Yesterday, in an interview with former Rainbow/Deep Purple and current Over The Rainbow vocalist Joe Lynn Turner with Spain's The Metal Circus, Turner alleged that Whitesnake vocalist David Coverdale makes copious use of pre- recorded vocal tracks, even for the lead vocals during live performances.When asked if he has ever used pre-recorded tapes for backing and/or lead vocals, Turner replied, "To be honest with you, I have one machine that helps sing the backgrounds — it's from DigiTech, and it's a great technology — but it's not samples, it's live; you have to sing into the microphone and then this machine will take your voice, whatever you put into this machine is exactly what you get. So if you sing like sh*t, it's gonna sound like shit. So there's no wizardry, there's no tapes.
Because recently I heard on the Internet that David Coverdale was using all kinds of tapes. Well, I was in Finland [in June 2008] with Graham Bonnet and we were on the same festival [Sauna Open Air) as Whitesnake, and I couldn't believe he was using these tapes — for lead singing! Not just backgrounds, but lead! And I was... My mouth was open. I was like, 'What the f**k, David?! You can't do this. You look so stupid, so foolish.' And everyone is complaining about this.
No, I'm singing live. This is what you get; that's it. . . I'm not trying to talk sh*t... This is true. Everybody sees this. . . I couldn't believe it, because he [David] was always one of my favorite singers. To use tapes for a lead vocal... I can understand backgrounds if the [rest of the bandmembers] don't sing. But for lead?! You've gotta be kidding!"
Now Coverdale has shot back. In a statement issued to Classic Rock Magazine he fiercly denies Turner's allegations, calling his claims "absolute balderdash"
Coverdale went on to tell the magazine,“I have no idea what the hell the daft bugger’s talking about.
“I do not, have not and will not use tapes of my voice to mime in concert. My band and I perform and sing live in concert. Yeah… we’re that fucking good! What a total prick.”
Coverdale continued: “We had these rumours in Germany last year while we were on tour with Alice Cooper and we actually had a journo [Frank Thiessis] sit out at the front-of-house mix to verify the rumours were unfounded.
“It’s strange… this started on the Internet last summer in Spain, then again in Germany. It persisted so much that SPV, my record company, proposed we get a ‘regarded German journalist’ to witness and report on the show, so we did.
“I’m not sure what you can do when something like this does the rounds. I’m still dealing with the ‘is it true you’re joining Van Halen’ rumours from years ago.
“If this continues, I’ll get a some of my professional associates to make statements about this nonsense.”
Ritchie Blackmore however, was unavailable for comment.
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