The Heaviest Tour of the Summer – PANTERA at T-Mobile Arena, Las Vegas

August 29, 2025 – For a long time I’ve had a deep admiration for Phil Anselmo as a prolific musical artist balancing so many different projects as he does and I applaud taking the opportunity to expose the Pantera fanbase that may not be aware of what Phil is up when not fronting Pantera, even before time show begins with putting an En Minor performance up on the big screen before the first band takes the stage. This cross selling (for want of a better word) starts with the genesis of Down in the midst of Pantera’s run of success in the early to mid nineties and was very much a sign of things to come.

Following the break up of Pantera the man’s discography only continued to expand in the following decades with the likes of Christ Inversion, Arson Anthem, En Minor, Phil Anselmo and the Illegals and my personal favorite Scour – just to name a very few.

One of the consequences of Phil’s rapid expansion was the need to establish a home for these various projects and as such Housecore records was born. The label would be sufficient in releasing material of his various side projects as well as already established artists and up and coming bands that would be less likely to be picked up by other labels more concerned with commercial viability.

King Parrot probably didn’t need Housecore Records to establish a god damn thing but I can see how their hardcore punk and grindcore ethos fits in with the Housecore framework. It’s a partnership that simply makes sense. The Australian band has seen much success already but I’m not confident that many tours of this scale would take such a band out on an arena tour even if their record label’s founder is fronting the headliner.

I wasn’t at all familiar with King Parrot before seeing them live in part in not being confident I’d even be able to go to this show in the first place, so I didn’t take the time to get to know their music beforehand as I’m normally in the habit of doing for these shows. Grindcore and punk just aren’t usually my thing either but I am glad we were present to see their set. Their music is intense but fun and that’s reflected in the song title and lyrics as well. I wouldn’t say no to seeing them again and have put on their music as I’m out and about since seeing them.

I will also call out overhearing one unknown utter moron complaining that King Parrot wasn’t playing guitar solos and that they were shit because of it. That’s the view of a shit for brains teenager my dude not the grown ass man you’re pretending to be. Like children sitting on each other’s shoulders under a trench coat. Get fucked.

After King Parrot’s set I explored T-Mobile Arena a bit as it’s been quite some time since I had last been there and got myself an overpriced beverage. Amon Amarth were about to take the stage and seeing that there was a distinct and understandable lack of mead available I was at least going to have a beer to raise in respect of the band carrying the torch of ‘Viking Metal’.

Viking Metal has origins in Bathory’s Blood Fire Death and just a few years later Norway’s Enslaved makes Viking History and Norse Mythology, the main lyrical focus for the black metal act. In later years both bands will go on to shift their focus away from the subject matter but from their formation in 1992 until present day Amon Amarth has never strayed away from the history and folklore of their ancestors. I’ve been calling them Viking Metal but I’d say they are primarily a melodic death metal band – the aforementioned melodic elements are used to great effect to conquer imaginings of warriors of old just as much as the lyrical content and imagery.

I became aware of them fairly early on in my solitary explorations of metal music as a teenager, their 2003 release Fate of Norns which is represented by “Pursuit of Vikings” on the set list is a fairly straight forward death metal track and still one of my favorite songs of theirs. However it’s their later works that dominate the evening. Songs like “Guardians of Asgard” “Raise Your Horns” and “Twilight of the Thunder God” are such mainstays that often many of my favorite songs are excluded here. For example my personal favorite Amon Amarth album 2006’s With Oden On Our Side was overshadowed by their follow up just two years later. To be fair, as far as problems go it’s a good one to have. I just need to see them headline at some point. Nudge nudge.

For different reasons Amon Amarth’s inclusion in this tour had been as surprising as it was welcomed and I’m stoked whenever death metal takes to an arena stage, especially in the United States. Kudos to whoever thought of Amon Amarth when deciding who’d open for Pantera on this run.

I’ve not written about Pantera at all really – which is both surprising and not at all. I’ve always liked the music of course. Having spent a chunk of my life living in the South and especially in Louisiana, I can appreciate Pantera’s swagger. From the opening of this write up, I think it’s obvious that I’m a fan of Phil Anselmo, but I’m also a guitar player and to say I was impressed by the man that was Dimebag Darrell would be a definite understatement. Having a metalhead for a brother in law had a profound effect on my youth that I don’t actually remember the first time I had heard a Pantera song but I do remember when I started paying attention – and by then Pantera had already broken up. That Dimebag was gone so soon after I had started really listening to his music on my own has been the cause of many ‘what if’ scenarios in my mind for the last twenty plus years.

The possibilities of a Pantera reunion featuring Zakk Wylde was an idea kicking around my friend group while I was in high school and not a lot of other names were thrown into that conversation. Perhaps in more recent years I might have thought Ola Englund being an interesting choice but Zakk being of a similar age, friend to Dimebag and lastly already established as being able to stand in the same spot as the likes of Randy Rhoads and Jake E Lee, it made plenty of sense.

It was never seen as very likely with one Abbott brother still harboring bad feelings for their singer and that the younger Darrell would never have the chance to try for any sort of reconciliation if he had ever wanted it, compounding the long standing and public issues the former bandmates had with each other. As one human being looking in from the outside, Vinnie Paul didn’t owe anyone any explanation for his grief.

So it’s with a lot of controversy that this Pantera reunion was put together only after the Abbott brothers were no longer with us. Zakk Wylde and Charlie Benante (Anthrax) joined Phil Anselmo and Rex Brown in playing tribute to one of metal’s most important bands. I say there was a lot of controversy but far less than there could have been.

Following Phil’s personal struggles with addiction and his foolish actions at a Dimebash event using the white power slogan on stage, the man has done a lot of work cleaning up his image. Important steps including actually apologizing for his actions on numerous occasions (something becoming very rare in today’s climate of doubling down on being a piece of shit).

All in all the show itself was great. The big Pantera fan in our household and featured photographer on this write up, Courtney Ware, may have expressed to me small hang ups on this riff or that solo not being quite right, and for the most part I don’t believe that was ever the point. Dimebag and Vinnie Paul will be missed and it’s a shame they never realistically had the chance to reconnect with Phil and take Pantera out on the road once more – but that band had truly solidified their importance to the genre long ago. This celebration of that legacy is as good as it could be at this date and I’d want to thank Zakk Wylde and Charlie Benante for their part and I’m appreciative that they have been so willing to set aside their own main bands to take part.

*Notes from the Pantera superfan photographer*
From the moment I stepped onto the property I felt an overwhelming amount of happiness and bliss. As I mentioned in my pre-show piece, I never openly spoke about how I felt about possible reunions of my favorite band, because I didn’t ever care to listen to anyone’s opinion over it. I read about all the controversies, the interviews, everything I could to gather a more complete picture instead of being sucked into clickbait webtitles on social media, which I always felt do more harm than good in a lot of scenarios. I knew long ago that my chance to see Pantera in it’s original form was long gone, so I had done my best through the years to see other bands that Phil, Vinnie and Rex took part in on their own. (Though I’ve never seen Down and I’m pretty bummed over that. Have to get on that one next time it presents itself.) Having seen these other bands play songs from my all time favorite catalogue always hit me like a freight train, and the pure adrenaline coarsing through my veins felt visible by anyone within 15 feet of me. There was something much different about this time, though. It could be the emphasis on the memory of the Abbott brothers, the energy from the fans, some of my best friends on the guardrail giving me hugs as I stepped into the photo pit because THEY know what this music means to me, too… it was a whole variety of things that made this evening extra special for me as a fan. This was one of those evenings where I felt like I could check a box off that essentially I could die happy having seen it. To capture it was a whole other feeling that I’m sure only other music lover photographers can relate to so I won’t delve too much into that. Though, as my husband mentioned above, I did feel like there were some parts that were a little off, but I also understand that really isn’t the point. The performance was done justice and I am, again, ecstatic that I was able to be there to see it.

I’ll always stand by my statements that this music changed my life. Finding it when I did in my formative, impressionable years could have been luck, but a big part of me believes that there is only pre and post Pantera Courtney. And post Pantera Courtney is a whole ball of fire and fury that cannot be tamed, put down, or put out. I’m grateful for it, too.

Until next time…
xx Courtney Ware