Uriah Heep

I absolutely love the Heep! David was such an incredible singer. Yes, Bernie sounds amazing too, but like Bruce, David is truly the best. My dad was very lucky to see them with Deep Purple back in early 70's and then we both saw them put on an amazing performance 10 years ago. And they were truly pioneers in progressive music with songs like Salisbury and The Magician's Birthday. Such an amazing and underrated band!
 
You're right. A massively underrated band with incredible albums. Very sad about Lee's death. He fought bravely.
 
Poto said:
Best albums?
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Demons and Wizards, Look at Yourself, The Magician's Birthday and Uriah Heep Live are generally considered to be their classics. Don't shy away from their later material though, they made some great albums in the nineties and beyond (Sea of Light, for example). Spellbinder Live is a pretty good introduction to their sound of the Bernie Shaw era.

I saw Heep live in 2010 and I was clearly the youngest person in the hall. They are a very old band and one that suffers a lot from the classic rock label. As you can see in this thread, people only know their stuff from the early seventies - and although I do think that David Byron was one of the greatest rock singers of all time, I wish the stuff they made with Bernie Shaw would get some more appreciation.
 
I personally loved all the albums from the beginning to abominog in the 80's. Although I liked a lot many of the albums they have released after it. As @Perun said, those albums are amazing.
You can take a look at this video where Pete Pardo and Martin Poppoff discusses about Uriah Heep on their best.
 
Perun said:
Demons and Wizards, Look at Yourself, The Magician's Birthday and Uriah Heep Live are generally considered to be their classics. Don't shy away from their later material though, they made some great albums in the nineties and beyond (Sea of Light, for example). Spellbinder Live is a pretty good introduction to their sound of the Bernie Shaw era.

I saw Heep live in 2010 and I was clearly the youngest person in the hall. They are a very old band and one that suffers a lot from the classic rock label. As you can see in this thread, people only know their stuff from the early seventies - and although I do think that David Byron was one of the greatest rock singers of all time, I wish the stuff they made with Bernie Shaw would get some more appreciation.
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I wholeheartedly agree!

I saw them live back in 2003 and was blown away. What a great band and how massively underrated Bernie Shaw is!
 
I'm relistening and enjoying the 70's and 80's albums these days and I went to wikipedia to research and I've seen that they have 41 compilation albums. Along with the Beatles and Presley I think I haven't seen any artist or any band with more greatest hits albums.
 
I listened the Lee Kerslake album called 'Eleventeen' and it has a couple or three cool songs. It's an intimate and short album just to be proud himself to achieve record this solo album and thanks his family and friends for the moments he lived.
RIP Lee Kerslake
 
The band have announced the sudden death of their former vocalist John Lawton, aged 74. It's sad, I really like this guy. Let's all spin Firefly, Innocent Victim or Fallen Angel today.
 
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I've been having a bit of a dive into this legendary bands back catalogue and expanding my knowledge of them beyond the four ]records I already owned (Demons and Wizards, The Magicians Birthday and Look at Yourself and Abominog').

Heep seemed to have developed a bit of a naff reputation even in their 70's heyday which i find rather baffling when listening to 'Live '73'' where they sound so fresh and exciting. And on some tracks like the rendition of 'Look at yourself' they sound world class, all driving organ and guitars and pummelling drums. It seems that the rock press of the day took a disliking to them, I suppose for the usual reasons of pretension and snobbishness.

Anyway I've been enjoying their latest offering 'Living the Dream' this morning and have also dipped into 'Return to Fantasy' and Sweet Freedom' as well as re-listening to the 4 I already owned. I'd welcome any advice on any other records amongst their vast discography, studio or live, old or new, that are worth dipping into.
 
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Picked up a ticket for Heep next year.

I only have the first album, so am looking to pick up a compilation in advance but there's about 20 listed on wiki.

Which compilation would be most representative of their best tracks that they are most likely to play at the gig?

I'm not looking for the equivalent of best of the beast, spanning all era's and including stuff like Virus and Holy Smoke that won't be played live.
 
srfc said:
Picked up a ticket for Heep next year.

I only have the first album, so am looking to pick up a compilation in advance but there's about 20 listed on wiki.

Which compilation would be most representative of their best tracks that they are most likely to play at the gig?

I'm not looking for the equivalent of best of the beast, spanning all era's and including stuff like Virus and Holy Smoke that won't be played live.
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They are an excellent live band, you won't be disappointed.

This relatively recent compilation would be a good place to start:

en.wikipedia.org

Celebration – Forty Years of Rock - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

It features re-recorded versions of most of the songs they tend to play live by the line-up of the band at the time. :) Sadly, Trevor Bolder died less than four years after that album was released. :(
 
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