Salisbury
	Produced by Gerry Bron
	Released on January 1971
	US CHART POSITION #103
	Find it at GEMM
SR-61319 cover

H eep raised the stakes on Salisbury (sorry about that, I’m not made of steel), culminating in the sixteen-minute title track which featured (I kid you not) an actual orchestra. I’m guessing the conductor must have asked for half of the money up front. Don’t get me wrong, I really like Uriah Heep. Part of their appeal is that they’re easy to root for as the perennial bull in the china shop, clumsily chasing a state of musical grace that came so easily to ELP, The Doors and others. In a sense Heep, like Godzilla, possesses a giant animal neutrality that works for good and evil irregardless. Harnessing classical elements for something as banal as “Salisbury” should be a crime, but I’d give them a get-out-of-jail-free card for “Lady In Black,” “High Priestess” or “The Park.” It’s hard to believe the same band that wrote the calculatedly contagious “High Priestess” or the epic “Lady In Black” could make such a giant misstep as “Salisbury,” but that’s the eternal paradox of Uriah Heep. Salisbury is by turns a very good album and a very bad one, steeped in the psychedelia of the late ‘60s (when were they even on the ground floor of anything?), but played out with a conviction that you have to admire. Mick Box’ opening guitar licks on “Time To Live,” Ken Hensley’s organ solo on “The Park,” and Paul Newton’s bass playing throughout indicate that Heep was running at one hundred percent. The band gives it their all, whether the song merits the effort or not, and the results are extreme (extremely good or extremely bad). Maybe that’s where Salisbury excels: you may not like every song, but you’ll have a strong reaction to most of them. Note that the US and UK releases differed primarily in track placement. The heavy “Bird of Prey” was replaced on US releases by “Simon The Bullet Freak,” an interesting tale of a man at odds with himself that suggests some of Jesus Christ Superstar’s dynamism. The expanded CD reissue reconciles the pair along with the single edit version of “High Priestess.”

SR-61319 back cover

TRACK LISTING

US track listing

1. HIGH PRIESTESS    3:39
2. THE PARK    5:38
3. TIME TO LIVE    (Mick Box/David Byron/Ken Hensley)    4:02
4. LADY IN BLACK    4:43
5. SIMON THE BULLET FREAK    3:25
6. SALISBURY    (Mick Box/David Byron/Ken Hensley, brass and woodwind arr. by John Fiddy)    16:22
   
   UK track listing
   
1. BIRD OF PREY
2. THE PARK
3. TIME TO LIVE
4. LADY IN BLACK
5. HIGH PRIESTESS
6. SALISBURY
   
   CD reissue bonus tracks
   
7. SIMON THE BULLET FREAK
8. HIGH PRIESTESS (SINGLE EDIT)
   
   All songs written by Ken Hensley unless noted

CREDITS

KEITH BAKER -- drums
MICK BOX -- lead guitar, acoustic guitar, vocals
DAVID BYRON -- lead vocals
KEN HENSLEY -- organ, piano, slide and acoustic guitars, harpsichord, vibes and vocals
PAUL NEWTON -- bass guitar, vocals
Peter Gallen -- recording engineer
Des Strobel -- art director

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