The Shaw Decades
The Shaw Decades
SHAW AUDITIONS FOR HEEP
Bernie Shaw originally auditioned for Heep when
Goalby left the band. Stephen Fontaine was given the job at that time due to his very powerful
voice. Fontaine was sacked after the North American tour
and Bernie again was a prime candidate
for the lead vocalist position.
SHAW IS ADDED TO THE BAND
Mick Box checked out Stratus' lead singer , Bernie Shaw, at their farewell performance at the Marquee.
Mick was in the audience singing at the top of his lungs, to see if their vocals were compatible. Later, Bernie came in for an audition and it was decided to have him step in
as lead vocalist on a trial basis for a German tour. During the German tour,
the fans were very enthusiastic about Bernie's
stage presence as well as his voice. Heep had a new lead singer!
THE MARQUEE CLUB
London's Marquee Club has been very good to Uriah Heep. Firstly, Spice landed a prestigious weekly Saturday night slot at the Marquee in 1969 before morphing into Uriah Heep. More recently, Mick Box first checked out future Heep members Phil Lanzon and Bernie Shaw at the Marquee.
HEEP PLAYS MOSCOW
In December of 1987, soon after Bernie joined the band, Uriah Heep became
the first Western Rock band to perform in Russia.
Heep played 10 consecutive nights of sold out performances to
a total of 180,000 people in Moscow's Olimpiskij Stadium. Actually Uriah Heep did
an eleventh concert. One afternoon, they sent
a bus around to pick up any kids who wanted to
see Heep and they brought them back for a sound check. The KGB wasn't prepared, so the kids got to come in and go right down in front of the stage. A live album and a video were released from the historic concerts entitled, aptly, "Live
In Moscow".
HEEP SIGNS WITH LEGACY
Legacy Records bought the rights to most of Heep's back catalog when Bronze folded.
As Mick once stated, that was part of the reason that Heep signed a deal with Legacy. The deal was for the Live
in Moscow album and a couple of studio
albums. The albums which turned out to be Raging
Silence and Different World. By the time Different World
was released, the Legacy organization was in shambles.
An once large company was reduced to just a
handful of people and the support for Heep was next
to nonexistent.
RICHARD DODD PRODUCES NEW ALBUM
Recording for their new label, Legacy, the new line-up of
Heep headed to the studio with Richard Dodd serving as producer. The album, Raging Silence, included a song inspired by their Moscow trip, "Cry Freedom".
HAVE WE MET BEFORE?
When Bernie first met the band, he had already met Mick several times. Mick didn't tell Bernie who was
in the band at the time, so Bernie was surprised when he went in to meet them.
He already knew Phil since they had both been in Grand Prix. Bernie had not left Grand Prix on amicable terms so there was a possibility of a very
uncomfortable situation. Apparently Phil held no animosity and the previous
unpleasantness was quickly forgotten.
THEME OF GOOD OVER EVIL
When Heep went to the Soviet Union, the band had to
submit lyric sheets to make sure there wasn't any unallowable subjects in the songs. As Bernie said in an interview, "Everything got passed ok, because Heep
lyrics are always good over evil, or positive messages..."
OOPS!
Heep had a Hungarian road crew with them on their historic trip to Moscow. Heep had discussed in front of the crew the fact that phone conversations had been interrupted several times. The band felt their phone calls were being monitored.
This made the crew really paranoid, so they searched their room for bugs. When they found
a suspicious lump under their rug, they worked on it
a while and finally got it pried up from the floor. They immediately heard a very loud crash from the room below.
It turned out the crew was over a ballroom and they had removed the nut that held up a big chandelier. Mick said the crew didn't make anything for the tour because they had to pay for that chandelier.