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WHITESNAKE
Flesh & Blood
2019 Frontiers Records

WHITESNAKE currently consists of David Coverdale (vocals), Reb Beach (guitar), Joel Hoekstra (guitar), Michael Devin (bass), Michael Luppi (keyboards) and everybody’s favorite drummer, Tommy Aldridge. This is the same lineup that recorded The Purple Album (2015), aside from the addition of Luppi on keys. 2019 sees WHITESNAKE celebrating their 41st year of existence, and Flesh & Blood is the band’s 13th studio album.

I already saw WHITESNAKE on the tour for this album, and they played four songs from Flesh & Blood, namely “Gonna Be Alright”, “Hey You (You Make Me Rock)”, “Trouble Is Your Middle Name” and “Shut Up & Kiss Me”. You can view the video for "Shut Up & Kiss Me", (in which several female fans pay homage to the classic “Here I Go Again” video), on KNAC.COM HERE. These new songs went over well in a live setting. Easily added to this list could be the album’s opening track, “Good To See You Again”. This barnstormer is the perfect greeting to fans, and hypnotizes with layers of Joel’s rhythm guitar and Reb’s slide guitar. Dave is still the hopeless romantic, as proven by the ballad “When I Think Of You” and catchy romantic rocker “Always & Forever”, the latter being my favorite track on the album. It’s a little reminiscent of the Slide It In album in structure, and is absolutely a hit single in the waiting.

The title track “Flesh & Blood” is a solid mid-tempo sing-along anthem. The album loses a little steam in the middle with the lethargic “Well I Never” and “Heart of Stone” but blues jam “Get Up” kicks things back into high gear. Album proper closing track “Sands of Time” is an “epic” track, somewhat in the vein of “Judgment Day” from Slip Of The Tongue. I bought the deluxe CD edition, which comes with two bonus tracks: the bluesy “Can’t Do Right For Doing Wrong” and the mid-tempo shaker “If I Can’t Have You”. Both of these tracks seem to harken back to the very early days of WHITESNAKE. The bonus DVD includes behind the scenes footage and different mixes of “Shut Up & Kiss Me”, “Gonna Be Alright” and “Sands of Time”.

I think this is a very strong album, one of the best in the recent WHITESNAKE catalog. It’s got energy, fantastic playing and flawless production. The songwriting, featuring plenty of trademark David Coverdale double entendres, is pretty good too. In fact, Dave’s voice sounds pretty great here overall. Reb Beach contributes some of the songwriting, but surprisingly a great deal was written by new journeyman guitarist Joel Hoekstra, which has given the band a boost and a kick in the ass. Thumbs up.

4.5 Out Of 5.0