Whitesnake - Slip of the Tongue
On November 7, 1989, "Slip of the Tongue", the eighth studio album by the band "Whitesnake", was released in the United States (and six days later in the United Kingdom).
The end of 1988 found David Coverdale on top of the world. His previous album, "Whitesnake"," from 1987, had caused a huge commercial revolution, selling over eight million copies in the United States alone and turning the British vocalist with the deep blues voice into a superstar in the MTV era. But behind the scenes of the dizzying success, a storm of male replacements was taking place. Even before the 1987 album was released, all the musicians who played on it, led by guitarist and co-writer John Sykes, were fired, and in their place Coverdale formed a sparkling supergroup for the world tour that included Dutch guitarist Adrian Vandenberg, Irish guitarist Vivian Campbell from the band "Dio", charismatic Cuban-American bassist Rudy Sarzo, who played with Ozzy Osbourne and in the band "Quiet Riot", and drum legend Tommy Aldridge. At the end of the tour, Campbell left the band due to musical and personal differences, and Coverdale and Vandenberg sat down together on the shores of Lake Tahoe, Nevada, to write the songs for the next album, with the intention that Vandenberg would record all the guitar parts himself this time.
(Photo: Cathy Griffiths)
When the band entered Record Plant Studios in Los Angeles under the baton of the super-producers Keith Olsen, who had also worked with Coverdale on the previous album, and Mike Clink, who arrived immediately after the historic success of "Appetite for Destruction" with the band "Guns N' Roses", a dramatic turn occurred that completely changed the face of the album. Adrian Vandenberg began to suffer from severe pain and severe tendonitis in his wrist, which was aggravated by incorrect stretching exercises and an old neck dislocation from a car accident, until he reached a point where he was unable to hold the guitar neck and record. The desperate Coverdale was looking for a replacement who could step into the giant shoes at the last minute, and after watching the 1986 film "Crossroads" in which American guitar virtuoso Steve Vai played the Devil's guitarist, he picked up the phone. Vai, who became famous for his brilliant work with Frank Zappa, the band "Alcatrazz" and vocalist David Lee Roth, accepted the dream offer, arrived in the studio with his arsenal of seven-string guitars and devoured the cards, giving the blues songs written by Coverdale Vandenberg a futuristic, dizzying and technical envelope like no other.
The album opens with a theatrical and overwhelming statement of intent with the title track "Slip of the Tongue", which begins with dramatic synth layers from guest keyboardist Don Airey and Steve Vai's spacey guitar riffs before Tommy Aldridge's thunderous double-bass drumming and Rudy Sarzo's pulsating bass propel the song forward. Coverdale roars at full power over an instrumental fireworks display in which Vai combines lightning-fast two-handed tapping and breathtaking tremolo lever play. It is immediately followed by "Cheap an' Nasty", a fast-paced, witty and tight hard rock piece born from an air-guitar riff that Coverdale invented and sang to Vandenberg, in which Vai demonstrates a funky and light groove alongside a brilliant melodic solo.
The third track is the album's lead single, "Fool for Your Loving", a remastered and polished recording of the band's classic from the 1980 album "Ready an' Willing" originally written by Coverdale, Micky Moody and Bernie Marsden for blues legend B.B. King. While the original version was based on a warm, organic blues-rock groove, the 1989 version became a modern, high-energy stadium monster that took second place on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Chart. The song's iconic music video, shot against a giant, gleaming stage and in a mental institution, amazes with the breathtaking theatrical playing that became one of the hallmarks of the end of the decade.
The first side continues with the third single from the album, "Now You're Gone", a melodic and moving power-rock ballad that opens with clean, ringing guitar playing and builds into a wide-ranging harmonic chorus that also features backing vocals from singer and bassist Glenn Hughes, Coverdale's longtime friend from the "Deep Purple" days. The first half is closed by "Kittens Got Claws", a smug, heavy, and rough street song in which Coverdale takes the cynical narrator character to the extreme while Aldridge and Woo-Whee engage in a dizzying rhythmic duel.
The second half of the album opens with "Wings of the Storm", a rhythmic and dramatic anthem that combines atmospheric keyboards by Claude Gaudette with a racing guitar riff and virtuoso solo work by Vai. It is immediately followed by one of the unforgettable high points in the band's history, the giant ballad "The Deeper the Love", which launched the album into the charts and reached No. 4 on the US Rock Chart and No. 28 on the overall Billboard chart. The song, inspired by a classical melody developed by Vandenberg and opening with a solemn church organ and moving piano, reveals Coverdale in one of his most bare, rich and moving vocal performances, and is accompanied by the last music video starring his then-wife and actress Tawny Kitaen.
The melodic tone suddenly shifts to epic, menacing gloom with "Judgment Day", a monumental work of over five minutes built on a heavy, slow oriental riff in 6/8 time inspired by Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir". The song, which deals with the Day of Judgment and the soul's reckoning, features huge dynamic transitions between tense silence and seething outbursts of rage in which Coverdale climbs to chilling heights. It is followed by "Slow Poke Music", a heartfelt and liberated homage to the rootsy blues-rock of the band's early days with backing vocals by Tommy Funderburk and Richard Page of "Mr. Mister". The album concludes with the melancholic and progressive masterpiece "Sailing Ships", a six-minute epic that opens with Vai's gentle acoustic guitar playing and Coverdale's quiet, intimate vocals, and gradually develops into a massive electric and orchestral climax that closes the album on a powerful emotional high.
The album cover, designed and illustrated by British artist Hugh Syme, who created the masterpiece covers for "Rush" and "Megadeth", presented the wordplay of the album's title in a sophisticated visual way through the image of a mysterious woman whose tongue turns into a writhing snake. Upon its release in November 1989 under the record company Geffen Records in North America and EMI in Europe, "Slip of the Tongue" soared straight to the tenth place on both the US Billboard 200 and the UK Albums Chart, took the first place on the Finnish chart, and sold over four million copies worldwide. After a massive world tour that culminated in a huge performance as the title band of the Monsters of Rock festival in Donington in August 1990, Coverdale decided to freeze the band's activities and join the legendary guitarist Jimmy Page in the "Coverdale/Page" project. Tested by time, "Slip of the Tongue" remains a spectacular, one-of-a-kind monument where Coverdale's British blues soul, Vandenberg's masterful melodic writing, and Vai's virtuosic genius met at the last moment of the golden age of glittering hard rock.
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