Whitesnake

Whitesnake took shape as a cornerstone of English hard rock when ex-Deep Purple frontman David Coverdale assembled the outfit in the closing years of the 1970s. Its early sound drew heavily from the robust British blues-rock lineage traced through Thin Lizzy, Led Zeppelin, and Deep Purple itself. To suit the rising tide of hair-metal and pop-metal in the 1980s, the band refined its approach and achieved commercial traction with the 1984 release Slide It In before surging into widespread prominence two years later via its seventh album, the multi-platinum eponymous set whose track list included the power ballad "Is This Love" alongside the chart-topping crossover smash "Here I Go Again." The act resisted the grunge and alternative wave until it could no longer sustain operations and folded in the early 1990s. A solitary studio return, Restless Heart, surfaced in 1997, yet the ensemble did not formally resume activity until 2002. From that point Coverdale and his colleagues issued a series of favorably received studio albums such as Good to Be Bad in 2008, which climbed to number seven on the U.K. Albums Chart, and Forevermore in 2011. In 2019 the group revisited its Deep Purple heritage through the covers collection The Purple Album while simultaneously returning to the U.K. Top Ten with Flesh & Blood. Three thematic retrospective anthologies followed—Love Songs and The Rock Album in 2020, then The Blues Album in 2021—chronicling the band’s position at the intersection of commercial hard rock, pop, and heavy metal.

A native of Yorkshire, David Coverdale sharpened his commanding voice in regional bands during the late 1960s and early 1970s. When Deep Purple sought a replacement for departing singer Ian Gillan, he seized the audition opportunity. Coverdale formally entered the lineup in 1973 and made his studio debut on the gold-certified 1974 album Burn. He remained for two subsequent releases, Stormbringer in 1974 and Come Taste the Band in 1975, the latter coinciding with an eight-year band hiatus and the start of Coverdale’s independent chapter.

Coverdale issued his first solo album, White Snake, in 1977, followed by Northwinds the next year. Both records featured the same core musicians—Mick Moody and Bernie Marsden on guitar, Neil Murray on bass, and Dave Dowle on drums—who performed as The White Snake Band. Coverdale shortened that name to Whitesnake for the 1978 EP Snakebite, which contained a brooding interpretation of Bobby "Blue" Bland’s "Ain't No Love in the Heart of the City" that became the group’s initial hit. Retaining its blues-rock orientation, the full-length Trouble arrived later that year and reunited Coverdale with former Deep Purple keyboardist Jon Lord. The 1979 album Lovehunter drew attention for its provocative cover illustration by fantasy artist Chris Achilleos yet still reached number 29 on the U.K. Albums Chart. Dowle departed after this release and was succeeded by another Deep Purple alumnus, Ian Paice, whose first studio contribution came on 1980’s Ready an' Willing. That effort marked the band’s strongest showing to date, peaking at number six in the U.K. and entering the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 with the single "Fool for Your Loving." The 1981 release Come and Get It advanced Whitesnake closer to the mainstream by securing the number-two position on the U.K. chart and resonating with European listeners, though activity slowed the following year when Coverdale paused to care for his daughter during her battle with bacterial meningitis.

A refreshed lineup reconvened in 1982, bringing in guitarist Mel Galley from Trapeze, bassist Colin Hodgkinson, and drummer Cozy Powell; all three appeared on Saints & Sinners. The album yielded U.K. hits "Guilty of Love" and an early version of "Here I Go Again," which would later be re-recorded for the 1987 self-titled release. Whitesnake expanded its sonic palette for Slide It In in 1984, which featured "Slow an' Easy" and "Love Ain't No Stranger," became the band’s fourth consecutive U.K. Top Ten album, and gained U.S. traction through a more aggressive remix by producer David Geffen that highlighted guitarist John Sykes. The record later earned double-platinum certification on the momentum of the subsequent album’s success.

After previously bypassing the American market, Coverdale moved to the States and assembled a new configuration featuring Sykes on both rhythm and lead guitars, Murray on bass, drummer Aynsley Dunbar, and keyboardist Don Airey, formerly of Ozzy Osbourne and Rainbow. The resulting 1987 album Whitesnake balanced hard-rocking tracks such as "Here I Go Again" and "Still of the Night" with sultry power ballads like "Is This Love." Certified eight-times-platinum in the U.S., the record and its videos dominated airwaves; the clips starred actress Tawny Kitaen, briefly married to Coverdale, and showed guitarists Vivian Campbell and Adrian Vandenberg miming parts originally played by Sykes, who had been dismissed before filming. As arena headliners in 1988, the band faced further lineup changes when creative differences prompted Campbell’s exit and a wrist injury sidelined Vandenberg. Coverdale recruited Frank Zappa and David Lee Roth guitar virtuoso Steve Vai to join a recovered Vandenberg, forming a potent guitar partnership. With bassist Rudy Sarzo from Quiet Riot and drummer Tommy Aldridge from Ozzy Osbourne, the group delivered Slip of the Tongue in 1989. The platinum-certified album included "The Deeper the Love" and a fresh take on "Fool for Your Loving." Following the tour, Coverdale declared Whitesnake finished and stepped away from music, during which time Vandenberg, Sarzo, and Aldridge formed Manic Eden while Coverdale collaborated with former Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page on the 1993 project Coverdale-Page.

A new Whitesnake configuration assembled in 1994 to support a recently released Greatest Hits collection. In 1997 Coverdale and Vandenberg recorded a solo project, yet the label released the bluesy, R&B-inflected Restless Heart under the Whitesnake banner. An intimate acoustic performance captured in Japan during the tour appeared as Starkers in Tokyo, but by year’s end Coverdale again suspended the band for five years.

Whitesnake reconvened in 2003 as a touring unit marking its 25th anniversary, with Coverdale joined by guitarists Doug Aldrich from Dio and Reb Beach from Winger, bassist Marco Mendoza, drummer Tommy Aldridge, and keyboardist Timothy Drury. A deal with Steamhammer/SPV Records yielded the 2006 double-live set Live: In the Shadow of the Blues. Two years later the studio album Good to Be Bad arrived, replacing Mendoza with bassist Uriah Duffy and Aldridge with drummer Chris Frazier. After recovering from severe vocal-fold edema and a left vocal-fold vascular lesion, Coverdale returned to lead the well-received eleventh studio album Forevermore, issued through Frontiers in 2011. The 2015 covers collection The Purple Album revisited Coverdale-era Deep Purple material. In 2018 the band compiled rare and unreleased acoustic recordings spanning two decades for Unzipped. Early the next year the thirteenth studio album Flesh & Blood reached number seven on the U.K. albums chart and entered the Billboard 200. The retrospective trilogy continued with Love Songs and The Rock Album in 2020 followed by The Blues Album in 2021.