Uriah Heep concert

Press, 27 April 1984, Page 4

Uriah Heep concert

Uriah Heep, at the Christchurch Town Hall Auditorium last evening. Reviewed by Tony Green. It made perfect sense to the leather and denim-clad crowd at the Town Hall last evening when Mick Box, the lead guitarist and sole remaining original member of the English heavy metal band, Uriah Heep, played an eight-minute guitar solo that was so distorted that it became a total blur. This was typical of the performance, all the band members except Trevor Bolder, the bass player, playing up to the crowd with very hammy, overextended solos and crowd participation spots. For the crowd, however, the band could do no wrong. After a lukewarm response early on, “The Wizard,” a 10-minute epic dedicated to

Gary Thain (a New Zealander who played bass for Uriah Heep before overdosing in 1976) had those downstairs punching the air and cheering loudly. It was only on the tighter, melodic numbers that Heep looked promising. “Stealin’ ” was the best of these, showing some song writing ability. Other songs that stood out from the raunch were “Easy Livin’,” the group’s biggest hit single, and “Another Lonely Night.” The vocalist, Peter Coalby, strutted round the stage waving his mikestand as if to threaten disbelievers, and the keyboards player, John Sinclair, played in a vast cathedral-like manner that would have sounded better in an American stadium.

It was Box who caught the eye, when he launched

into a solo and instead of grimacing wildly as most heavy metal guitarists do, smiled sweetly at the righthand side of the stage, and fluttered his hands gracefully about his instrumentvery odd.

It seems pointless to criticise this gig. Uriah Heep were playing to their fans, most of whom looked as though they had been followers since the group’s inception in 1969. The fans got exactly what they had wanted.

With the pop music of the 1980 s offering more possibilities than before, Uriah Heep sadly seem to be stuck in the same old sweaty rut. Maybe they will emulate the Rolling Stones and play for 20 years, but it remains to be seen whether anyone will be listening.