Customer Reviews

Ready an Willing (Mlps)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What people don't realize when they're listening to this album for the first time in this day an' age, when we're so saturated with crap music, or even a Whitesnake fan that bought the 1987 album as their first...
This album came out in 1980.
Just think of all your favorite bands and figure out when they came out...
In 1980, very few great rock bands were around, compared to what came out since...
I was a fan of Coverdale when he was in Deep Purple.
I found the first Whitesnake ep "Snakebite" when it first came out,
It was pretty good, just loved his voice.
I lost touch with the band intil I heard "Fool For Your Loving" on Hartford, CT radio.
I went out and found "Ready an' Willing" that day...
My point is, that when this is the current Whitesnake album, you listen to it over and over and over and over... in the car, in your room, with a beer, with a smoke...
That's when you zone into the album and really appreciate and love what you're listening to...
This album has no bad songs...
Every song is perfect, the band was perfect at this point...
Ian Paice on drums, what taste...!!!
Neil Murray on bass, Whitesnakes finest bassist ever...
Jon Lord on keyboards, greatest player in all of rock playing some great riffs on this album...
Mickey Moody & Bernie Marsden are great blues-rock guitarists... just think of when Zeppelin actually played blues songs over their first 3 albums...
Coverdale's voice is at his finest...
"Fool For Your Loving" blows away the 1989 version...
My favorite tracks are "Love Man", great blues song... "Blindman", great 'ballad' in the vein of Deep Purple's "Soldier of Fortune"... "Ready an' Willng", a great straight-out rock song...
I'd have to put this album as my favorite album in their catalog...

Wild Man (former roadie & Rochester radio dj)

`Ready an' Willing' should be seen as the peak of the first era of Whitesnake as it is their finest collection songs and would be seen as their most accomplished album until maybe `Slide It In' released three years later. Ian Paice rejoined his former Purple mates Coverdale and Lord and completed `Snake's best lineup (arguably) and this lineup would last for a for a few years until Whitesnake the band succumbed to their leader's whims to become another Rainbow as far as musical chairs are concerned. `RnW' contains many great examples of the classic Whitesnake sound, as they were originally conceived - a hard driving blues rock band (before the age of hair metal). For those who prefer the later platinum selling Whitesnake, there is a perfect point of comparison as `RnW''s first song and single "Fool for Your Loving" was later remade nine years later as a pop metal/MTV extravaganza. You can guess which version I prefer and can maybe understand why when the '89 redux came out I wanted to throw up in my mouth! Other great songs on the LP include "Sweet Talker" and the title track which makes for a killer first three songs on any album. "Ain't Gonna Cry No More" is sort of the album's sleeper track as it builds from ballad to rocker fluently and "Blindman" is a classic Coverdale ballad (that original came from his first solo record). Much like the previous Whitesnake efforts there is a ton of blues here which while gaining popularity in the UK and the Continent did not make much of a mark in the US and that was probably the biggest reason the Coverdale would change the band by mid decade and make it more palatable to the glam metal market. Commercially he was absolutely correct but for fans of the original band, at what cost? If you are a fan of hard blues rock in the Free/Bad Company tradition then you will love `RnW'....be my friend be my brother...

This CD is by far the best Coverdale and Co. ever put out. This is the blues rock Whitesnake of early 1980's. The addition of Ian Paice on drums makes this the classic lineup. At least 4 of these songs were concert staples. So much more soul and substance than the MTV crap of the late 80's Whitesnake. I can't begin to count how many people I turned onto this era of Snake music. Most Americans never even knew they put out any music before Still of the Night.

It is quite entertaining to read the reviews of this album and the other Whitesnake albums. The blues version of Whitesnake and the hairspray/flashy version of the band controversy is hilarious. I am an old school blues rock fan so the blues version of the band appeals to me more. Ready an' Willing was the first Whitesnake album I was turned on to while attending school in Evansville, Indiana where I frequently visited Roberts Stadium to see the blues rock bands of the day. I always thought the connection with Deep Purple was cool and their sound has that connection especially with Ian Paice on drums and Jon Lord on keyboards. One of the earlier reviews mentioned he thought the music had space with not much going on. This is the problem I have with the later hairspray version is that after corporations took over music in the mid eighties, the bands started to loose the blues component of rock and roll which did have space. Space is good! Space is what lets the music breathe and give it some soul and groove. Playing a lead guitar solo in every song as fast as humanly possible is boring to me because it has little soul in it. The early version of Whitesnake was mostly based around rhythm guitar not bombastic lead guitar, saying look at me and how fast I can play. Without the blues component to rock and roll what is it? It leaves me cold without the blues. The guys who started listening to Whitesnake in their hair metal mid 80s days, using the term metal loosely, reminds me of the old joke about the two bulls. One bull was a young hyper bull talking to the old experienced bull. The young bull was jumping up and down, restlessly, shouting as they looked down upon the group of cows in the valley and said "I'm gonna RUN down there and do one of those cows". The old bull said "screw that, you're gonna stay here and I'm gonna WALK down there and do em all". The old bulls know whats happening! It's a shame that music has evolved into a corporate thing with no soul. You young guys need to discover the roots of rock and roll. Check out John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters, the original Fleetwood Mac with Peter Green, early J Geils Band before the freeze frame crap, 70s ZZ Top, 60s and 70s Rolling Stones, Deep Purple, Ten Years After, Robin Trower, Frank Marino, Jeff Beck, Johnny Winter and the bands who are carrying on the tradition, The Black Crowes, The Raconteurs, The Bottle Rockets, Gov't Mule, Drive By Truckers, etc. They know about space! Music with no space is like a when you take color wheel with all of the colors of the spectrum and put it on a drill and pull the trigger on the drill. The color wheel goes real fast but turns white, no separate colors, just white. No space , no color!

I thought that this album was long gone! I have tried to ask other people about ready an' willing, but no one seems to have heard it! I have the album and it is in very good condition, but what a suprise! Now that I have ordered the cd, I ain't gonna cry no more!!!!

thank ya,
Lightin'larry

PS. Some good ol'e southern rock

Like many people, I first discovered Whitesnake in 1987 when they released their smash hit self-titled album. Growing up with that album and the band's 1989 follow-up Slip of the Tongue makes listening to the band's early works a challenge. They're all good albums, but it's just not the Whitesnake I'm used to.

Released in 1980, Ready an' Willing is the band's third album (unless you count the Coverdale solo albums White Snake and Northwinds). As a latecomer to the band, it was reassuring to hear a familiar song opening the album. "Fool for Your Loving" definitely got things off on the right foot, and the fact that it's not even the best track on the album says a lot about the quality of Ready an' Willing. Whitesnake really seemed to hit their stride on this album, finding the perfect mix of rock and blues, and improving their songwriting along the way. The whole album is solid, more so than previous releases, but the highlights (to me, at least) are the raucous "Sweet Talker", the subtle "Ain't Gonna Cry No More" and especially the soulful "Blindman".

Ready an' Willing is one of the best of the early Whitesnake albums, and one that I'd definitely recommend it to all serious Whitesnake fans, as well as anyone into old school blues-based rock & roll.

NOTE: Ready an' Willing was reissued by EMI in 2006. The reissue includes the previously unreleased song "Love for Sale" and live versions of "Ain't No Love in the Heart of the City", "Mistreated", "Lovehunter" and "Breakdown". I'm not usually a fan of live recordings, but there's a wild energy to these songs that came across very well live, especially on the (very) extended version of "Mistreated". As good as these performances are, and as nice as the expanded liner notes are, the real attraction of the reissue is the digitally remastered sound, which makes the album sound incredibly clean, clear and loud. I highly recommend picking up the remastered version of Ready an' Willing, especially now that the price has dropped to a reasonable level.

I think Amazon needs to pay me some dividends!! When this first came out Amazon was listing this for a price of between $35 and $45. I had to go elsewhere to get it for the price it was really worth. Now after paying $25 elsewhere, Amazon lists it for less than $20. What a rip off!!

With a deep love of the blues Coverdales early incarnation of Whitesnake was a radically different beast to the later hirsute version adored by US audiences in the late 80's. Knowing this and wanting to explore further I scored this album cheap - it was allegedly a classic so seemed the place to start. My verdict can be summarised as follows;

- Lots of space in the songs and arrangements (ie not much happening).

- A lot of mellow numbers of classy blues based rock 'n' roll. Note the term rock 'n' roll, not hard rock, which is an important distinction.

- Plenty of lovely vocal melodies form Coverdale. His voice changed over the years and both earlier and later versions are pretty darn cool. Regardless of what era of Whitesnake you prefer it must always be said the guy can sing.

- Fool for your Loving. A flagship song. One redone later in the bands career. Some like to argue the respective merits of the different versions but I prefer to just enjoy them both. This is the first song on the album and is ably backed up by the funkier styled Sweet Talker and the more juttering Ready An' Willing.

- Utter boredom from track 4 onwards.

Yep, you read that last point correctly. Under the delusion that his fans actually want to hear him sing the blues that's exactly what Coverdale gives them. Now it's gotta be said that anyone thinking they're gonna get anything like 1987 from this album should brace themselves for a surprise. Chunks of these tunes are so slow you can't even tap your foot to them. Though the boogine in the belly of Ain't Gonna Cry No More interspersed with keyboard sections is kinda cool, and ditto for Black & Blue.

This album gets two stars for having the always interesting Coverdale on board crooning away through pleasant enough tunes while Martin Birchs' knob job makes sure the tunes breath. Plus a third star for the cumulative coolness of the first three cuts. And the dissing of hippies in the liner notes/credits. A lovingly crafted, fairly uneventful alleged 'classic'