Former Whitesnake Guitarist Explains Why David Coverdale Kicked Out Vivian Campbell

During a conversation on Full in Bloom, Adrian Vandenberg, who was one of Whitesnake’s most successful guitarists, talked about David Coverdale’s fight with Vivian Campbell who was fired from the band after being moody.

David Coverdale, the founder of the popular English band Whitesnake and former Deep Purple lead singer, is often considered to be one of the nicest and most hard-working musicians in the rock scene. However, there have been times in his career, and especially within his own band, that he had to make tough calls.

Adrian Vandenberg was hired to the band in 1986 after impressing David with his amazing guitar and songwriting skills. Coverdale really enjoyed working with Adrian and they created some of Whitesnake’s best hits together. In his recent interview, Adrian explained how their close relationship led to problems within the band.

Former Dio guitarist Vivian Campbell, who was in Whitesnake from 1987 until 1988, was not very happy with how things were as he felt left out. Thus, when they started rehearsing for ‘Slip of the Tongue,’ he started acting a little bit moody, and eventually ‘David decided he didn’t want to work in that atmosphere,’ which is why he fired Vivian.

In his recent interview, Adrian Vandenberg described the tensions as follows:

“I remember that once we started rehearsing initially on ‘Slip of the Tongue,’ the first couple of rehearsals, Vivian was there, and he was just really moody because David wanted to work with me as far as songs.

Vivian was not really happy, and the thing goes, the important reason that David decided he didn’t want to work in that atmosphere. But on the road, for me, everything was great.”

It seems clear that the reason why Vivian felt unhappy was that Coverdale preferred to write with Adrian, and maybe Vivian felt like his efforts weren’t appreciated enough. However, bearing in mind that Vivian went on to have a great career with Def Leppard and Last in Line shows that maybe everything worked out for the best.