Review by Xephyr for Pantera - Cowboys From Hell (1990)

Chug Chug Chug Chug Chug

It's funny, after finally going through most of Metallica's discography in full for the first time, coming back to Cowboys From Hell presents some mixed feelings. Pantera's similarity to their chugging counterparts Metallica is uncanny sometimes, even though they drew influence from many other Thrash bands. They have a rawer, debate-ably more aggressive sound to them, replacing the Metallica theatrics and more complex songwriting with more guitar solos and even more riffs. Back in 1990 this brought aggressive metal back into the limelight after the original Thrash bands of the early 80's were beginning to die out.

Pantera definitely hit the sweet spot of their niche with Cowboys From Hell, with each riff being absurdly crunchy, their vocals being somewhat questionable, and the album's longevity being sadly short. If you wake up and want to listen to some Pantera, you're listening for the riffs, plain and simple. That's all fine and good, they have some great ones, but that's about as deep as the music goes for the most part. There are some interesting tidbits in tracks like "The Sleep", but the replay value on this or any Pantera album is pretty low. With almost an hour of run-time...that's a lot of riffs to sit through.

Sure, Pantera catapulted the Groove Metal genre into the metal world, but I don't put that in too high of regard. There were plenty of riff-based metal bands before this album and even though the different, syncopated riff structure made it stand out, Cowboys From Hell and Pantera as a whole just don't hold up as one of the greats for me. Doesn't mean the album is trash by any means, they've got a couple of great tracks on here, but as a package I'm not a huge fan.