Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Uriah Heep
Label: Bronze Records
Release: 1980
Rating: 1.5/5
The last Uriah Heep album with Ken Hensley is sadly one of the low points of Uriah Heep’s career. After the Fallen Angel tour (1979), Lee Kerslake (drums) and John Lawton (vocals) leave the band. Stepping up to the mic in Lawton’s place is Welshman John Sloman, who came over from Lone Star and had previously also sung with the lesser-known Pulsar. John Sloman was a good-looking guy, with an image reminiscent of Robert Plant (Led Zeppelin). So: unbuttoned shirt and a “chest rug”, a scarf around the neck, and a hairdo with way more hair than Lawton ever had. But all that did was hurt the band. Heep were slowly turning into mature men, and a frisky stallion just didn’t fit the picture. Sloman was a talented, gifted singer, but his improvisational style and the tone of his voice unfortunately left gaps in the music. And it wasn’t only Sloman. The friction in the band had been growing over the years, and there was simply no willingness left to sort it out. And the magic on “Conquest” just isn’t there. New drummer Chris Slade (Asia), who had previously drummed for Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, came to the rescue. It was an emergency job of gluing the pieces of the wreckage back together and artificially keeping alive a giant whose days were numbered.
So “Conquest” has about half the songs that carry the real Heep hallmarks. That is, polished, flowing melodies that hit the ear on first listen, with the right dose of tightness, listenability and rock intensity. Those are Feelings (released as a single), Fools, Carry On (released as a single) and the closing It Ain’t Easy, all decorated with the familiar tasty multi-part vocal harmonies, a Heep specialty after all. It Ain’t Easy even has some of that familiar dramatic atmosphere, thanks to Hensley’s Hammond! The organ, though, is simply impossible to hear on the record, and Hensley is hardly recognizable across the album, which is also why the band’s sound suffers! The rest of the material limps along, either because of awkwardly chosen motifs that follow one another through the songs (Won’t Have To Wait To Long, Out On The Street) so they just never take off, or simply because Sloman’s vocal isn’t compatible enough, being either too thin or because his improvisational style and way of singing the lines just doesn’t belong in Uriah Heep (No Return or Imagination, with an absolutely excessive dose of experimenting for Uriah Heep).
Hypothetically, the only thing that could have saved “Conquest” was John Lawton’s vocal. Compare the bonus track Been Hurt, sung once by Lawton (the version on the “Fallen Angel” remaster) and once by Sloman (the bonus track on the “Conquest” remaster), and it tells you everything. But fate evidently wanted Heep to sink completely. So in the middle of the tour the great Ken Hensley leaves them. He was the only one who saw what damage bringing Sloman into the band had done, and it was surely a blow for a band that Heep hadn’t known since the days of “High And Mighty”, when the iconoclastic singer David Byron left. Hensley contributed a few immortal Heep melodies to the band’s history, along with most of the standout hits that still happily turn up on radio stations today (Lady In Black, Easy Livin’), and in the eyes of many fans he was a link in the band that was simply irreplaceable. As a bonus track, Think It Over is interesting, with Greg Dechert on keyboards. He had already worked with Sloman in Pulsar and came in for a short time to replace Ken Hensley. Think It Over carries the riff and musical direction that point to the band’s rebirth two years later with the album “Abominog” (1982).
“Conquest” has a few bright moments, but taken as a whole it just doesn’t convince on consistency. You can feel the guys weren’t breathing for a common cause anymore, because the real chemistry simply isn’t there. “Conquest” also marks the end of an epic chapter for the band, one that will never again be what we understand as classic Uriah Heep, meaning Uriah Heep with Ken Hensley.
Line-up
John Sloman – lead and backing vocals, piano, percussion
Ken Hensley – obx, vocoder, organ, piano, guitars, backing vocals
Mick Box – guitars
Trevor Bolder – bass guitar
Chris Slade – Staccato drums, percussion
Production
Gerry Bron
Track list
1. No Return (6:02)
2. Imgination (5:49)
3. Feelings (5:26)
4. Fools (5:03)
5. Carry On (3:57)
6. Won’t Have To Wait Too Long (4:54)
7. Out On The Street (5:57)
8. It Ain’t Easy (5:45)
Album length: 44:37
BONUS TRACKS ON THE 1997 REMASTERED EDITION:
1. Been Hurt (3:56) single b-side
2. Love Stealer (3:28) single a-side
3. Think It Over [vocals John Sloman] (3:33) single a-side
4. My Joanna Needs Tuning (3:02) single b-side
5. Lying (4:23) out-take, previously unreleased
