When you’re on the road, you’ve got to have your four-track – or some kind of recording device to jam on and have a good time. – Dimebag Darrell
Lessons didn’t really work out for me, so I went to the old school, listening to records and learning what I wanted to learn. – Dimebag Darrell
Man, that first Leppard album really jams, and their original guitarist, Pete Willis, was a great player. – Dimebag Darrell
Music drives you. It wakes you up, it gets you pumping. And, at the end of the day, the correct tune will chill you down. – Dimebag Darrell
On our early demos, I was really frustrated with my recorded sound. I’d tell my dad, ‘Dude, I want more ‘cut’ on my guitar – I want more treble.’ And he’d say, ‘Now, son, you don’t want that. It’ll hurt your ears.’ But my dad just didn’t understand. – Dimebag Darrell
Man, don’t get me started on Pat Travers. That dude writes killer blues rock and roll riffs. – Dimebag Darrell
Between the record companies being the way they are and the fact that people can just download one song instead of buying a whole album, it’s hard to make a good living nowadays. – Dimebag Darrell
I’ve become more interested in creating a band sound than trying to outshine the other guys. – Dimebag Darrell
Using string bends instead of just playing regular, unbent notes can definitely help give certain riffs a cooler, heavier edge. – Dimebag Darrell
Whenever I record more than two or three layers, it starts to get cluttered up, and you can’t hear the cut of the guitars as good. It’s hard to get four guitars to hit at exactly the same time and keep the attack tight. – Dimebag Darrell
My heroes were Eddie Van Halen – especially after Van Halen I, II, III, and IV – Randy Rhoads, Ace Frehley and dudes like that. My brother played drums and we jammed in the garage and started writing our own stuff. – Dimebag Darrell
My first killer amp was a Sunn Beta Lead. It was solid-state, but that Sunn was incredibly loud. I used to say to my friends, ‘Hey, check it out. It’s only on two.’ – Dimebag Darrell
Initially, I just used the guitar as a prop. I’d pose with it in front of a mirror in my Kiss makeup when I was skipping school. Then I figured out how to play the main riff to Deep Purple’s ‘Smoke on the Water’ on just the E string. Next, my old man showed me how to play barre chords, and that’s when things started getting really heavy. – Dimebag Darrell