Velvet thunder at midnight—Coverdale’s slow-burn confession built to rule FM and MTV
By late 1987, Whitesnake had traded smoky club grit for a widescreen sheen, and “Is This Love” became the soft-focus blade at the heart of it. Cut for the self-titled Whitesnake album, the ballad pivots on David Coverdale’s hushed gravitas and a guitar figure that glows like dashboard light—restraint doing the heavy lifting. It’s a power move disguised as a whisper: verse lines hovering in close, chorus blooming just enough to fill the room without breaking the spell.
The origin story fits the song’s elegant poise. Coverdale has said the tune first took shape for Tina Turner—an idea floated by friends at EMI—before Geffen urged him to keep it for Whitesnake; once John Sykes heard the sketch in a South of France writing session, it became a keeper. The result sounds tailor-made for Coverdale’s velvet rasp, but you can still imagine Turner’s phrasing ghosting through the melody, which is part of why the lyric lands like a private confession broadcast at scale.
The polish came by design. Producer/engineers Mike Stone and Keith Olsen keep the band tight around the center—kick and bass breathing together, high mids smoothed until the guitars feel satin-edged. Sykes threads melody rather than muscle, letting sustained notes carry the heat while Don Airey’s keys float like late-night fog. Coverdale sings with the kind of control that sells vulnerability as strength; every inhale is part of the rhythm section.
On screen, the official video—served today via Rhino’s channel—turns the music into a mood board: performance shots in mist and monochrome, intercut with apartment-light intimacy and flashes of Tawny Kitaen. Director Marty Callner frames it like a memory you can rewind, the camera lingering where the vocal does; it became pure MTV oxygen for the single and the album.
Radio answered in kind. In the U.S., “Is This Love” climbed to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, while in the UK it peaked at No. 9—the sort of cross-Atlantic confirmation that tells you the arrangement is built on granite. Decades on, it still plays like a late-night murmur that somehow fills arenas.
Musicians:
David Coverdale — lead vocal
John Sykes — guitars, backing vocals
Neil Murray — bass guitar
Aynsley Dunbar — drums
Don Airey — keyboards
