Official Truth, 101 Proof: The Inside Story of Pantera Read Free

I was standing, watching, and suddenly this fucking DJ idiot put a microphone in my hand and asked me to say a few words to these five thousand or so people who were in attendance. Like I said, I didn’t know I was going to be asked to say anything and I certainly didn’t have a speech planned, so when I was up there I was desperately trying to find the words—any words—and in the end, all I could muster was “He loved you all. We’ll miss him badly.”
    While this was happening, I was aware that this DJ idiot was pressurizing me all the time. “C’mon, Rex, we’ve got to go, we’ve got to go,” is all I remember. Go where? Who the fuck knows, but after he said it, there were boos from the audience and in my numb state I wondered whether they were booing him or me. It was a really weird situation. In retrospect I think he was just trying to rush me off stage so they could get Vinnie up there. All I was trying to do was hold myself together that evening, and I wasn’t doing that very well.
    The whole place was a huge clusterfuck of security that night, with all kinds of barricades in place to keep certain people in certain designated areas. In my dazed headspace I decided I wanted to go down front-of-house, and on the way down the stairs I literally fell into the arms of Snake Sabo and Terry Date, who somehow managed to prop me up. They chaperoned me to the area I wanted to be in and put me in a seat between our manager Kim Zide and Charlie Benante. By then I was an emotional wreck and all Charlie could do was hold me like a baby.
    One person obviously absent that day was Philip, although by this time he had flown into town—despite Rita’s earlier warning—and was staying in a hotel, so I was phoning back and forth with him all day. I even went to see him for a while and kept him informed as to what was happening. I’m sure there was a part of him that wanted to be there—or at least be close to what was going on—but at the same time I’m certain he wanted to respect the family’s wishes. Either way, it was a tough position for him, and one that would offer no closure whatsoever. The concept of him showing up unannounced would not have been well received given Rita’s total insistence that he stay away. So, frustrated by being excluded from all the events surrounding Dime’s death, and cheated out of any closure on the death of one of his best friends and musical soul mates, Philip later wrote Vinnie a letter, but my suspicion is that it may not have been read or certainly not acknowledged in any way. It was suggested that Vinnie never even got it, but I’d bet that he did.
    The days following the funeral were no less stressful. Every day my wife and me were harassed by reporters at our door—they even went through our trash and threw it all over the yard—trying to get any kind of comment from me about what had happened. I simply didn’t want to get involved in any of that discussion because what else was there to say? So I just had my wife say to them, “He’s not talking to anyone so you might as well fucking leave.”
    I went to the cemetery a few days later, alone. I wanted to say my own goodbyes to Darrell, but the public wouldn’t even allow me this privacy with my friend, as I was continually harassed for comments and even autographs, all while I tried to spend a little private time at Dime’s graveside. I remember this as one of the worst days of my life.
    From that day on, I went into the “why?” loop, and I’m still asking the question. Maybe I always will be. I live with a constant combination of anger at the fucker who did this to my dear friend, and complete shock that the existence of the band with whom I’d spent my entire adult life has been ended by a series of events that were far beyond anyone’s control. What you need to remember is that only four guys ever really knew what went on in Pantera, and one of us isn’t around anymore to tell his side of the story.

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