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Early life
Darrell Lance Abbott was born in Arlington, Texas, to country songwriter Jerry Abbott. His father owned a recording studio, Pantego Sound Studios, in Pantego, Texas, where Darrell had seen many blues guitarists play, but it was not until hearing Ace Frehley of KISS play that he wanted to start playing guitar himself. At first, he wanted to play the drums. However, after discovering that he wasn't as good as his brother Vinnie Paul, he decided to try the guitar instead, likewise was the situation with his brother - starting with guitar he discovered quickly he was no good at it, and soon turned to the percussion area of music.
Bands
Pantera
Main article: Pantera
Pantera was formed in 1981 with Dimebag's brother Vinnie Paul on drums. In the band's early days, Pantera could be considered what would later be referred to (sometimes in a derogatory sense) as hair/glam metal, but the band eventually evolved into "true" metal (a term used by many scene purists) – often classified under the subgenre groove metal, or, by term coined by the band "power groove". Pantera went on to become one of the most influential and popular heavy metal bands of the 1990s. The band officially split in 2003 due to conflicts between members. Phil Anselmo, in the throes of a heroin addiction, started lashing out at other members. Brothers Vinnie and Dime officially broke up the band and went on to form Damageplan.
Damageplan
Main article: Damageplan
After Pantera broke up, Darrell and his brother Vinnie decided to continue their music careers with a new band, Damageplan, with Patrick Lachman (vocals) and Bob Zilla (bass guitar). Their debut album, New Found Power, reached number 37 on the charts in 2004. The band was suddenly ended by Dimebag's murder. In late 2004, Damageplan manager Paul Bassman announced that a second Damageplan album was almost finished at the time of Dimebag's death but there is no word yet as to when this material will be released to the public. According to Vinnie, "...as long as I'm around I think eventually they will get heard."[1] Vinnie Paul has also formed his own record label, Big Vin Records, and has mentioned a few things about Dime's unreleased work (those of which have been in the studio but never reached the CD labels) possibly being compiled into an archive of his unfinished tracks and then submitted to the public as a new CD cut.
Other projects
Shortly before singer Phil Anselmo joined Pantera, Darrell was invited to join the pre-Rust in Peace Megadeth by Dave Mustaine. According to both Darrell and Mustaine's telling, Darrell was willing to join, but insisted on Mustaine also hiring his brother Vinnie. When Mustaine found out that Vinnie was a drummer and replied that he had already hired Nick Menza, Darrell turned down his offer and stayed with Pantera.
On and off between 1996 and the formation of Damageplan, the Abbott brothers and Pantera Bassist Rex Brown teamed up with country singer David Allan Coe for a project called "Rebel Meets Rebel". Vinnie's favorite recorded Dime solo is on this album, part of the track "Get Out Of My Life". The album was released May 2, 2006 on Vinnie's "Big Vin Records" label.
Dimebag played guest guitar solos on several Anthrax tracks from their John Bush era the songs being: Riding Shotgun from Stomp 442, Inside Out from Volume 8: The Threat Is Real, Strap It On and Cadillac Rock Box from We've Come For You All. In a recent interview Anthrax bassist Frank Bello said 'Darrell was basically the sixth member of Anthrax'. A sample of a dime guitar solo has been put in the Nickleback song Side Of A Bullet.
Shortly before Dime's death, he went into the studio with a band named Premenishen to do a guest solo on a track titled "Eyes of the South". The band consists of two of Dime's cousins (bassist Heather Manly and guitarist April Adkisson).
There was speculation that Dimebag and close friend Zakk Wylde would collaborate with Eddie Van Halen, however nothing was confirmed. He was also confirmed as one of the original guitar player choices for Liquid Tension Experiment by Mike Portnoy.
Dimebag's musical roots were in Country Western music, he supported the local music scene in Dallas and would sometimes record with local musicians. On December 2, 2006 a very rare track of one of his collaborations was discovered. Dimebag sat in on a recording session with local Texas musician "Throbbin Donnie" Rodd and recorded "Country Western Transvestite Whore". It features Dime on lead guitar and lead vocals.
Magazine appearances
Dimebag frequently appeared in guitar magazines, both in advertisements for equipment he endorsed and in readers' polls, where he was often included in the top ten metal guitarist spots. In addition, Dimebag wrote a long-running Guitar World magazine column, which has been compiled in the book Riffer Madness (ISBN 0-7692-9101-5). Total Guitar frequently featured him and wrote about him in the months leading up to his death. One year after his death, they also made a tribute issue.
Equipment
In his early career as a musician, Dimebag used Dean ML guitars (Most notably the "Dean From Hell" that was custom painted in a lightning bolt design) and Bill Lawrence L500XL pickups, which he would install in a reversed position to have the "hot" blade facing the neck. When Dean guitars went out of business he switched to Washburn. Dimebag used Washburn guitars for the greater part of his career (1996-2004), endorsing various signature models. Seymour Duncan also manufactures a signature pickup co-designed by Dime, called the Dimebucker. Dimebag proudly endorsed Seymour Duncan, but continued to use Bill Lawrence pickups in all of his personal guitars. Several months before his death, Darrell ended his long relationship with Washburn guitars, and again became a Dean endorsee as Dean Guitars was bought and reopened by Dean Zelinsky. As a tribute to the late great, Dean Guitars released the new Dime Tribute line of ML guitars. These guitars come in various models, ranging from lower end ones that have a stop tail piece, a bolt-on neck, Basswood Body, and lower quality pickups, to higher end models with Dimebuckers, a Floyd Rose bridge, and set neck construction. Dean has also produced a unique Dime signature-design guitar, called the "Razorback", reminiscent of Dean's classic ML design, but with a more modern twist. During the height of Dimebag's fame, he also worked together with MXR and Dunlop to produce the MXR Dime Distortion and the Dimebag "Crybaby From Hell" Wah respectively. Dimebag's rig also included Randall Century 200 heads and cabinets loaded with Celestion and Jaguar speakers, Furman parametric equalizers, MXR flanger/doublers, Lexicon effect modules, Korg tuners, Rocktron silencers and Digitech Whammy pedals, amongst other gadgets in his arsenal. When Dime left Washburn a few weeks before his death, he also left Randall Amps, investing in and endorsing amps from a brand new company, Krank. He planned to redefine his very own sound by developing the "KRANKENSTEIN". He also used the Zakk Wylde Overdrive by MXR, and had a prototype expression pedal by Dunlop giving a Wah Fuzz and Octave at once for "noise".
Musicianship
Darrell was quite experienced with the whammy bar, his style being one of the most original and innovative. Darrell had a strong legato technique and occasionally made use of the harmonic minor scale in such songs as Primal Concrete Sledge, or the phrygian major mode in the Domination solo.
Darrell used a variety of guitar tunings. He was one of the first guitarists to demonstrate the use of tuning every string on his guitar down 1/4 of a step, something that became part of his "signature tone". From CFH onwards, he tuned down 1/4 of a step, a half step and sometimes an entire step, as well as using drop-d (DADGBE) tuning. From Vulgar onwards, Darrell's guitar tuning got lower and lower, giving more of an "edge" to the murkier, heavier feel of many Pantera and Damageplan songs. Many Damageplan songs included tuning a whole step and a half lower.
Darrell is also known to have mastered Angelo's "Star Licks" instructional guitar video, along with the likes of John Petrucci and Michael Romeo, and not to mention dedicated a Pantera set to him during Pantera's tour of the album "The Great Southern Trendkill", in which he played some guitar pieces of Batio's notorious "Speed Kills".
Influences
Among Dimebag's influences were KISS, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Randy Rhoads, Eddie Van Halen, Ace Frehley, Rusty Burns, and Pat Travers.Dimebag once said in an interview that if there was no Ace Frehley, there would have been no Dimebag Darrell - he even had a tattoo of the Kiss guitarist on his chest. Ace signed the tattoo in pen ink upon meeting him, at Dimebag's request, and then the autograph was painstakingly tattooed over soon after, so as never to be washed off. In addition, he cited many of his contemporaries among his influences, including Slayer's Kerry King, Zakk Wylde of Black Label Society, Metallica's James Hetfield, Prong's Tommy Victor and Helmet's Page Hamilton. He also credits Vito Rulez of Chauncy for convincing him to try Bill Lawrence pickups. According to an interview with Dino Cazares then of Fear Factory Dime told him that during the recording of Reinventing The Steel he A/B'd his guitar tone with Dino's [incidentally during the making of Fear Factory's Demanufacture Cazares A/B'd his guitar tone against that of Vulgar Display Of Power)
Dime has stated, in various interviews, that his riffs were largely influenced by Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath. Indeed, Tony's influence can be heard in many Pantera songs, Dime often emulating his sliding, slurring, style, his odd timing, his dissonant, eerie single note riffs, his open string chugging, his use of the wah pedal on rhythm parts, his penchant for odd changes and adding funky embellishments and his frequent use of sludgy, mammoth walls of distortion. Tony's influence can occasionally be heard in Dime's soloing as well, with his fast, manic pentatonic licks. Tony also influenced Dime's tunings, which often went down to C# or lower. Pantera covered Planet Caravan, Hole In the Sky and Electric Funeral by Black Sabbath.
He has also cited thrash giants Anthrax, Metallica and, despite a sometimes vicious feud, Megadeth as primary influences. He was also a great fan of Slayer and a good friend of Kerry King. Dime mentioned in an interview with Guitar World that the clean chord passages in the intro to Cemetery Gates were influenced by the clean chord passages found in much Ty Tabor's, of King's X, material. Dime cited Alice in Chains as his favorite grunge band, and Pantera frequently toured with them. The first song Dimebag learned was said to be Smoke on the Water by Deep Purple. Fistful of Metal era Anthrax can clearly be heard in Dimebag's guitar playing. The frantic, out of control feel of both Anthrax's leads and rhythms are common place in Dimebag's playing. Dimebag has stated on multiple occasions that ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons' bluesy, soulful playing style has, if subtly, had an influence over him.
Indeed Dime frequently made use of pentatonic scales and slide guitar in both his leads and rhythms. Another playing characteristic Dimebag shares with Rev. Gibbons is stomping, aggressive, and yet still grooving rhythms. Both guitarist employ blues scales, start/stop dynamics and pedal tones. A good example of each style would be Dime's southern style riff in The Great Southern Trendkill, and the stomping main riff to ZZ Top's Tush. Randy Rhoads' eerie, clean, dissonant chord arpeggios can be heard in much of Dime's playing as well, noted examples being Floods, Shedding Skin, The Sleep, and This Love. It is also possible that Dimebag developed his love for the wah pedal, which can be heard on nearly all his leads on Vulgar Display of Power, through listening to Metallica's Kirk Hammett, whom he has in fact cited as an influence.
Murder
On December 8, 2004, while performing with Damageplan at the Alrosa Villa in Columbus, Ohio, Dimebag Darrell Abbott was shot and killed onstage by Nathan Gale. Abbott was shot a total of four times, twice at point blank range in the head. He was 38 years old.
Three others were killed in the shooting: concert attendee Nathan Bray, 23, of Columbus; club employee Erin Halk, 29, of northwest Columbus; and Damageplan security guard Jeff "Mayhem" Thompson, 40, of Texas. The band's drum technician, John "Kat" Brooks, and tour manager, Chris Paluska, were injured.
According to police, Gale fired a total of fifteen shots, taking the time to reload once, remaining silent throughout the shooting. When security staff and audience members climbed the stage to try to stop him, Gale fired at them, killing Thompson and Halk, who had attempted to stop the gunman with a wooden table, and wounding Paluska. Gale then took Brooks hostage, holding him in a headlock position after the technician attempted to wrestle him to the ground. When the hostage moved slightly, Columbus police officer James D. Niggemeyer, who was the first Officer to arrive at the scene, shot Gale in the face with a 12 gauge police issue shotgun.
During the rampage, nurse and audience member Mindy Reece, 28, went to the aid of Abbott. She and another fan administered CPR until paramedics arrived. Dimebag Darrell was buried at the Moore Memorial Gardens Cemetery in Arlington, Texas.
Due to insufficient seating, several members of Darrell's family were escorted out of the funeral services by security in order to make room for "distinguished guests." Later on during the services, other family members walked out due to the extreme profanity and other vulgarities by some of the speakers.
Some months before his murder, Darrell had found out from one of his industry contacts that Eddie Van Halen and Charvel guitars were going to produce a limited-edition series of guitars bearing Van Halen's trademark tape-striping. Van Halen himself would be individually taping each guitar and they would also come with a picture of him doing so and a certificate of authenticity. According to Eddie, Darrell called him on the phone and asked if he could purchase one before they became available. Eddie replied that the next time he saw Darrell, he would have one of the guitars with him and would stripe it in Darrell's presence as a gift. Before they could meet again, Darrell was murdered. Eddie recounted this story when he spoke at Darrell's funeral, then, to the surprise of those in attendance, he brought out the black and yellow tape-striped guitar seen on the back cover of Van Halen II (which Darrell had said was his favorite guitar of Eddie's) and laid it in Darrell's casket to be buried with him.
The shootings had occurred on the 24th anniversary of the murder of John Lennon (who himself was murdered by a crazed fan), but there is no indication that this was a factor in Gale's actions.
In May 2005, Officer Niggemeyer testified before the Franklin County grand jury, which is routine procedure in Franklin County after a police shooting. The grand jury did not indict Niggemeyer.
Niggemeyer received a commendation from the Ohio Peace Officer Training Commission for his outstanding police work in time of crisis.
Early theories of motive suggested that Gale may have acted based on the Pantera breakup, or a public dispute between Abbott and Pantera singer Phil Anselmo, but these have now been ruled out by investigators. Another theory is that Gale believed that Abbott had stolen a song that Gale had written.
Abbott's family has now decided to sue the night club where he was murdered. They claim that if the club had employed competent security guards, this death would have never occurred. The club owner states that his security guards are not trained nor were ever intended to thwart gun wielding guests. The news of this lawsuit comes within days of the anniversary of Abbott's murder.
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