ANTHEM, SUPERJOINT RITUAL). You can now watch the clip below.

On PANTERA's "Cowboys From Hell" album, which was recently reissued as a 20th-anniversary expanded edition:

Anselmo: "We were young, obviously. We were 20 years younger... [sighs] Man, we were Supermen; we were made of rubber. We could bounce off the ground, we could walk through walls. We had this regional scene in the DFW [Dallas/Ft. Worth, Texas] area that was monstrous, man. We built this following that was insane, man. I think coming out of 'Cowboys From Hell', you gotta figure most of that stuff was written in '88/'89, people knew it in the scene. We had been playing those songs live — 'Psycho Holiday', 'Heresy', 'Cowboys From Hell', obviously... People loved those songs. So whilst recording 'Cowboys', I think the attitude, actually, finishing up, was more 'Vulgar Display Of Power'. And I say this because the last song written for 'Cowboys From Hell' was 'Primal Concrete Sledge', and if you listen to 'Primal', you can hear that bridge that would lead to 'Vulgar Display'. So were very, very hungry. But one thing that was interesting, back then, 1989, getting signed was a like a benchmark thing for bands, a big deal. But all of a sudden, being the most popular band regionally, coming from that and all of sudden you're in this huge ocean again and you're the tiny fish, you know?! We played gigs with a chip on our shoulders, and that was the truth — we wanted to destroy every night, and I think we accomplished that. But it was hard work; we did a lot of touring".

On PANTERA's more aggressive approach on 1992's "Vulgar Display Of Power" as compared to that on "Cowboys From Hell":

Anselmo: "It was such a natural transition. Going into the studio to do 'Vulgar Display Of Power', coming off the 'Cowboys From Hell' tour, the momentum... What we saw, the exposure to all these different cities, all these different places around the world, and what was going on, all these different bands... It was a measuring stick. And there was always this borderline, this divider of taste. There was no way Dimebag [late PANTERA guitarist] was gonna be this SLAYER-esque-type player — he was gonna be in key and very tasteful and what-not, and he meant that. And it was apparent in our songwriting, too, because those were some strong songs — very anthemic, especially on 'Vulgar Display'. We aimed for that. We wrote music to move people. We didn't want them just standing in one spot; we didn't wanna give them a chance."