There are a couple of points that I would like to make here. The first one is this. Metal does serve a purpose, and those within it have a purpose. I know to reach for a Pantera CD when I'm really pissed off. I still have yet to find anything better than the opening seconds (the scream) of "The Great Southern Trendkill" album. It's great stress relief. And how the homemade Pantera tape that I keep in my truck, a tape that has been listened to hundreds of times and that needs to be turned way up just to be even barely audible (and with horrific sound quality at this point), even still works, I'll never know. To be able to evoke a visceral reaction to one's work is, I believe, one of the highest honors an artist can achieve.

But back to the integrity of metal. With metal, there are the four (or however many) guys (usually) up on stage playing. That's it. And most of the time these guys are essentially metal fans who got lucky. It's those guys and the audience at a show. This instantly creates a bond between band and fan. This is even more evident in smaller venues where everybody is basically just a few feet from the stage. It's a unique kind of intimacy. Anyway, it's really just these guys up there playing. Aside from the necessary roadies and techs and stuff, the guys in the band are it. There's no cabal of dancers. There are no choreographers or synchronized dance steps. There are no overdubbed backing vocals. There's no rack full of effects mixers used to make vocals more "palatable" (in fact, oftentimes the more extreme, the better). It's a very honest form of music. Metalheads can see a certain injustice in Dimebag's death when a no-talent hack like Ashlee Simpson is not only allowed to survive and make millions of dollars, but whose career continues when it should have ended even long before the "Saturday Night Live" lip-synching fiasco. ...And then to blame the band? A bunch of session musicians who did nothing wrong? Argh! This is unacceptable! I will admit this, though. I can't tell Ashlee Simpson's or any other pop stars' songs apart, either, so who knows. Metal's discerning fans know there is a significant difference between a true innovator and a fabricated corporate whore, and they realize what that difference is. The former is embraced; the latter is rejected outright (correctly so).

If metal was about money, the wacky world of metal would not exist. Underground metal bands do not make money. Simple as that. It is about the music and the fans. Metalheads are really normal people who just happen to demand a little bit more out of their musical lives and experiences. They are intelligent and creative, perhaps not always in a book sense, but certainly in an art sense. You know, engage the audience during the show; have a shot of Crown Royal Whiskey with them after. Metal is like a very weird extended sort of dysfunctional family. When it comes right down to it, we only really give a fuck about our own.

Such was the case with Dimebag. As I mentioned earlier, it was just flat-out fun to watch him play. And play he did. He created his own very distinctive sound. There is a very distinctive "grinding" sound to his playing. It's almost as if the man is playing a chainsaw. For those with the desire, listen to the first few opening bars of Pantera's "Walk" to hear what I mean. Mixed with these infectious surges, of course, are insanely searing solos. Again I return to Pantera's "This Love." Listen to that song to hear what I mean. Dimebag knew the art of the solo. Nowhere was this more apparent than when watching him play live and watching him take full control of the stage.

Dime looked like a medieval barbarian. I almost hate to use the word "barbarian" for fear of conjuring a negative image. This is not at all my intended effect. I mean it in the most respectful, positive sense which I hope, by now, everyone understands. He was a savage warrior, a pure, animalistic guitar-playing wild man. As such, he wielded his signature series of Washburn guitars like he was a medieval barbarian. And those guitars even looked like medieval weapons--sharp points, hard angles, some clad in diamondplate, etc. They were played and handled like a weapon, and they even sounded medieval--just pure, unadulterated, devastating power. Even the ribbon to the right of this essay contains a silhouette of Dimebag crunching out one of his classic, killer, face-melting riffs.

Honestly, what Dime did with (or should it be "to?") a guitar is simply amazing. I'm talking Jimmy Page with a violin bow, Hendrix at Monterey in 1967, David Gilmour and "Comfortably Numb" or "Another Brick in the Wall Part 2," Clapton and "White Room," Stevie Ray Vaughan's cover of "Little Wing," Pete Townshend's trademark windmill, and just about anything that Tony Iommi and Randy Rhoads have done. Dimebag's is the stuff of legends. It really is difficult to describe to those outside the world of metal the magnitude of his loss and what it means to those inside.

I never met Dimebag. I didn't know the man. I am a fan. Though I didn't know him beyond this level, he still touched my life, and I still feel a deep personal loss. Afterall, it has taken me nearly a month after starting to manage to finish this essay. Even now, typing this after writing it, it still hurts to think about Dime's death, and I can still barely listen to a Pantera CD. Those CDs have helped--and still do help--get me through some pretty dark, difficult times. Dimebag died doing, presumably, what he enjoyed doing the most--right up until the very second of his death; and this was an artistic pursuit, a creative endeavor. And doing what he enjoyed brought me a great deal of happiness and satisfaction. Again, right up until the very moment of his death. As I discussed in my essay on Warren Zevon, I feel that this is one of the most noble ways for an artist to exit life's stage. I realize that this may seem somewhat selfish on my part, but this is part of my take, my opinion, on the situation. At the very least, Dime left behind a legacy of uncompromisingly roaring music, and I feel privileged to have seen him play only a couple weeks before his murder.

I suppose no essay on Dimebag's death would be complete without at least a brief discussion on the shooter. It is, however, not something that I wish to spend a great deal of time on, nor will I mention the shooter by name. Since he was killed on the night of his rampage (which is good if for no other reason than he had many more unused rounds of ammunition on him that night), his motive may never be fully understood. The prevailing theory, though, is that he was still upset about Pantera's break-up and largely blamed Dime and Vinnie for the split. In his mind, this gave him the right to kill, among others, a guitarist of unmatched talent. I won't start playing the blame game here, but I believe the shooter was somewhat mistaken in his assertion of who was to blame for the band's split. But I'm getting slightly off the topic. So, was Damageplan "Pantera II?" No. Was Damageplan as good as Pantera? In my opinion, no. However, Damageplan was essentially a new band. Granted, the band contained seasoned veteran musicians, but collectively it was a new entity. It is unusal for a band's first offering to be absolutely spectacular. Was "New Found Power" a bad album? Not by any means, but even "Vulgar Display of Power" was Pantera's second Phil-fronted album (and arguably their best offering). Was Damageplan different than Pantera? Yes, but Dime's presence was unmistakable. Given time to grow as a group, I believe Damageplan would have trod a path similar to Pantera's. I think that true fans were able to look past the Pantera/Damageplan rift, see the situation for what it truly was, and realize, with much joy, that there were still a shitload of influential, ass-kicking, neck-snapping riffs left in ol' Dime's axe. It is terribly unfortunate that one deranged, schizophrenic asshole had to ruin it for everyone else. I believe a big "Fuck You!" would be appropriate here.

With the murder of Dimebag Darrell, metal indeed lost a true pioneer. Of course, there were some major media news blurbs to report on the tragedy, but aside from those very brief token reports, that was it. They can never accurately convey the full gravity, the true magnitude of the situation. Aside from the loss of an amazing guitarist, metal also lost a member of its close-knit family. Sure, there have been plane crashes, bus crashes, and various other mishaps that have taken family members sooner than what was fair, but Dimebag's murder was a senseless act of ultimate betrayal. There was a gross violation of the special bond between band and fan. When it comes right down to it, Dime was killed while doing his job. He was basically killed at work. It's analogous to a computer programmer sitting at his desk, staring at his monitor, when someone comes up and shoots him several times at point blank range. This is horrible to think about and should be unacceptable to the civilized. Dimebag was a hero to metalheads everywhere; one deranged fan stole that. Though Dimebag himself can never be replaced, the metal world, however, will eventually recover as it always does when it loses one of its icons. Despite the wishes of many people, this strange world will never go away. It is very resilient and has a tendency, when met with adversity, to come closer together and become more extreme and go further underground, and that's just fine. Just like after a family crisis, it will rise again, stronger and more pissed off than ever before. It will close itself off even further from the rest of society, lock society out, deal with the loss in the only way it knows how (through heavy music), and emerge a more unstoppable, powerful, angry force than ever.

I believe at this point that there is not much more that I can say. A Dimebag solo will never sound the same to me; a Pantera CD will never sound the same to me. I doubt I am alone in this sentiment. The metal world lost a key figure. Dime got to this hero status and point of adoration through honesty, technical proficiency, musical brutality, and hard work, not a TV show. This is as it should be. From an artist's standpoint, I can never find a way to appropriately honor Dimebag. From a fan's standpoint, I could never thank him enough. I can simply say, "Dime, have yourself a shot of whiskey, and may you always riff in peace, you crazy motherfucker! We'll miss you."