It's no secret there is still bad blood between the Abbots and Phil Anselmo. It seems anytime Dimebag's girlfriend, Rita Haney, is interviewed by a music publication, we find out new reasons why the Abbots absolutely refuse to ever speak to Phil again. And, during a recent interview with Guitar World magazine, she did not disappoint. She went into futher detail about what lead to her quote in the PANTERA Behind the Music where she told Phil Anselmo that she "would blow his face off if he showed up at Darrell's funeral or memorial":
"One thing that really bothers me is how they edited my interview for that show. They only used that one part from what I said our phone conversation was, and they took out important parts that explained what I meant. They left out the part where I mentioned how Rex [Brown, former PANTERA and current DOWN bassist] told me that they had to throw ice water on Phil just to sober him up enough to tell him that Darrell was dead. I thought it would be disrespectful for Phil to show up here in that shape on that drug. I got on the phone with Phil and asked him why he never bothered to call back all those times Darrell tried to reach him. He said, 'I'm so devastated.' I said, 'You're devastated? Your words murdered my boyfriend!' He said, 'You and I don't see eye to eye,' and I said, 'You're damn right we don't!' Then he said, 'Well, right things happen to right people.' I asked him to repeat that because I couldn't believe what I just heard and he did. It just blew me away that even then, at that moment, he would still try to throw something out there to take away his responsibility for his actions. That's when I told him that if he showed up I would blow his face off myself.
"The bottom line is Phil's actions led to what happened. If Phil hadn't quit PANTERA, Darrell wouldn't have been playing in that shithole where that guy could get to him. The guy wouldn't have been after Vinnie [Paul, Darrell's brother and former PANTERA/DAMAGEPLAN drummer] and Darrell if PANTERA had not broken up. It was all due to Phil's stupid, stupid actions."
Ouch. You ultimately have to feel for Rita, right things happen to right people…what the fuck is that? Its great that Phil is all clean now, but man that dude sure has a rep of running his mouth and not know when to just shut the fuck up. Ultimately though, it seems every time she is interviewed she has to bring up more shit. Granted, I'm sure the interviewers just egg her on and bring it up but can't we just move on? Its been three years!
The entire interview can be read in this month's issue of Guitar World.
