Australia is soon going to rock like it is the 1980s again as two of the biggest bands of that decade are about to hit Australian shores for one almighty tour. Yes the powerhouses that are Whitesnake and Scorpions are going to share some of Australia’s best venues and HEAVY Mag simply can’t wait to get front and centre.
To wet our appetite a little bit more about what is set to be one of Australia’s biggest tours of 2020 we recently had the opportunity to talk to the man himself – David Coverdale – and he gave us a little bit of an insight to what Aussie fans can expect.
“I think it is going to be absolutely fantastic,” he yells when we talk about what we can expect from this tour. You can literally hear and feel Coverdale’s excitement down the phone line. “I think the last time we were there was back in 2008. “I have bluebirds flying out of every orifice. I know we are only doing the three shows but every time I see Melbourne on the list I am taken back to when Deep Purple were asked to headline the Sunbury Festival.”
“I think it was 1974 and it was the height of the Australian summer,” he says continuing. “We were invited over to headline this festival and we were all in Los Angeles at the time so we hired this huge fucking commercial jet that carried all our equipment, our road crew and our wives and girlfriends. We were all fine until we started to descend into Melbourne and Thor the fucking God of thunder decides to make his presence felt. The plane was all over the place and it was the wettest and coldest fucking weekend on record… it was horrible.”
“But the best part of the memory was that as we were leaving, and we left because nobody could hear us in front of the stage because of the wind and how wet it was,” he explains. “Then when we got into the car I could hear drums and I thought ‘hang on I thought we were the closers.’ It turns out this young band had got up and plugged into our stuff, these crazy bastards and of course this huge fight started with our crew… but it was AC/DC… this new Australian band called AC/DC stole Deep Purple’s thunder…. it was wonderful. So, yeah I am delighted to head back to Australia, I just wish it could be more because we only have the three shows.”
It is hard to believe that aside from a few years apart Whitesnake have now been at this since 1978 and Coverdale is really honest when I ask him whether or not back then he could have predicted the band would still be touring in 2020. “No way, no way… I would have laughed at you,” he admits. “Back then when I writing songs like ‘Here I Go Again’ and ‘Crying In The Rain’ it was during the break up of my first marriage and I was heading into my 30th birthday and I thought that was it. But now I am nearly in my 70s and my wife is mad at me for using the word retirement, but every fucking day I am in gratitude and have an appreciation that my life is the way it is, both from a personal circumstance and a professional circumstance and it is magical.”
“There are a lot of bands that stay together for the money,” he goes on to say. “They are in it for the economics of it, but this band we are all friends, actually we are brothers… we are brothers of the same. As long as we sound good live, and believe me we are still one fucking powerful band live, we are as happy as whoever the fuck Larry is.”
As the discussion goes on I also learn that there is a very strong bond between Whitesnake and Scorpions. “They actually flew in for my birthday in San Paolo a few months back,” says Coverdale and you can hear in his voice that he is in true awe of Scorpions. “Our friendship goes right back and we share the perspective of given people the value for their money with our performance. There are no bullshit stunts – the audience are there for three hours plus of good songs and we genuinely want to make you guys enjoy yourselves.”
It is such a pleasure to chat to a musician who is so still so passionate about his music after all these years and you get the feeling that these Australian shows are going to be something very special indeed… so don’t miss them!
