Uriah Heep Album: “Lansdowne Tapes”

I've heard about the pre-Uriah Heep band Spice for SO many years,I never thought the public would get a chance to hear the band's material.Glad I was wrong.'The Lansdowne Tapes' is a must-have for ALL true Heep fans.Especially the older ones.Fourteen tracks of mostly unreleased cuts and a few studio out-takes.Through out this 77-minute disc,you'll get to fully experience the true spirit of the band,during the 1970-71 era.One critic said the group was like a mutated Deep Purple,as I've always agreed with that.The two best tracks are the eleven-minute "Why"(features a priceless melody)and "Here I Am".Other good songs are "Simon The Bullet Freak",the never before heard "Astranaza","Lucy Blues" and the instumental "Born In A Trunk".Have always enjoyed the work of guitarist Mick Box,met him after a Heep gig a few years ago and he gave me a most beautiful pink guitar pick with the band's name on it and always wished I could've seen vocalist David Byron(R.I.P.).A good CD to play on a Sunday night.Should appeal to fans of Wishbone Ash,Trapeze,Thin Lizzy and Argent.Recommended.

This is the U.S.A. pressing of original one CD edition of "The Lansdowne Tapes"(same track listing as the original UK "RPM" label edition).This is a collection of outtakes & unreleased songs from the first three "Uriah Heep" album sessions,but focusing especially on outtakes from "Very 'Eavy,Very 'Umble",showing the group's transformation from the 4-piece group "Spice" to the 5-piece group "Uriah Heep"(with the addition of keyboardist/guitarist Ken Hensley).It is a good collection,but there is now a much more comprehensive 2-CD edition edition from "Sanctuary Music".Buy that version instead.Besides,a technical fault with some of the mixes(or tape copies) of the "Spice" tracks used on the original Viceroy/RPM editions caused those tracks to run much faster than the artists intended.Those tracks are now newly remixed and run at the correct speed on the new 2-CD edition.