Whitesnake
Starkers In Tokyo

On this site, you will find all the information regarding the colorful career of the White Snake. Therefore, I won’t go into detail about the various adventures of the reptile, the lineup changes, or Coverdale’s vicissitudes; it would bore you. I would like to limit myself to a brief comment about the most peculiar album of the entire career of Whitesnake: “Starkers in Tokyo.”

“Starkers in Tokyo” is an album born out of the sad necessity to appease the lucrative Japanese audience with a questionable commercial operation, not so much for its promotional nature, but for the squalid ways in which it was carried out (aseptic scenario, highly selective audience, setlist reduced to half an hour, etc..).
That being said, the mini-concert presents itself as a small gem in the group's fierce career or as the greatest act of vanity for a splendid voice… being accompanied only by the guitar. It is interesting to find Whitesnake in an acoustic guise, stripped of the baroque embellishments that adorned their most recent productions, in front of a fire, on a summer evening, perhaps at high altitude under a sky of sharp stars.

In purity, a decent guitarist (Adrian Vandenberg) and a very clear vocal talent (David Coverdale) enhance the noble heart of a career, sketch out the strong emotions of a life, recall the time spent, and rediscover songs like “Can't go on” and “Don't fade away” (from the last “Restless Heart”), “Is This Love?” “Too Many Tears” (from the epochal “1987”) reimagined as whispered little confessions to our ear or the ancient tale of Purple’s “Soldier of Fortune” with an interpretation as heartfelt as never before.
This is Coverdale, reflective and imbued with blues, giving space to the voice, to the vibrations, to his own emotions, only distantly recalling, with few strokes, the screams of the past. Ultimately, it turns out that this peculiar half-hour is more than enough for Coverdale to make the most intimate confession of a career, 30 minutes of classic rock in the best sense of the term, a half-hour that can appeal, perhaps especially, to those who are not accustomed to the usual style of the group, who will discover in David Coverdale a seductive voice among the most “warm” ever heard and songs with great verve and depth.

Despite the aforementioned negative premises and the restrictions imposed by Toshiba and EMI (organizers of the event), the duo, in my humble opinion, made the best of the opportunity presented, choosing a well-composed setlist and presenting themselves in good form for the appointment. This is a curious acoustic album that probably deserves something more, but given the whims of the record company, the most appropriate rating seems to be a 3 and nothing more.