Another Pantera show cancelled as promoter says Austria gig is off

A picture of Phil Anselmo performing with Pantera
(Image credit: Photo by Guillermo Legaria Schweizer/Getty Images))

Another scheduled Pantera show has been cancelled just days after Germany's Rock Am Ring and Rock Im Park festivals removed the band from their lineups.

The band were due to play in neighbouring Austria in the days before the Rock Am Ring and Rock Im Park festivals. But today the promoter of the gig at Vienna's Gasometer, scheduled for May 31, has announced it has been cancelled.

In a statement posted on social media, Mind Over Matter Music say: "Pantera concert on the 31st May 2023 at the Vienna Gasometer will be cancelled. All tickets can be returned where they were purchased. Thank you for your understanding."

While Mind Over Matter Music gave no explanation for the decision, the organisers of Rock Am Ring and Rock Im Park said they made the call after "many intensive conversations with artists, our partners and you, the festival fans."

Although they didn't explicitly say so, it's understood the decision was related to Pantera frontman Phil Anselmo's white power outburst in 2016, which outraged the metal community.

After initially hesitating to apologise for the incident, Anselmo later released a statement insisting that he was “1000% apologetic to anyone that took offence to what I said, because you should have taken offence."

"For all the pious out there who like to point the finger at me and say, ‘Oh, racist,’ they don’t fucking know me,” he later told Rolling Stone.

The cancellations leave a gap in Pantera's European touring schedule for late May and early June. They are in Hungary for a sold out show on May 30 and now have a 6-day wait until their next gig, in Poland on June 5.

Posted by mindovermatterAUT on 

Pantera 2023 live dates

May 26: Sofia Armeets Arena, Bulgaria
May 27: Bucharest, Metalhead Meeting Open Air Festival, Romania
May 30:  Budapest Barba Negra, Hungary
May 31: Vienna Gasometer, Austria (CANCELLED)
Jun 2-4: Nürburgring Rock Am Ring, Germany (CANCELLED)
Jun 2-4: Nürnberg Rock Im Park, Germany (CANCELLED)
June 05: Lodz Atlas Arena, Poland
June 8-10: Rock Fest Hyvinkaa, Finland
June 10: Sweden Rock Festival, Sweden
June 12: Prague O2 Arena, Czech Republic
June 13: Berlin Verti Music Hall, Germany
June15: Copenhagen Copenhell, Denmark
June 21: Hamburg Edel Optics, Germany
Jun 22-24: Oslo Tons Of Rock, Norway
Aug 04, 2023: East Rutherford, NJ MetLife Stadium, USA +
Aug 11, 2023: Montreal Stade Olympique, CAN +
Aug 18, 2023: Arlington, TX AT&T Stadium, USA +
Aug 25, 2023: Inglewood, CA SoFi Stadium, USA +
Sep 01, 2023: Glendale, AZ State Farm Stadium, USA +
Nov 03, 2023: St. Louis, MO - The Dome at America’s Center, USA +
Nov 10, 2023: Detroit, MI Ford Field, USA +

+ with Metallica

Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.