The Metal Files

I’ve liked Uriah Heep since I was a kid thanks to my older brother Robert’s love for them and really prefer the David Byron era.  We listened to those early records quite a bit and they’re forever ingrained in my musical muscle memory.

I saw them in 1986 at our local city fair called the Suffolk Peanut Fest.  I really just remember it being a very small crowd there, but I was rocking out with my brother and I think that was the only concert we ever went to together.  Unfortunate.

Last night’s show wasn’t promoted very well online and even the venue still had Michael Schenker on the marquee, which was from last week.  At the height of attendance,  there may have been 200 people there but it thinned out.  No bother.  After 3 of the same openers we always see in San Antonio, Uriah Heep came on and flat out blew away the everyone.

The band was incredibly tight, especially the drummer and bassist.  Phenomenal players.  Mick Box’s guitar playing was just fine and long time keyboardist, Phil Lanzon, was perfect.  But the star of the show was Bernie Shaw who’s been in the band since 1989.  Besides being a good frontman, his vocals were stellar.  His range was was incredible and I was quite surprised at the high notes he could hit.  The whole band, minus the drummer, provided great backing vocals.

They primarily stuck to the first 5 or 6 albums, 2 songs from their latest (which were good!) and one from 1998’s Sonic Origami.  I pretty much got everything I needed to hear sans Rainbow Demon.

Just a stellar show overall.