Friday, November 17, 2006

Whitesnake-Slide it in, 1984

After the break-up of Deep Purple in 1976, vocalist David Coverdale recorded a solo album and then decided to form his own band called Whitesnake. He went through numerous band members over the next few years. Generally the first few Whitesnake albums were not quite as hard rock as the material that Coverdale did with Deep Purple in the mid-70's. However, by 1984 I think that either the band or the label saw the rising metal scene and figured that maybe it was time for Whitesnake to join in. The album starts off with the title track and it's a good representation of the overall sound of the album. It's a straight forward hard rock tune with little build-up, but certainly solid enough. Next up are the two radio songs "Slow and easy" and "Love ain't no stranger". Slow and easy is about what you think it is about and again it's just a good, simple yet solid hard rock song. "Love ain't no stranger" is a slow song, but not sappy as the band pulls quite a bit out of this track. Lyrically they aren't breaking any new ground and it may even be a bit silly at times, but the music is so strong that it doesn't matter that much. A few years later, the band would be known for their videos and Dave Coverdale was often accused of ripping off Robert Plant. However, the truth that Coverdale has a very good rock voice and you can't take that away from him. It's obvious that he puts his voice to good use on this album. Songs like the Gambler, Standing in the shadow and the great Guilty of love are good examples of how strong this band could be. I think this album is a good blend of the kind of hard rock that was prevalent in the late 1970's and the kind of hard rock that was starting to take hold in the 1980's. I don't think a lot of other bands were doing that style at the time. This is the album that this band should be remembered for. Oh and as a teenage boy I giggled at the dirty album title.

8 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Mark - I have always liked this album, Coverdale, Sykes and co. form the best Whitesnake line up, and this is their best record.

6:52 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ah yes...I remember the first time I heard "Slow and Easy" on the radio...it blew me away!!!

As a teenage boy, I quite liked "Spit it Out" :)

I thought Whitesnake hit their peak musically with this one...the "Whitesnake" album that would follow had "Still of the Night", and then two remakes of their own stuff...and I liked the older versions better...they just never sounded convincing to me as a pure metal band...they were much better with that blend of 70s and 80s sound...

7:08 AM  
Blogger BeckEye said...

I'm a 33 year old girl and I still giggle at the album title. But, I've watched a lot of Beavis and Butthead in my life.

12:05 PM  
Blogger David Amulet said...

One of my favorites for just good, straightforward pop metal. Even though I enjoy some of the band's earlier, bluesy albums, this is probably my favorite from Whitesnake.

-- david

1:40 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

This is my favorite Whitesnake album and I think it gets overshadowed by the s/t album that followed. 'Love Ain't No Stranger' is a great tune.

11:26 AM  
Blogger :P fuzzbox said...

Gotta like a band that names themselves after their peckers.

6:57 PM  
Blogger Ray Van Horn, Jr. said...

I still love this album. I laughed more at the snake down the cleavage than the title. But yeah, it's a shame the self-titled album sold so well, because this is their legacy album

9:12 AM  
Blogger Mike said...

I always love this album. I bought it after their self titled album came out and actually emjoy it more.

9:55 AM  

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