When I was very, very young, seven years old, I heard there was school where you could go to learn to draw. That was my absolute driven passion, to become an artist or a painter. So the romantic realist in me, I studied to be a graphic design artist and an art teacher.

The critics love to get out their knives and dine on Coverdale. But the worse the criticism gets, the more successful I become.

I've always thought live albums were cop-outs.

I'm the last person to ask 'what do you remember' from a particular time period... I like to learn from the past... not 'live' in it.

Hard rock may have faded from the media for a time, but I've always been able to make a living, if not in America, then in the rest of the world.

My voice is an instrument.

I think we have two very important missions in life. One is to find out who we really are and the other one is to taste as much of life and experience as much of life as we can.