While speaking with The Irish Times in a new interview, Pantera and Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante was asked what he thinks about the current state of the music industry, and if he believes it has gotten better or worse over the years.

“There is no music industry. That’s what has changed,” he responded. “There is nothing any more. There are people listening to music, but they are not listening to music the way music was once listened to. It’s a different time now.

“Here’s a strange thing. While I have seen people eating a little bit more healthy here and there, the industry of music was one of things hit the worst and nobody did anything about it,” he continued. “They just let it happen. There was no protection, no nothing. Subconsciously this may be the reason why we don’t make records every three years or whatever because I don’t want to give it away for free.

“I take music very seriously and what I do and what I write is very personal and, for someone to take it is not right. It is like I pay Amazon $12.99 a month and I can just go on Amazon and I can get whatever I want. It is basically stealing. It is stealing from the artist — the people who run music streaming sites like Spotify.

“I don’t subscribe to Spotify,” Benante revealed. “I think it is where music goes to die. We have the music on there because we have to play along with the fucking game, but I’m tired of playing the game.

“We get taken advantage of the most out of any industry. As artists, we have no health coverage, we have nothing,” Benante added. “They f*cked us so bad, I don’t know how we come out of it. You’d probably make more money selling lemonade on the corner.”

When asked if he thought Metallica was justified for taking legal action against Napster in 2000, Benante replied:

“They were absolutely right about it. You see where it went. All those people who said, ‘Fuck Metallica. They are rich bastards’. They were protecting their art, their intellectual property so that some asshole does not come along and take your art. They make the money while you just make the art and you just give it away.

“People don’t know anything about this. Until you have lived the way we live and do what we have done, then you can comment on it.”