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Pantera show in Vienna pulled after German festival appearances canned over racism claims

By | Published on Monday 30 January 2023

Pantera

A Pantera show due to take place in Vienna later this year has been cancelled. And while no reason has been given for the cancellation, it quickly follows the axing of the band from two German festivals taking place this summer over allegations of past racism on the part of vocalist Phil Anselmo.

The surviving members of Pantera – Anselmo and bassist Rex Brown – announced last year that they were reforming to play a number of shows in the US and Europe this year, marking the 40th anniversary of their debut album ‘Metal Magic’. Ozzy Osbourne guitarist Zakk Wylde and Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante are taking the places of the band’s late founders, the Abbott brothers Dimebag Darrell and Vinnie Paul.

The reunion was set to include performances at the Rock Am Ring and Rock Im Park festivals in Germany in June. However, the organiser of those festivals came under pressure to remove Pantera from the line-up because of the racism claims.

Those claims are at least in part based on a controversy that occurred at a Dimebash show in the US – held in honour of Dimebag Darrell – back in 2016. At that event Anselmo gave a Nazi salute and shouted “white power”.

He subsequently apologised and insisted it had been a joke, but the “white power” outburst was widely criticised within the metal community at the time. Anselmo later said of the incident in an interview with Kerrang: “I feel like it’s ridiculous. I made an off-colour joke and ‘boom!’ – it’s like I’m literally Hitler! I’m not”.

Rock Am Ring and Rock Im Park, the latter of which is held in Nuremberg, came under political pressure to remove Pantera from their 2023 line-ups, with critics citing the 2016 incident.

Confirming last week that the band were being axed from the two events’ line-ups, organisers said: “In the last few weeks, we have had many intensive conversations with artists, our partners and you, the festival fans, we have continued to deal with the criticism together and decided to remove the band from the programme”.

The promoter of the Vienna show simply said: “The Pantera concert on the 31 May 2023 at the Vienna Gasometer will be cancelled. All tickets can be returned where they were purchased. Thank you for your understanding”.



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