Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Location: Maribor / Lent festival (Main Stage) / Slovenia
Concert date: 04.07.2013
Attendance: 3500
Ticket price: €20.00
New year, new summer, new Lent festival. That’s pretty much how things roll in our homeland. Lent holds up. It’s tradition, it’s culture, it’s a way of life. A gorgeous festival in every respect, and it stays that way. Our pride. This time the organizers slipped the name Uriah Heep into the overall lineup, creating new facts on the ground that meant one thing for every rock die-hard: a must. At the very least a one-day visit to this year’s Lent.
In 2013, Uriah Heep show two faces. One is the defiant one that always enchants concertgoers, as well as consumers of their latest studio releases: the band is enjoying a new youth, an artistic and creative bloom, culminating in outstanding stage performances of the new millennium. The other has older roots. Uriah Heep have well and truly waded into their 44th year of existence. And this year, sadly, Trevor Bolder left the band. A rock, a pillar of the group, who stamped an indelible mark on Uriah Heep from the album »Firefly« (1977) onward (apart from a five-year absence, until he rejoined in 1983), he is an irreplaceable piece of the band. With his departure, Uriah Heep will never be the same again. There simply is no adequate replacement. You’d have to look among the guard of musicians who put rock on its feet. John Wetton? Maybe, but that’s probably a pipe dream. What I’m trying to say is that the years of defiance are slowly coming to collect their toll. If it isn’t the tooth of the goblet, then it’s certainly the tooth of time that slowly drills into you. Quietly but mercilessly, it gnaws at you. Uriah Heep are now officially a quartet, and bassist Dave Rimmer (Zodiac Mindwarp) is filling in for Bolder as a temporary hired gun. The energy lines in the Uriah Heep lineup will therefore never be what they once were. On the other hand, though, the band is announcing work on a new studio album. That means Mick Box, the only man to have survived literally all the eras of the band, is keeping his creative fitness, which points to a bright continuation of the band going forward. Into the fifth decade of its existence.
Let’s set the philosophy aside for a moment. Off we go to Lent. Uriah Heep in Maribor? On the “river raft”? Dreamlike. The banks of the Drava river came alive in all their picturesque color. The energy was fantastic right at the festival’s entry points. Faces everywhere, relaxed, full of joy and cheer. This time the Uriah Heep merch table greeted us right in the ticket-sales container. Uriah Heep souvenir prices? They don’t budge. The packed stands were a surprise. Filled to the last corner, really only the far left (as seen from the stage) had a bit of empty space, otherwise jam-packed. Uriah Heep took the stage right on the dot of the time printed on the concert tickets. With the familiar intro that morphed into one of the best songs of the band’s newer era, called Against The Odds (»Sea Of Light«, 1995). A punchy riff, and in its punchiness it’s hard to find a more fitting candidate for opening an Uriah Heep show in the band’s later era. It grabs you from the first second! And that’s exactly how it went for Uriah Heep’s gig in Maribor.
Excellent sound throughout the show. At moments Box’s guitar was a touch too loud, especially in numbers like the newer Nail on the Head (»Into The Wild«, 2010) – where the raw punch of the hard rock riff is emphasized even more – but otherwise it was the usual, for this band almost expected, sonic fantasticness. That night the band was treated to an exceptional crowd and view from the stage. Most of them, of course, didn’t come because they were Uriah Heep fans first and foremost. That would mean Slovenia has a years-long tradition of healthy rock culture worship, like Germany does (though sadly the takeover by “Dalmatian klapa” groups doesn’t inspire much hope). They came because of the tradition of Lent festival. They simply have to be there. And thank God for that. They enjoyed the Uriah Heep show. All generations.
The stage, built on a wooden pier, practically floating on the laws of physics laid down by the Drava river! The floor area, squeezed tightly between the stage and the stands, was open only to the “well-heeled” with VIP passes. Some of them honestly “swaying.” If not earlier, the crowd came together as one and woke up for Lady In Black. Never mind whether they knew that Uriah Heep play the original. The nation simply knows the song from the radio waves. But Bernie “rejuvenated” the mature crowd when, before Nail on the Head, he addressed the people in the stands with two questions, asking if they like rock and noting that they looked tired. He called them to their feet and diplomatically flattered them that they suddenly looked thirty years younger. Even without that kind of “gem,” which got drunks in the crowd yelling “Špileej!”, Uriah Heep routinely established an extremely genuine and heartfelt connection with the audience, built on two basic pillars: vocalist Bernie Shaw and guitar yogi Mick Box.
The band has clearly lost more with Trevor than when the retired Lee Kerslake was replaced by Russell Gilbrook in January 2007. Don’t get me wrong, the temporary stand-in Dave Rimmer (Zodiac Mindwarp) is an excellent bassist. He impressed with his softness, precision, a really lovely warm and active bass sound, and a lively, melodically rich use of his playing, in the spirit of what bassists Gary Thain, Trevor Bolder, John Wetton and/or Bob Daisley brought to the essential Uriah Heep sound. Still. Neither visually nor energetically could Rimmer fill the gap. His stage presence is built completely differently from Bolder’s. So he’s merely a stopgap, until the lineup plays its booked shows through the end of summer. The question is whether Uriah Heep will ever decide to bring in a new bassist as a permanent member. Officially they’re a quartet right now. It would be best if that simply stayed that way. With one exception. If John Wetton were to rejoin them by some miracle, it would raise the chance of hearing some »High And Mighty« (1976) classic live one day.
Bernie delivered another excellent vocal performance! Still, the band had to patch up a problem with the vocal harmonies. In the golden days, every single instrumentalist in Uriah Heep took on backing vocal duties alongside the lead singer. Even after Kerslake left, Gilbrook needed quite a while to master that skill. The Maribor show offered a glimpse of how they’re handling emergency measures on that front. Mick Box took over more backing vocals, even the higher parts that Bolder used to sing. Still, as a vocalist Box is no Bolder, let alone Hensley. Rimmer barely opened his mouth at the mic all night. With this latest arrangement you could feel that the vocal harmonies, in coloring the character of the lead vocal, are no longer what they were even two years ago.
However hard I try to nitpick, Uriah Heep delivered an excellent show that confirmed the band isn’t about to leave the stage any time soon. There’s no reason to. There’s Mick Box with his standard “yogi healing.” Fantastic solos, intense guitar phrases that come to full-blooded, active life only through the combination of his unique grip. Mick is Mick. What you see is what you get. The man, who over the last decade has turned into an irreversible stage figure, a stand-in Gandalf, used his right hand to direct the energy flux of his guitar’s vibrations out into the space and shared the magic selflessly with the audience. In the setlist the band delivered a repertoire of iron-clad classics. In fact they trimmed it down to suit summer stages, cutting out songs like Too Scared To Run, Come Away Melinda and All My Life, which surely didn’t sit well with hardened Uriah Heep fans, and brought back the worn-out »Sweet Freedom« (1973) “ranchero” number Stealin’. Even so, the finale, in which the classics Gypsy and July Morning slowly lead into the closing crescendo, can be called the emotional peak of the Uriah Heep concert experience. Classics remain classics. Even in 2013. Even if this is your twentieth-plus time seeing the band live. The songs from the first half of the seventies, packed with an element of pioneering, simply carry far more expressive power and breadth than the band’s later material.
The band takes the liberty of having some fun during Free N’ Easy (»Innocent Victim«, 1977) in the encore. Tried and tested, seen it before. This time the guys just wouldn’t stop calling women from the crowd up on stage to spin in the whirlwind of the hellishly fired-up riff that, in the late seventies, once more tried to win Uriah Heep the success of the evergreen hit Easy Livin’. Apparently Uriah Heep are enchanted by the beauty of Slovenian women. You won’t experience anything like that in Austria. A full twelve girls, gals, moms on stage… Anything like it? Then the obligatory Easy Livin’, and Uriah Heep bid Lent farewell to the sound of the recorded outro, the “patriotic glory” of “Land Of Hope And Glory”!
Uriah Heep are holding strong. The show was excellent, no wobbles. Solid, coherent, well-oiled. All within the context of the band’s singular, unmistakable, ultimate stature and voice. If nothing else did, Lanzon’s grandiose Hammond intro in the cult classics Gypsy and July Morning reminded us of that. The gurus and sages of rock ‘n’ roll culture don’t give up. With fresh confirmation of their stage freshness and form, they also promise a new album, and that’s a good sign that fills us with hope that the Uriah Heep fairy tale is nowhere near over.
Setlist
1. Against the Odds
2. Overload
3. Traveller in Time
4. Sunrise
5. Stealin’
6. I’m Ready
7. Between Two Worlds
8. Nail on the Head
9. Into the Wild
10. Gypsy
11. July Morning
12. Lady in Black
—encore—
13. Free ‘n’ Easy
14. Easy Livin’
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