#219
May 31 1980
by Jon Rosenberg
Whitesnake
Ready An’ Willing
Genre: Rock
Allen’s Rating: 3.5 out of 5
Jon’s Rating: 2.75 out of 5
Highlights: Fool for Your Loving
Sweet Talker
Blindman
She’s a Woman
Gotta say, I was kind of dreading writing this review. Not that I have anything specifically against Whitesnake, but when they entered my consciousness with their 1987 MTV video “Here I Go Again,” they represented everything I hated about 80’s hair metal: flashy and over-produced with high school freshman poetry class macho lyrics, blow-dried hair and stuffed crotches. But, unlike Spinal Tap, they weren’t joking! I don’t wanna reopen the whole MTV can o’ worms, but apparently, before that became the only audience that mattered, Whitesnake had some actual rock cred. Lead singer David Coverdale had done a three-album stint with Deep Purple, and two of his old bandmates – Jon Lord on keys and Ian Paice on drums – join him on Ready An’ Willing. The rest of the band are competent journeymen who seem to know their way around a riff. Unfortunately, the riffs aren’t really that interesting. And the infrequent solos did not impress me much either. “Fool for Your Loving” is a good, stupid opener. “Sweet Talker” has the Noble Prize-winning lyric “The bitch is in heat, so you better run,” along with a nice organ break (seriously!). “Blindman” sounds like a Bad Company outtake. And “She’s a Woman” gets so synth-y towards the end that I thought I was listening to Yes for a second. But at least everyone seems to be having fun. And I guess fun is what this kind of music is all about. No deep, meaningful lyrics. No complex compositions with metre changes and polyrhythms. They’re the musical equivalent of drunken dry humping after the prom in your cousin’s van with the Frank Frazetta painting of a barbarian chick in a metal bikini on the side. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to finish my trigonometry homework. Mr. Duffy is such an asshole. I’ll be lucky if I get a D this semester. See you Friday night at the party in the woods. You bring the warm Bud Light and I’ll bring the Whitesnake!
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