Similarly stadium-rocking records Head First, issued in 1983, and Equator, issued two years later, capped off this exciting era for the band.Īs a way of contextualizing the band’s extensive history, the well regarded FM-friendly Peter Goalby years might be considered the third era of Heep’s extensive and productive history. and in the annals of Uriah Heep history, this record, a conquering document released smack in the thick of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal, is revered by Heep fans on par with such classics as 1971’s Look at Yourself and 1972’s Demons and Wizards, even if the band’s music had been overhauled and supercharged for a new decade. This album featured Peter Goalby on vocals. But in 1982, the band stormed back (as they would again in 1995) with a classic of British heavy metal called Abominog, which entered the top-40 in the US. Indeed, some of these personnel shuffles might have been responsible for a fallow period in the late ‘70’s, the accepted nadir in the narrative being 1980’s Conquest record. What is perhaps even more admirable than the love for the band across the globe has been the quality and consistency of the band’s music across a myriad of personnel changes, some of them potentially critical, beginning with the loss of charismatic vocalist David Byron after the band’s ninth studio album, High and Mighty, issued in June 1976. Through their success as Rock n’ Roll pioneers this enabled other bands to follow in their wake and Russia is now part of every bands touring schedule. Impressive American numbers, but that leaves 36 million records to be sold in the rest of the world, underscoring the fact that Uriah Heep have become, through their relentless dedication to touring, a truly global band, with particular success in Germany, Scandinavia, Japan, Eastern Europe and Russia, where they were the first Western rock band to play live in Moscow in December 1987 to 180,000 people. Across 25 studio albums, along with myriad live releases and compilations, Uriah Heep have managed to sell 40 million records worldwide, four million of those in the US. Success has followed the forging of such an audacious formula.
It is for this reason Heep were coined the Beach Boys of Heavy Metal, and their influence is there for all to see in other bands including ‘Queen.’ They were also one of the forerunners of using the Hammond organ along with Micks signature wah wah guitar and this became the template for their sound.
Uriah Heep have been responsible for the most elevated and intelligent use of vocals in a heavy metal context amongst the major bands inventing the genre in the 1970’s.
It is from those roots, with classic, crucial slabs of nascent metal such as “Gypsy,” “Bird of Prey” and “Walking in Your Shadow,” that Uriah Heep began their ascendance both at home and in the US, culminating in their most enduring works, Demons and Wizards, The Magician’s Birthday and Sweet Freedom, all of which went gold in the states and entered the Billboard Top 40. Among venerable UK rock institutions, with Black Sabbath and Jethro Tull dispersing, we are, perhaps, really, down to just Deep Purple, Yes and Uriah Heep left to uphold the tradition of quality original progressive hard rock forged at the very beginning of a golden era for this music, late ‘60’s into the nexus year that was 1970.Īt that crossroads, along with Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and Deep Purple, Uriah Heep helped invent a decorative and uniquely British form of heavy metal with their debut album, Very ‘Eavy, Very ‘Umble, offered as a self-titled on American shores, but whatever the titling, historically massive in the invention of a music format that would rule the ‘70’s and only intensify in the ‘80’s.
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