Whitesnake - Good to Be Bad - Music & Performance - CD

Hard as it is to believe, heavy metal is now somewhere in the ballpark of the big 4-0 -- an ugly number for a genre that idealizes youth and all its surliness. Of course, how old it is, exactly, depends on your stake in longstanding debates about the respective pioneering qualities of Deep Purple and Sabbath. The sound never quite got pinned down at the beginning, and this has only troubled its definition since. The "metal" handle has evolved wildly, from avant-garde laurel to badge of decibel honor to mark of vintage blues spirit to outright hair-related slur.

In truth, the metal header has encompassed bands of such differing values that it's become rather useless as a definition. In most instances, anyway. Whitesnake are a funny case. The English band appeared in the late '70s as a new outlet for Deep Purple man David Cloverdale, and they started off paying dues in the movement's rugged rock era; the first Whitesnake records were serious, blues-drenched powerhouses. Now, however, they are best-known for their '80s pop-metal anthems -- sturdy if saccharine tunes like "Here I Go Again," which just barely fell outside the decade's hovering fog of Aqua Net. Whitesnake have been purists in an impure genre: consistent makers of "metal," whatever the term, at any given moment, happens to mean.

The energized new album Good To Be Bad fits right into this arc. Shrewd enough to follow the musical consensus, the group have sidelined pop-metal's worst features (overly glossy production, painfully banal lyrics). What we get is a fine mix of juicy hard-blues tracks spelled by lighters-high power ballads: a stadium-pleasing set of real credibility. "Got What You Need," for example, crosses elements of both early Deep Purple and Zep. Machine Head-style power chords mix with lusty lyrics that Robert Plant would sign off on. But immediately following that "Need" is a balladic turn. "'Til The End Of Time" works on an outsized acoustic guitar and crisp harmony. In the '80s, this was a recipe for sap, but "Time" wisely sticks to the Bad Company end of the power-ballad gamut.

The group appears to be at their happiest the closest they can get to straight, stormy blues, and isn't that what metal was supposed to be?

By Jake Blaine