Customer Reviews

Head First

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This album stays the course set by the previous release Abominog: slickly-produced hard guitar rock augmented by liberal use of synths and with a few odd cover versions. Not quite as strong as Abominog, but if you liked that one you'll want to have this one also.

Side One
1. Other Side of Midnight
2. Stay on Top
3. Lonely Nights
4. Sweet Talk
5. Love Is Blind
Side Two
6. Roll-Overture
7. Red Lights
8. Rollin' the Rock
9. Straight Through the Heart
10. Weekend Warriors

Simply put, good 80's Hard Rock! If you liked "Abominog", then you'll love this one too. In my opinion, they go together. Both have some killer tracks. For fans of the older stuff, this might be too different for you. I preffer the harder songs from UH but can still appreciate their earlier softer stuff. "The other side of midnight" is one of the best Hard Rock songs ever! That song alone makes this CD worth getting. Cool cover too! Pick it up and judge for yourself.

The average idiot pops this album in and expects "Demons and Wizards". By 1983, Uriah Heep was vitrually a completely different band than that of the 70's. Only guitarist Mick Box can really be considered a "founding" member on "Head First". But the reality is, if you open your mind to the new sound which Uriah Heep had introduced on their "Abominog" album, you will discover that "Head First" is a damn fine album(despite the contrary whining of 70's Heep purists who never really even LISTENED to this album, they just assumed it was bad). "Head First" is a solid, well produced, early 80's hard rock/metal album, with spacy overtones. Peter Goalby's vocals are excellent, and the songs are easily as catchy as some of the best 70's Heep classics, just in a different way. I worship that which was early-70's Uriah Heep, but as I've grown older(as well as wiser and more open-minded) I've come to appreciate Heep's late-70's and early-80's efforts more and more. Box's guitarwork just kept improving, and while it was true Uriah Heep were not rehashing the classics, they were working much harder than the average band to bring their fans new, fresh, and quality, hard rock albums. Roll a joint, and take a dive "Head First" into this often ignored Heep classic!!!

With the exception of "Abominog", the 1980s were unfortunately not a productive decade for Uriah Heep. This is the second-worst album of their career (which, even more unfortunately, was followed by their worst, "Equator"). Mick and the boys fall prey to all the worst tendencies of 80s cheese-rock here, and there's simply no excuse for covering a Bryan Adams song. Avoid this one.

IN this one, Heep gave up writing intelligent hard rock stuff and went for a final assault to America, writing cheesy lyrics and songs all the way. But this line up was so talented thateven this way a lot of the songs sounded good and hard.

Uriah Heep was dead with the release of Wonderworld..."Head First" is an abomination

By 1981, everybody tought Uria Heep was gone for sure. So, surprinsingly, they came with ex-OZzy Obourne men Bob Daisley and Lee Kerslake and release a strong, well focused hard-rock album, ABOMINOG. That album clearly had a commercial/pop edge to it, with more and more lyrics dealing about the subject of "love"... But, even so, that album had a parituclar edge to it, some great vibe. But in HEAD FIRST, they stepped the commercialism a lot of grades higher, making a totally pop / hair metal / mainstream composition, clearly succumbing to pressures from the record company, like so many matal band did in the eighties... This album is a sell out by Heep, nothing less than that.