Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Uriah Heep
Label: Frontiers Records
Release: 2018
Runtime: 53:29
Rating: 4/5
Uriah Heep are legends of rock’n’roll today. Not just a pioneering band that set some of the standards in rock, but straight-up legends. Standing tall from the original lineup is the phenomenal guitarist Mick Box, without whom the band surely wouldn’t have lasted this long on the rock’n’roll map of the world. »Living the Dream« is, immodestly put, the band’s 24th studio album. And really. Its predecessor »Outsider« (2014) showed signs of running out of ideas and steam, so plenty of people could justifiably (and quite respectfully) hint that it was time for the legends to retire at last and pack up their bags.
Anything but. After four years, the famous British art rockers are returning to the scene with a splendid continuation of their musical fairy tale. With the album »Living the Dream« they’ve picked up the thread of quality right where »Wake the Sleeper« (2008) left off. In terms of quality, then, the album is at least on par with that record. Uriah Heep have been touring non-stop lately. In fact, they only wrapped up the shows last year in the late summer, then headed into the studio and knocked out a new studio album pretty quickly. Around that time, keyboardist Phil Lanzon also put out an excellent solo studio album, which surely contributed to Uriah Heep’s greater songwriting “flexibility” when writing new music, while Mick Box also made good use of the songwriting talents of bassist Dave Rimmer. The guy with the shortest tenure in Uriah Heep.
So Uriah Heep have pulled together a fresh batch of songs marked by big musical appeal and accessibility, while also bringing some progressive rock impulses back into the writing, which shows in the stacking of multiple motifs within songs and in the greater variety of the individual compositions. There are quite a few infectious, epic, bombastic moments that, in their conviction and freshness, even evoke the superb »Sonic Origami« (1998) and »Sea Of Light« (1995). Especially “toxic” in this regard is the album’s third track, Take Away My Soul, which opens straight away with an unbelievably catchy chorus and closes with an outstanding Box solo, in which this soulful master, in a minute and a half and in his signature, instantly recognizable style of combining wah effect with cunningly placed (wailing) pull-offs, delivers a real finale crescendo loaded with top-notch drama theater. Take Away My Soul is, after Grazed By Heaven, the album’s second single; the edited version of the track has the closing section with the extended Box solo cut off entirely, since in that form it’s meant for radio airplay. A justified choice.
Uriah Heep have always been known as the authors of a signature magic, and on the new album it’s all over the place again. In fact, they haven’t changed direction sonically at all. In the compositions they’ve steered gently toward the style of their nineties albums, but not too much. Just right. And they still sound like they did on the last three studio albums. That means razor-sharp guitar riffs backed by ridiculously chunky Hammond lines, the cannon-like rhythms of the exceptional Russell Gilbrooke, and Dave Rimmer’s thick, booming digging at the bass. On top of it all, and at the center of the action, there’s once again the top-notch vocal output of the charismatic Bernie Shaw. Everything is in its place. Exactly where it should be, and on top of that the album is packed with songwriting freshness and wit, which is what really matters. The opener Grazed By Heaven is a sharp, speedy rocker that, in the way its motifs are structured, clearly signals that Uriah Heep are bringing more progressive rock seasoning back on the new album, yet at the same time they keep, in everything, their true art rock character of great compositional compactness and polish. The highlights are once again in the chorus melodies, though plenty of them have their thunder stolen by a dramatized instrumental passage, most often placed at the end of a given song. The title track is one such example. You’d honestly tack at least a pre-chorus onto it, or turn the existing chorus into a pre-chorus and write an extra chorus, but that feeling completely fools the listener as the composition unfolds. In this song, Uriah Heep masterfully solved that “feeling that something small is still missing” by creating a total “break” in mood in the second half of the song, leading it into an extremely dramatized instrumental finale where the Hammond organ lines take over.
A story of its own on the album is Rocks In the Road, “stretched” out to eight minutes and the album’s longest composition. The first half is a classic Uriah Heep tune, and then the second half kicks in, where a passage with a completely different, fully instrumental continuation breaks it up, and the band creates a new, highly vibrant drama. The album’s sophisticated moment is defined by Waters Flowin’, backed by acoustic arrangements, which in structure could also have a place on one of Uriah Heep’s nineties albums. Goodbye To Innocence doesn’t hide the fact that Uriah Heep haven’t lost their sense of fun, humor and mischief even in their mature years, telling the tale of a girl who teaches things you can’t learn in school, so that in her company it’s not hard to lose your innocence. Falling Under Your Spell is a song that, in 2018, is the equivalent of Uriah Heep’s unique songwriting gems, led by Easy Livin’ and Free N’ Easy. The album closes with the excellent Dreams of Yesteryear. This composition rounds off the album brilliantly, standing out with a special, specific atmosphere created by this band’s chemistry, which we often equate with the word magic. An unbelievably sophisticated closing point, with no shortage of mysticism, longing and a skillfully slipped-in British style of melancholy.
The album »Living the Dream« is thus full of atmospheric upheavals, outstanding chorus melodies that grab you from the first listen, and a skillfully woven-in dose of progressive rock charisma, which strengthens its art rock dossier. An album with just the right amount of variety in ideas and songwriting. Played mostly in one (and at the same time first) take, with an incredible organic sonic warmth and the noble chemistry that only this quintet has always been able to conjure up so masterfully. It sounds compact, unified, and above all magical. Uriah Heep-ish, as it should be. In a new era and with a new album, Uriah Heep have really wrung out of their creative juices an achievement that’s about as optimized as it gets. The tracks will get along great with the band’s classics in the live set, and it honestly won’t bother anyone if the band decides to cram as many as five songs from the new album into the setlist. The album carries the listener along with an unbelievably fluid brilliance. It’s over in the blink of an eye. Fans of the band will be thrilled, and with »Living the Dream« Uriah Heep prove that as songwriters they’re far from having said their last word, and that in this respect, unlike their (also still active) contemporaries who coast at gigs purely on old glory and wrote their last (good) song twenty years ago, they’re far from being past it.
Lineup
Mick Box – guitar, backing vocals
Phil Lanzon – keyboards, backing vocals
Bernie Shaw – vocals
Russell Gilbrook – drums, backing vocals
Dave Rimmer – bass guitar, backing vocals
Production
Jay Ruston
Tracklist
1. Grazed By Heaven
2. Living The Dream
3. Take Away My Soul
4. Knocking At My Door
5. Rocks In The Road
6. Waters Flowin’
7. It’s All Been Said
8. Goodbye To Innocence
9. Falling Under Your Spell
10. Dreams Of Yesteryear
