By Martin Popoff
I imagine you could do some work on the next Pantera album during some of that recuperation time?
"I doubt it. I really doubt that. Because a tour would definitely be somewhere in the works. You gotta understand that if I'm having trouble walking even, you know, when I'm doing a Pantera record, I'm f**king screaming! f**king bellowing as loud as possible, which requires you to throw your entire being into it, your entire body into that one f**king note or one line. It's a very physical thing. And I would not want to take the chance to be weak doing that."
So the back-breaking work continues, Phil finishing up dates with Down, then onto a Superjoint Ritual tour, then onto a couple months of Ozzfest with Down again. Surely there's gotta be a change in the way Anselmo presents himself on stage these days.
"Same thing that I do with any other f**king band," reflects Phil, "just take it easy to the point of knowing my limitations, knowing what I can and cannot do. It actually kind of works out for the better for me. Because back in the day, Pantera was so f**king physical and so f**king in the air. We were a hardcore band playing metal, you know? But these days it's been borrowed from so f**king much and used over and over and all these bands jumping up and down... silliness. It's almost like better that I hurt my f**king self man (laughs). To me, I don't think there's anything as pure as just planting your feet and f**king headbanging like you remember doing when you were a kid, man, 15, 16 years old. You can be sitting in the car and you kick up f**king Chemical Warfare by Slayer and you're headbanging in the f**king backseat. It's all re-living stuff that brings you back to that golden f**king age, and when that happens, that's a good feeling."