After fulfilling his contractual duties as the singer of Deep Purple at the Liverpool Empire on March 15, 1976, David Coverdale walked away relieved, but entered a period of limbo. He decamped to Germany to earn a tax break, also declining opportunities to sing with Paice, Ashton & Lord and Uriah Heep. Without a contract, he opted instead to press ahead with plans for a solo album funded by the Deep Purple management.
Coverdale immediately enlisted his “local hero” Micky Moody, a guitarist who he held in high esteem from his pre-Purple days in their native North East. Moody, best known for stints in Juicy Lucy and more recently Snafu, was a celebrated slide blues player worthy of comparison with Little Feat’s Lowell George. He would commute back and forth to Germany to work with Coverdale on arrangements for a clutch of songs that would become Coverdale’s self-titled debut solo album White Snake (two words, originally). A pair of them – opener Lady and the brooding Time On My Side – were originally conceived for the never-made follow-up to Purple’s final album before their split, Come Taste The Band.
