Customer Reviews

Restless Heart

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I believe most longtime WS fans will dismiss this album as an unfortunate last gasp at recapturing the former Snake glory. If that's all they're looking for, they'd be right. But there's far more to this final(?) Whitesnake release that deserves mention and even a little praise. First of all, I'll get the bad stuff out of the way. Coverdale is clearly in his weakest voice, not quite hitting those high ones anymore, and having to augment the backing vox with female singers (which is, actually, not bad-sounding at all...). Some screams have been replaced with melodramatic whispering, others simply displaying a very aged voice no longer in top form. Adrian Vandenberg, who wrote and played brilliantly on this effort, is recorded on (what sounds like) a single track, pushed way off to the right in the mix, and has no fullness or bombast. Pity. While this intimacy level works well on the slower bluesy numbers, it makes the full-on rock songs sound thin and amateur. Lastly, Coverdale's lyrical content is sadly still relying on cliche, double-entendre, and effortless rhyming. Here is a man who probably has some of the best stories to tell in all of rock, and instead gives us the same silly "heart/apart", "mine/time", "I'm drunk again and I lost my woman" lyrics. Did the alternative music revolution do NOTHING to inspire this man to begin telling his life stories with finesse and zeal? All that notwithstanding, this would make a fairly interesting Coverdale/Vandenberg solo record, and should have been titled as such. Coverdale's baritone is still the coolest thing to hear, and as mentioned earlier, Vandenberg shines. I admire that Coverdale & Co. stuck to their guns an put out a quasi-blues rock album instead of more L.A.-style hair metal, but the talent displayed here had SO much more to offer. But.....if you feel Coverdale is Shakespeare and can do no wrong, you'll love it. The rest of us are just left wanting more......

....RESTLESS HEART sounds more honest than the glam metal albuns that hit the big time in America during the late '80s. And it is so good to listen to Coverdale singing closer to the style of the old days of COME AND GET IT and READY AND WILLING. There's almost no high-pitched histrionics in this album. Coverdale doesn't need it. His bluesy, deep voice is what made the old Snake so special, together with the no-frills arrangements, and he rescued this legacy in this album.

The band is competent. Of course I miss the old guitar-players Moody and Marsden, but I have to admit Coverdale put together a line-up that played true to the spirit of bluesy hard rock.

"Don't Fade Away" ia a gentle opening. It is a beautiful ballad, Coverdale's voice is superb. It is like a '90s version of "North Winds", the title song of a pre-Snake solo album. The lyrics are meaningful, displaying a mature side of the singer that many people can relate to.

The energy builds on the next tracks. "All in the name..." is charming, the arrangement right to the point. Good classic rock. "Restless Heart" is the first hard rock. Strong! "Too many tears" is a ballad with a Nashville feel. Good to listen to, and it sounds like a progression from songs of the old Snake like "Carry Your Load"(1980).

"Crying" is the heaviest rock of the album. The riffs remind me of Zeppelin. Actually, the Coverdale-Page collaboration of the early nineties shows the direct influence in this song and also in the slow heavy blues of "Take Me Back Again" and the last track, "Woman Trouble Blues". That's allright, Coverdale! Don't forget the roots of the best British rock!

"You're So Fine" is an unremarkable rock 'n' roll, but every Snake album had a song like that and all the fans can dig it. The others are rock ballads. If nothing else, the singer is in fine shape in all of them.

People who expect an album like 1987 or SLIP OF THE TONGUE will be disappointed (Thank god!). But if you are a fan on the old Snake, RESTLESS HEART is a satisfying experience. There are maybe too many romantic numbers and too few of the cocky rock ones. But that would be innevitable, since at this point in David's life it makes more sense for him to sing something like "Don't fade away" than "Sweet Talker"(don't get me wrong, I know the latter is great rock 'n'roll).

If only he could return to record with Moody, Marsden and Murray... But it is unlikely, the singer and the players haven't been exactly in friendly terms recently.

I've been waiting for this to come! It's like "candy to my ears" to hear Coverdale really sing the way only he can. The first track Don't Fade Away is a majestic melodic rock-blues-ballad that truly shows his powerful, at the same time sensitive, voice. A truly great opening. All In The Name of Love, with great guitarwork from Adrian Vandenberg, has a lot of Hendrix-spirit in it. In all, this album has everything that the other late Whitesnake albums were lacking; strong melodies, superb singing. It really seems honest. Tomas Lange

David's vocals are very strong.After being in the band for almost 15 years we finally get to hear how Adrian Vandenberg sounds on album.HE SOUNDS GREAT! They do everything from the "Trouble" type sound to the "Slip of the tongue" sound.(The Zeppish sounding ones,not the bad pop-metal ones)I listen to this CD frequently+never get tired of it.Fans of any Whitesnake era will enjoy this CD.

At first I was a little skeptical about buying Restless Heart. I had heard some bad things about it. But then I just decided to go for it. I was very pleased with it. Don't go in expecting Whitesnake 1987, or Slip of the Tongue. I like both of those C.D.'s a lot. This particular release has a little slower pace. It still has some real rocking songs on it. Crying is the hardest song on it. You're So fine, Take Me Back Again, and Woman Trouble Blues are also very good blues/rock tunes. If you like old school Whitesnake before they turned metal for their extremely popular 1987 C.D.. Then you should really enjoy this. I personally like both styles that Whitesnake has come out with.

I have to say with all honesty: I'm an old fan and i like Whitesnake in their platin-hairy,glamour,shiny,polished 1987-1991 days. I still call this kind of music Heavy Rock or american Hard Rock, because the term Hair Metal is just ridiculous(it doesn't describe a music style but the appearance of the musicians)and the term Glam Metal is an absurdum itself (Glam metal bands doesn't really exist;Motley Crüe or Cinderella playing Hard Rock not Metal).On the other side i like Albums as Slide it in(especially the american remixed version with John Sykes)and Come and get it, although i think that the old line-ups and more specific the guitarists are terrible not only in the appearance but in their playing to(Coverdale describe's the sound of the days with Marsden-Moody&Co simply as a fart, and he's right) . Restless Heart is in my opinion by far the best effort Coverdale's to combine old days Blues Hard Rock with the modern Sound of the 1987 era, and the effort is truly successful. The Album has blues moments(Crying,Take me back again,Woman trouble Blues)Ballads(Too many tears,Don't fade away)and rockers(Restless Heart,All in the name of love),a great Guitar Player(Vandenberg)and of course Coverdalewho sings fine, because he's not trying this time to scream his balls away. And the result is still much better then the last incarnation of Whitesnake: Restless Heart is clearly better then "Forever More" or "Good to be Bad"(which are both mediocre Albums,although the line-up, especially Reb Beach,are great musicians). Any old fan are gonna like this Album(by old i mean fans of the early slide guitar-80's days )but also people who like stuff like "Don't Turn Away" and "Deeper the Love". It will probably remain an answered question why Coverdale's Record Company never released this Album in the States, which, partly, explains the poor sales(nowadays it is count as o flop, but i don't have the actual numbers to compare it with other Whitesnake records). Buy it!

Ah, Restless Heart, the forgotten Whitesnake album. Released in 1997, almost a decade after the previous Whitesnake album (1989's Slip of the Tongue), Restless Heart was essentially a David Coverdale solo album written in collaboration with guitarist Adrian Vandenberg. It certainly has more in common with Coverdale's other solo album (Into the Light) than with the average Whitesnake release.

Restless Heart is not a typical Whitesnake album, but it's definitely a good one. This is basically a laid-back and very soulful mix of blues melodic rock. Obviously, Coverdale is no stranger to the blues rock sound, but it's cool to hear him in this mellower setting. The album has a few rocking moments, but it's the slower, more soulful songs that really shine, thanks to a combination of Vandenberg's sweet melodies and Coverdale's deep, world-weary vocals.

It's always the last album that comes to mind when you think of Whitesnake, but Restless Heart is still a very strong melodic/blues rock album that just about any David Coverdale fan should own. If you're looking for the harder-rocking Whitesnake sound though, you may want to skip this one.

I really like this Whitesnake album it is one excellent album every tune is excellent and David Coverdale sounds great this is execllent blues rock with a modern sound and Whitesnake is one great metal outfit long live WHITESNAKE!!

Well, after getting the excellent "Good To Be Bad" this year, I got inspired to catch up on the Coverdale/Whitesnake albums I neglected and finally got this and Coverdale's "Into The Light".
The cover of this CD is credited to "David Coverdale & Whitesnake" and as another reviewer noted, it seems apparent that it was intended as a solo CD but maybe the record company was trying to cash in on the Whitesnake name (but, then, why not release it in America?). It doesn't really follow the shredding hair-metal style of late-80's Whitesnake, nor the crooning blues-based hard rock of earlier Whitesnake so much as the softer rock of his two late-70's solo albums - except, where his earlier solo work was infused with the funk and soul sounds of it's time, this one has more of the blues and white R&B soft-rock stylings of the late 90's, with a few Zeppelin-y touches (Coverdale's previous album was, after all, a collaboration with Jimmy Page). There are a few good rockers (I especially like "Crying", which has a middle section reminiscent of the one in "Still of the Night", and the slide-guitar infused "Woman Trouble Blues"), but they make up only about a third of the album.
Coverdale no longer has the beautiful crooning voice of the late 70's/early 80's (when I think he had one of the best voices in rock), but his singing here is closer to that than the screaming of his "hair-metal" era. The guitarist/co-songwriter on this is Adrian Vandenberg, who toured 2 albums and co-wrote the "Slip Of The Tongue" album, yet didn't appear on previous Whitesnake recordings (except one guitar solo). His playing is in a tasteful blues-rock style, rather than the shredding late 80's metal one might expect. There's no second guitarist, and (although there's a keyboard player in the credits) not much keys to be heard, which also makes it sound a bit different from Whitesnake.
All in all, this won't satisfy those looking for the metal side of Whitesnake, but should please Coverdale's fans who weren't happy with the hair-metal era of the band, while his solo album "Into The Light" has more in the vein of early Whitesnake.

A great comeback album and another Whitesnake incarnation that revisits Coverdale's melodic and bluesy roots,having more in common with his solo albums from the seventies than with the late eighties hair metal.