SUFFERING FROM RIFF-WRITER’S BLOCK? TAKE A PAGE FROM THE FORMER WHITESNAKE GUITARIST’S BOOK AND HOP ON A BIKE
By Joe Bosso
GOT A PROBLEM writing riffs? Adrian Vandenberg has some sage advice for you: go bike riding. “Whenever I play the guitar at home, I tend to noodle around and nothing comes from it,” he says. “But something different happens when I’m on my bicycle. I’ll cruise through the woods, and before you know it I’ve got these incredible riff ideas in my head. I’ll pull over, sing them into my phone, and then I’ll keep going. It’s pretty cool.”
Perhaps best known to music fans for his stretch in Whitesnake in the late Eighties, Vandenberg kicked around with various projects before forming Vandenberg’s MoonKings in 2013. When that band’s singer was unable to commit to extensive touring, Vandenberg decided to form a new band with his surname moniker — returning to the original group name he used back in 1981. “In many ways, I never really felt as if Vandenberg the band was finished. It just took me a while to come back to it.” he says.
The new Vandenberg lineup (which includes singer Mats Levén, drummer Koen Herfst and bassist Randy van der Elsen) issued its debut album, 2020, three years ago (natch), and now they’re back with Sin, a robust collection of fiery, epic hard rockers that afford the Dutch guitarist plenty of room to explore what he calls “the emotional side” to his playing.
“There a
