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Events and Reports - Sweden Rock Festival 2003 - Whitesnake
WHITESNAKE
Festival Stage
Saturday 23.30
The band I was looking most forward to was Whitesnake. However, in my head I tried not increase my expectations, since Tommy Aldridge and of course David Coverdale were the only 2 members from my favorite 1987 line-up. There was a chance of getting disappointed. I always favored the Hard Rock approach of Whitesnake at the expense of the more bluesy style. The Whitesnake record released in "1987" is among my all time favorite albums.
The show started off with a prelude, which was the entire studio version of the Deep Purple song Burn. Since this was Whitesnake's silver anniversary Tour it felt right to kick off with the beginning of Coverdale's impressive career. After the song the band showed up on stage and Coverdale ran to edge of the stage and screamed "Here's a song for Ya" and the guitar riff to Bad Boys started.
David Coverdale looked really good and he was well trained for the Tour. The same goes for his band. There was no big beer bellies in Whitesnake year 2003. Coverdale has gathered a really strong band consisting of Reb Beach and Dough Aldrich on guitars, Marco Mendoza on bass, Timothy Drury on keyboard and of course long time member Tommy Aldridge on Drums.
The guitarists followed John Sykes, Adrian Vandenbergh and Steve Vai's footsteps completely. Reb Beach is the technical perfect guitarist, while Dough Aldrich is more old school. The fact that Dough didn't play cordless on his Les Paul supports the reality that he is inspired by the older players. Both players traded solos making it quite entertaining to watch. Doug Aldrich also had his minutes of fame, when he alone on stage was performing a quite good guitar solo.
Apropos solos. That was the only weakness of the concert. Even though Whitesnake is synonymous with David Coverdale he lets his musicians get scope for their abilities. Tommy Aldridge also played a long drum solo during Crying in the Rain. The first part he played with his sticks and afterwards he threw them at the audience and kept playing with his bare hands. Marco Mendoza also had a small bass solo and all in all the solo stuff was prolonged. Especially since we wanted to hear some Whitesnake songs and not tests of the musicians' abilities. Whitesnake only played around 75 minutes even though they were scheduled to 2 ½ hours. With a strong back catalogue and a playing time of only 75 minutes 3 solos is too much.
That was my only negative criticism of the concert. The show rocked big time. Compared to the other bands on stage earlier Whitesnake had more charisma and star quality. Coverdale oozes sex appeal and he knew it by directing attention to the women in the audience. Bass player Marco Mendoza also had a great stage appearance. Mendoza was a showman, who also had a great set of pipes to back David Coverdale. David Coverdale's vocals were still great, but you could sense a little rusty edge on his voice. He still sings fantastic, but time has worn out some of his tone. However, it didn't affect the show at all. The setlist's main focus was on "Slide it In" and the "1987" albums, which both are packed with melodic sing-along tunes.
As listed below, the setlist was a Tour de greatest hits of Whitesnake. The beautiful ballad Is this Love sounded full with Mendoza's pounding bass layering the song. Fool for Your Loving was played closer to the "Slip of the Tongue" version than the "Ready an' Willing" version. The Steve Vai tricks were missing though.
Ain't No love in the Heart of the City was introduced as the song that started it all for Whitesnake. There was a middle play with an audience sing-along. The band ended with Whitesnake's biggest hit Here I Go Again and left the crowd wanting more.
Coverdale returned alone for the encores and started singing Soldier of Fortune alone. It was a highlight to hear his full vocals unfolded alone on this great song. The band entered and kicked into the heavy intro to Still of the Night. This was a fantastic ending to a really good performance. The middle play where the strings enter was played by the keyboard and after a couple of bars Dough Aldrich joined in, playing the strings' melody line on his guitar and Reb Beach followed a bit later. In that way they build up for the climax, which was unleashed right after the bridge to the last chorus.
In a time with a lot of reunions this version of Whitesnake was truly amazing. Whitesnake has always had changing line-ups, but the great chemistry between the current members was transformed to the audience. This concert had everything; great showmanship, skilled musicians, great vocals by one of the most famous frontmen in Rock music and most importantly the songs are truly amazing and timeless. Both the "Slide it in" and "1987" songs still sound great more than 15 years later.
For me this was the highlight of Sweden Rock 2003.
..a lecture from Coverdale and Whitesnake in professionalism and great music.
(Songs remembered - almost in order)
Bad Boys
Slide it In
Slow and Easy
Is this Love
Love Ain't No stranger
Fool For Your Loving
Crying in the Rain (plus Drum solo)
Gimme all Your love
Ain't No Love in the Heart of the City
Here I Go Again
Soldier of Fortune (Coverdale only)
Still of the Night
Continue to Talisman...
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All pictures taken by Borg | Written by Michael
Sunday, June 29, 2003 |
This article has been shown 8108 times. Go to the complete list.
RevelationZ Comments
| Comment by Biku (Anonymous) - Friday, April 2, 2004 | No comments! Great and Perfect!
I like it and I love it
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| Comment by LAURA FROM FRANCE!!!! (Anonymous) - Sunday, April 11, 2004 | Hello everyone ! I come from PARIS and i have a big passion for whitesnake . It begun in 1987 when i saw vandenberg and vai in french heavy metal magazines it was love at first sight with sykes because i discovered him in a whitesnake fansite picture gallery seven weeks ago .And after that i discovered slip of the tongue album. If somebody have sykes with coverdale posters to sell or dvd s or magazines thank you to contact me to my mail adress .
LAURAVENEMA@yahoo.fr
i hope to hear somebody verry soon about it.
THANK YOU FOR THE ANSWERS!!!
Happy easter
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| Comment by Chubs (Anonymous) - Thursday, January 18, 2007 | Whitesnake is pretty cool.
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| Comment by Shazzarooney (Anonymous) - Friday, January 19, 2007 | I have been a Whitesnake since the 70's growing up on rock music and this is a great article. Whitesnake are truly the best and Cove has the sexiest rock voice in history.
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| Comment by masyrangelo (Anonymous) - Tuesday, April 10, 2007 | whitesnake for ever
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