by Zac Crain
Cost: $0.75US
Page Count: 301 - Including Index
Another musical biography? Hell yes...
Black Tooth Grin was a great book. It read fast, the characters were authentic and hilarious, and the story was tragic. "Dimebag" Darrell was the lead guitarist for the seminal metal band, Pantera. Back in the '90s, Pantera was one of the hardest and toughest of all musical acts. Much of the band rested on the prodigious talent of "Dimebag". Dime, as his friends and legions of fans called him, was quite the virtuoso on the guitar and there are still, to this day, little metalheads trying to get their sound just like Dime's.
The Black Tooth Grin (which was a drink invented by Abbott) story starts as brothers Darrell and Vincent grew up to become half of a metal franchise. Sure, there's more to the story than that, but for the sake of space... Anyway, Black Tooth Grin gives the in's and out's of Pantera, touring, recording, and daily lives of the players involved. The best part of the book, however, is Dime himself. I'm not sure if it was just the writer's slant but, Dimebag just seemed to be a normal, hard partying, down to earth dude. Someone you might want to hang out with at a bar at four in the morning. Or maybe not. Dime could get crazy.
The end of the story is one that is well documented. After the breakup of Pantera, Dimebag and Vinnie had a new band, Damageplan, that were starting to get some real attention. Basically, the fellas had to start over. Anyway, at a stop on tour (in Columbus, Ohio) a mentally disturbed nutbag walks into the show and onto the stage and blows Dimebag away (along with other's deaths and injuries to many). Very fucked up. Right in front of the audience. It's horrific and really hard for me to imagine or even think about and I didn't know the guy.
Great book. Great read. Very well done, sir.
One last thing. Pantera singer Phil Anselmo comes off as a real twat in this book. Hopefully, he's not really that much of an asshole.
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