David Coverdale

• Genre: Hard Rock

About

David Coverdale has a long, flowing, blonde mane and a soaring voice that can hit piercing high notes, and he writes Hard Rock songs -- so he's basically just like Robert Plant, only less daring. He paid his dues as Ian Gillan's replacement in the '70s blues metal outfit Deep Purple. From there he went on to form Whitesnake, who recorded classic Pop Metal records such as Slide It In in 1984 and a self-titled album in 1987. As a songwriter and a lyricist, Coverdale's music has covered the range of Hard Rock -- ubiquitous power ballads in the early to mid-1980s, pompously majestic (or is it majestically pompous?) Zeppelin-esque numbers, and pile-driving, in-your-face Metal. Perhaps realizing that Coverdale needed to fulfill a dream, Jimmy Page did an album with him in 1993.

- Will Lerner