1994 In Review: Pantera - "Far Beyond Driven"

Sometime just before my high school graduation in June of 1994, I scared the shit of my mom. A friend of mine had just picked up the new Pantera album and given me a dubbed cassette copy of it to tide me over until I got my own (I don't know how many times I can say it in these write-ups, but no internet access in '94). Without a lyric sheet, however, I didn't get as much out of what Philip Anselmo was trying to convey. So, I got out my typewriter (again, 1994) and got the words down on paper. Which brings us to my mom, who in the process of putting some laundry away found the lyrics to Strength Beyond Strength. I was taken to task over such mom-friendly lines as "fuck you and your college dream" and "no family life to open my arms to". "Is this how you feel about life?" I was asked.

As the follow-up to the surprisingly well-received Vulgar Display of Power, Far Beyond Driven was bound to be heavily criticized and hotly anticipated; it was expected by some that Pantera might take advantage of the attention and go for a hit. So, of course, they went harder, angrier and nastier than before. There aren't many moments of quiet reflection to be found in Pantera's discography, and this album houses the fewer than any of their other albums. Aside from the closing Sabbath cover, Far Beyond Driven is a relentless attack; wave upon wave of crushing drums, throat-shredding screams and gutteral guitars.

That primal attraction within these songs cuts to the essence of why people devote their lives to heavy metal; and, more than any 1994 album, Far Beyond Driven speaks the same brutal language as its listeners. The boiling-over frustration of Strength Beyond Strength, the pulverizing despair of 25 Years, the incendiary manifesto of Use My Third Arm, and the haunted anguish of I'm Broken bleed, cry and fight with (and for) anyone who wants it.

It was all, of course, perfect timing; a band reaching its professional and artistic peak just as disaffected youth were looking to take their teen angst up a notch. Far Beyond Driven debuted at number one on the U.S. album charts, and is to this day perhaps the most extreme album ever to do so. Most fans still cite Vulgar Display of Power as their favourite (and it has sold about twice as many copies over the years), but don't think of Far Beyond Driven as a lesser album. It's more like a retaliation; a tool of violence designed to ward off would-be fairweather fans who didn't have the stomach for something as vicious as Strength Beyond Strength or as disturbing as Good Friends and a Bottle of Pills. It's also a retaliation against stardom that, like so many ill-tempered attempts at withdrawing with integrity, worked to the opposite effect.

How I felt about life in 1994 was a difficult thing to pin down, because there was still so much to learn about it; and, in the grand scheme of things, Far Beyond Driven didn't exactly teach me anything. Still, it's hard not to give the year's most abrasive and punishing smash hit its due for being a beacon of rage to millions of young people desperate to release their aggressions. There may have been less successful metal albums of the era that elitists would call more brutal, but Far Beyond Driven is the metaphorical heaviest album of 1994. Stronger than all indeed.

March 22, 1994 • EastWest

Highlights Strength Beyond Strength • I'm Broken • 5 Minutes Alone