By Martin Popoff
"What I normally would spend on putting together an extraordinary collective of musicians I've actually been spending on this record company," explains Dave, when asked about the (im)possibility of touring. " It's hard. Let me give you a basic example. If you want a soft drink and you go to the supermarket, the first thing you will see when you go to the supermarket is Coca-Cola because they pay for that shelf space. So of course trying to get shelf space in some of the major record stores is very difficult. Initially, a lot of people would have been more comfortable with me embracing the name Whitesnake. It's a great brand name and it's globally recognized but I really felt that it was appropriate for me to move on. So there's been a lot of stuff I had to deal with in terms of overcoming corporate power, so it's proven extraordinarily expensive. And it's compromised the idea of me actually being able to tour in the normal sense, whereas it would be the perfect promotional premise for me to tour, for people to be able to see and hear what I do. The analogy I've been using, is that hopefully from little acorns, oak trees grow. You know, it's quite a baptism of fire. I haven't lost faith at all dealing with a lot of negatives."
But man, with an album like this, it's even more inexplicable Coverdale isn't with a major, although elsewhere, he still is. "Outside of North America, Canada and the U.S., I've been involved with EMI. I'm actually the longest surviving artist on EMI Records, which is kind of a pain in the ass to have a company that pays you very significant money to be involved and then really doesn't do anything. So basically the only promotion I've been able to do for this, is that I did a worldwide promotional tour, all extraordinarily positive. But if the record company doesn't get behind it... For the last six months I've been receiving emails on my website and people in EMI territories don't even know the record is out, so that screams volumes to me that maybe it's time for a change."
DAVID COVERDALE - The Harsh Light Of Reality Page 3