The disastrous tour of Pantera and White Zombie

The tour is an illustrious beast. Many people sit in their rooms, working on vocals, practising guitar and air drumming, dreaming of the moment they can step out on the stage to thousands of adoring fans and play to their heart’s content. And with those dreams of admiration come more sex, drugs, booze and non-stop partying. All of this makes the tour seem like the musician’s dream, and to many, it is, while to others, it’s a nightmare. Then there are some, like Pantera and White Zombie, where it’s a bit of both.

In 1996, Pantera, White Zombie and Eyehategod embarked on the War of the Gargantuas tour. There is a caricature image inside everybody’s head about what life is like on the road, one that paints images of the Jackass movies but with more music playing. Well, that’s precisely what happened in ‘96, as the three bands had what could only be described as the best and worst time of their lives.

The first night, they played to a sold-out crowd in Louisville, Kentucky. Each band did their set and destroyed it for better or worse. Eyehategod were met with boos, as they were most nights, something that they quickly came to accept and revel in.

“Every night I’d come out, and the first thing I’d do is give everybody the double middle finger,” Eyehategod vocalist Mike Williams recalled. “But, yeah, people would boo. Definitely. And you could tell that that’s what they thought they were supposed to do, because especially in arenas, I mean, of course. People come, and they boo the opening bands; that’s what they do.”

Over the boos, Williams used to try and adlib to get the crowd back on side by reciting local events that he didn’t understand or pay much attention to. He said: “I’d see something in the newspaper, like in Phoenix, Arizona, they had some kind of militia thing; I didn’t even know what it was about; I had no clue. But [on stage] I was like, ‘let’s hear it for the Viper Militia,’ or something; I didn’t even know who it was. I remember in Miami, I was shouting out some narco-terroristo drug dealer who had just got out of prison. Just stuff like that… We all have a very strange, dark sense of humour.”

It was off-stage that the real carnage started, though. The bands didn’t take care of themselves, as drinking, drug-taking, and generally fucking around became the central ideology of their heavy metal odyssey. It resulted in hazy nights out, laughs and pranks. Pantera guitarist Darrell was one of the frontrunners in pranking.

“Every day was insane,” said White Zombie bassist Sean Yseult. “Darrell would always come out and prank us, pretty much daily, on stage. One of the more hideous things he would do is he would put on this really ugly old-man mask and a cape, and he’d come out, and you had to try to get far away from him because he would open that cape up, and he’d have this huge rubber fake dick, and he’d start squirting it, and it’d be horrible, and ridiculous.”

Pantera Fans - Walk - Music Video - 1992

“I got lice, somehow,” Mike Williams added. “I think I got it before I left home because somebody had given me this old couch, and I slept on it, and I had like dreads at the time, just ratty-looking hair, and I slept on that couch a few times and then went on the tour, and it was just horrible.”

The tour was so extreme that the bands even developed a motto, “Somebody’s going down,” which became the mantra of all involved. “We were saying that since day one,” revealed Yseult, “because we were just partying too hard.” Unfortunately, they didn’t realise just how right they were, as only a few weeks into the shows, Pantera vocalist Phil Anselmo overdosed.

“That would be pretty wild and horrific. But it was also significant,” said Anselmo. He was in a lot of pain before turning to the drug, thanks to slipped discs in his back. When they toured, the band put everything on the line, and after so many years of doing it, the wear and tear was becoming too much. He was in a catch-22, where doctors would prescribe him ineffective pain meds and any pleas to the band for a break or time off were met with a lack of understanding.

“When I turned to heroin, that was me closing the fucking door. That was me saying, okay, I’ve had enough, fuck off and let me suffer. Just let me suffer,” he remembered, “I’ll get to these fucking gigs by hook or crook, and I most certainly chose the crook. Once again, I would never, ever advocate this, but at the time, as a young man, a confused young man caught in this catch-22 of the doctors not helping me, the band not understanding me, like what the fuck? What can I do now but carry on any way I possibly could?”

He continued: “I chose the worst possible route. After I overdosed – and these are my words – it was understood in my mind, I got it. There was no injury, there was no suffering, there was no anything, there was only a drug problem. There was only a fucking drug problem.”

Despite the overdose, the tour continued, and the band didn’t cancel any shows. They had a meeting where Anselmo sensed a shift in tone and saw people become emotional for the first time since he met them. “I called a meeting at soundcheck with all the bands on that tour… they were all sitting up on the stage while I stood in front of them in the audience pit, and I gave them a very heartfelt apology, and I said I was so sorry for bringing this blight down on this awesome fucking tour. Waking up from that overdose was maybe one of the most embarrassing, humiliating feelings I’ve ever felt in my entire life. Justifiably so.”

Despite the overdose and the dark cloud that hung over the bands because of it, they still look back fondly on the chaotic tour. People have such a glorified view of life on the road that it’s not unusual to let the harsh realities of over-indulging slip past their vision. Sex, drugs and rock and roll sound great, but there are harsh realities, and all you can hope for in such challenging times are the right people around you. Whether the members of Pantera, White Zombie and Eyehategod are the right people remains up for debate.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *