Instead, my son looked at me worried and asked, "Do you get super sad when it rains this hard?" I looked back at him dumbfounded, and the only response I could muster at that moment was, “How did you guess?”Ĭheck out this excellent Uriah Heep documentary called “The Hensley Years, Part 1.” Everything you ever wanted to know about the David Byron years." Rain" is a song by the English progressive rock/ hard rock band Uriah Heep, which was originally released on their fifth studio album, The Magician's Birthday, in 1972. As our car was being pulled through and the water started spraying on our windshield with considerable pressure, I kept looking at my son, expecting to hear exclamations of surprise and excitement. I wanted to share this magical moment that I had enjoyed so much as a small boy with my son. Anyway, a few days after that, I took him with me to the local carwash. It wasn’t really even raining too hard that day. To end on a more positive note, I once told my oldest son way back when he was three that rain always makes me a bit sad. For the most part, he really wasn’t the nearly superhuman vocalist you hear on "Rain" anymore on “Return To Fantasy” & “High And Mighty.” As a result, Byron was sacked from Uriah Heep in 1976 due to his erratic behavior and excessive alcohol consumption and ultimately, died of alcohol related complications at the age of 38 on February 28 in 1985. He was still absolutely stellar at times but these moments of brilliance came in fits and starts. In all honesty, it’s all pretty amazing stuff: Thain’s bass on "Sunrise," Kerslake and Box’s guitar-drum duel on the title track, Hensley’s slide work on "Spider Woman" as well as his hammond-licks on "Echoes in the Dark" and last but not least, David Byron’s simply bone-chilling vocal performance on "Rain."īy mid-1970s, Byron’s drinking problem had gotten out of hand and sadly, began to have an effect on his singing from the "Wonderworld" album onward. Upon listening to this album, it’s easy to understand why Hensley, Box, Byron, Thain and Kerslake continue to blow people away, generation after generation with their performances of these songs. Their chemistry on "Magician’s Birthday" is simply put, outstanding. The band still had its classic line-up firmly in place and boy, do they shine. “Rain" and the album it first appeared on, "Magician’s Birthday," show Uriah Heep at their utmost best. The music, both songwriting as well as the piano accompaniment, is fantastic. However, "Rain" isn’t spectacular only because of its haunting lyric. However, Ken Hensley (along with the likes of John Lennon, Bob Dylan, Tony Asher, Van Dyke Parks, Don Henley, Roger Waters, Neil Young, Gene Clark, Paul Simon etc.) delivered, time and again, lyrics that were basically poems in their own right. Usually, when you read the words printed on the CD booklet, the feeling you get is one of slight embarrassment rather than one of deep admiration. This is extremely rare for pop songs, mind you. Hensley’s style of songwriting has always been to write the lyrics first, which is why most of his lyrics stand so brilliantly on their own without the music. However, it is usually a very decisive moment, a moment of no turning back. On the one hand, this moment is very beautiful and serene on the other, it’s very, very sad indeed. "Rain" portrays beautifully the feeling that overtakes us once we realize that the relationship we are in isn’t really worth pursuing and that it is time to move on. Now it's raining inside and that's kind of a shame It's raining outside but that's not unusualīut the way that I'm feeling is becoming usual More precisely, it’s a snapshot into what he was feeling on a rainy day a long, long time ago. It’s a snapshot into the life of its author, Ken Hensley. And this is exactly what Uriah Heep’s "Rain" is all about.
I’m not talking about a particular feeling rather, the fact that rain usually puts us in a state of mind where we start reflecting on life. However, the thing that doesn’t change, as per your location, is what happens in our minds when we look out the window on a rainy day. Over here, it’s mostly drizzle - at least in comparison. In Finland, you don’t get rain like that, not even close. I remember what it was like in the Ohio Valley: when it rained, it really poured. Those of you who have lived in different parts of the world know that rain is different wherever you are.
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