For them who spent childhood and young years listenin' to this great music of early Heeps that was even more important, than the coming down of Messiah or so, i'm not kiddin' at all. But there were some people in the location, who didn't even know what the ads telling "Uriah Heep in our town" really meant.

But I let them go their way. Heep's visit, awaited as a childish dream, but sudden as a sound of thunder WAS the great event in our town. That's enough to say that Heeps are the first english band ever performed in Nikolaev. Event needs description. So let's get started. I got to the entrance of the Regional Palace of Culture long before the Show was going to begin. I can't say exactly why i did it, but i like to come for the shows earlier and all. By the way I got the opportunity to watch the behaviour of the fans crowd.

But really, there wasn't any crowd at all when I came down to the place. There were little groups of not so young people smoking and discussin' that dissapointin' stuff like "whether David Byron will perform today or he'll be suddenly(!) replaced by someone else". Terrible stuff to listen to, but I had to do it cause there I was waiting for my father to come. He is even more devoted to Heeps than I am. But he didn't like Bernie Shaw.

You know, he was that kind of Heep's fan who thinks that Byron is thoroughly irreplaceable. He stuck to this belief till that Magic Night, though. But I let things go their natural pace. We got into the lobby of the Palace and saw the stall where some rock addicts, lad and girl, sold the "merchandise stuff" about Heeps.

I bought a funny cap with the title of the band right on the frontside of it. Other things you could buy were signed CD's, the book written by Phil Lenzon, shirts with "Very 'Eavy, very 'umble" cover on and so forth... There weren't so many people so far. It made me worrying about the followin' reaction of Heeps, when they will see so little audience. But then I hadn't known yet how vast and mighty would be those waves of people rushing into the concert hall after the time of the Show would come.

We took our seats near the place where the sound editor was allocated so I got the opportunity to look at all those huge consoles and to think about the difficulty of making such a great sound that Heeps have for a while. Heeps is a band for youth. Well, indeed. For the youth of all ages but mostly for the youth of seventieth. I'd never seen so many guys by the age of 40-50 jumping and whistling like they all suddenly gone mad or somethin' like that.

And they weren't all drunk, you can believe me. That's so exciting in a way. I got a feeling just for a moment that time actually hasn't its almighty power. But it has it, though. After the Show all those guys' faces got sad and even sort of angry, then they got into their luxury cars and set out for their ordinary daily lives again.

That was something like the absolutely harmless drug that makes you so happy and cheerful despite of lots of troubles you have... And it's certainly worth those about 40 Euros I'd paid for the ticket. Then i got that sort of stupid thought about Ken Hensley's performing as a special guest at the coming show, but my father replied to that stuff right at the time "he won't, i can bet".

And he wouldn't. But I wouldn't be too dissapointed, cause i knew certainly whose show i was going to taste this night. Uriah Heep current lineup were starring at the stage if I may say that way. Box, Bolder, Kerslake, Lenzon, Shaw... No more, no less. Everybody in the crowd was happy, though. Now i should say what a great guy Bernie is. Before that night I wasn't a big fan of him, but now i'm too close to become the one. He really rocks. Besides it, he hadn't missed any single note in the whole set of songs.

Everything was loud and clear. At this time the Show was going to begin. There were no spotlights turned on around the stage so i couldn't see it well what was happening there. Some guy walked near the amplifiers and for a while I thought that was Mick Box himself. But he wasn't. That guy was the guitar master of the band checkin' if everythin' was alright. But the hall was gettin' full of people with every single minute.

The crowd started clapping and whistling. That's a funny thing though, they always think the musicians are just waiting for this to appear on the stage. After that the man came on the stage saying that any kind of filming is stricly prohibited here at the Show. That's even more funny but I let it go, anyway. I knew right away, we were in just a few moments from the performance.

I've even got up from my seat to greet the heroes, but that indescribably terrific roar like hundreds of thunders broke up made me to fall into my chair again. Some human-likely figures were moving rapidly under the shining of a dozen of bright spotlights. I'd recongnized Bernie Shaw right at once.

Now we were all belong to them. To the Magicians, the temporary holders of our hearts, minds and souls. A few first songs were from their late epoch's albums which i'd never heard before, that's a shame I realize it, but they turned me on, though. What i thought of then was "The Magician ain't too delicate and mysterious now, but he has more power".

However, the first track that made me feel like yellin' was "Come Away Melinda", the kind of ballad i'd heard for about a thousand times before that, but i'd got it live and it sounded for a hundred times even more sensually and sincerely. I was clapping like a madman, waving my hands, shouting "you're great" aloud.

And all i wanted, was just to thank them for that as much as I could do. The audience mostly reacted to this song with restraint, though, and just when Bernie shouted that russian word "spasibo" people made some approving noise. I know, that isn't so much popular Heeps song right here. Some fans began to shout the word combination that annoyed me for the whole Magic Night.

What they shouted was "we wanna you to play July Morning!". It sounded like as if Heeps had no any other good song to perform except of July Morning. What a stinking stuff. But I let it go. Then for a while I paid my attention to Phil, who has the big Ukrainian flag attached to the stand of his keyboards.

There was the band name written on it. Interesting thing to pay attention for and Phil was amazing himself as usually. The first track that rocked out the audience was Free Me. I may not believe me, but i could predict that, cause I always know long before the show which song will be treated by people in the most exciting way. The crowd even tried to sing along with Heeps and i should say that wasn't so awful sound to hear. After the singing of Free Me followed another brilliant perfomance with another famous one called "If I had the time".

And also I can't not to mention those bewithcing vocal harmonies due what Heeps are being respected too. Hell, was it a pleasure to hear them live. And escpecially in the tracks, which performances made me so happy and delighted. I'm speaking about Gypsy and Bird of Prey. That was great surprise to listen to those legendary songs from the very first album.

After that came those two things that I might call "hits" if I hadn't hated this word so much, but they really hit the audience like some heavy hammer or so. I'm talking about Stealin' and Easy Leavin'. Another old song I was willing to hear was Sunrise. And, hell, I got it. And Bernie hadn't murdered any of initially David Byron's tracks. He sang them in a different way and that wasn't less emotional and powerful. That's still true when speaking about The Wizard.

He didn't even try to sing like Byron did, he created his own skillful wizard, who's also able to make some magic tricky stuff. Then suddenly i realized that i could freely get closer to the stage and have a lot of fun out there right in front of them, the Magicians. There was only one man between myself and the stage. And first thing I noticed out there was everyone tried to get his hand shaken by Bernie Shaw who quite often came down straight to the edge of the stage. And there were even more exciting atmosphere than where i was watching the first half of the show.

When the crowd paid all the attention to Bernie I sort of watched the behavior of Mick and Trevor. They'd hardly got an inch closer to stage during the performance, but they made a lot of tricks with guitars. Mick was showing us that his LesPaul is a some kind of Magic Stick which needs a special treatment and approach, when Trevor was just dexterously moving his bass in up-and-down direction. I realize, that's well-known stuff about their style, but, you know, it seems that you've just discovered it when you're right out there at the show.

And I can't no to tell you about Mr. Lee Kerslake. What a powerful drumming it was. It seemed that he was going to crush it all down to the ground, drums and cymbals were shaking all over the place. And after that came the prelude of the eight minutes madness. The crowd had recognized the organ intro of the long awaited ballad, first published in 1971.

Hell, where was I then. It didn't matter at all that was the first day of spring, and it still didn't matter that the night had already come down. We had those magic and wonderful July Morning in the concert hall. And a few minutes later Bernie, sitting on an amplifier had started telling that story, that for the decades has heated the hearts of many people around the world. Amazing and thundering bass solo of Trevor rocked my body as some kind of earthquake or eruption and then was the sawing-like performance of Mick's guitar.

That killed the audience entirely and it appeared that there was a good time to finish the performance. But, you may not believe, i was sure that it wasn't the bitter end. There was one song, I certainly knew would the final one that night. And when Heep's walked out from the crowd towards the side scenes I pronounced quietly the title of that song.

There wasn't any chance they'd heard my voice, but it doesn't matter at all. Mick turned around had taken his acoustic and started playing the chords I wanted to hear most of all at the moment. She came to me one morning and so on... Hell, were there crazy minutes.

The crowd began to sing along, especially at that chorus without the words. And I swear I'd made the attempt to join the chanting, but, hell, it seemed they all sang awfully out of tune and I wasn't able to set it right under those circumstances. I can imagine, how much surprised was Bernie and others while listenin' to that kind of mad choir screaming, but it doesn't matter in the end of it all. Everyone was happy.

 And Bernie even rose up his thumb, showing "alright guys". And when Lady in Black was sung up, I took it easy, cause that time I knew, it was all over. They embraced and made that respectful bow, thanking the crowd for having so much fun and entertainment. I hadn't missed the chance to notice how tall Phil was comparing with the rest four of them. And also how much strength has this guy, called "Bear" on account of his mighty power. And he hadn't lost any single grain of it growing older.

Well, they are real magicians, i hadn't any doubt before. And they just proved it once more. But now I see, that at the same time they aren't some spirits, ghosts or so. They are the kind of guys, who despite of their greatness and fame can just come down and give you a friendly pat on your shoulder.

And that's great for my mind. And they grow heavier as I music band, I should say. They left that priceless treasure behind them but they are walking and looking forwards where the new heights are waiting for them to reach. They blessed our not so big, but so proud town with their coming.

Though it was just the paltry stop on their wonderful and windy way through space and time. We should thank them sincerely and wish them lots of luck and joy.

The Magician is still alive and he's thriving. That's all, there's no more words. When I got out of the Palace I took a look at the skies for a moment. They were dark blue with the brightly shining stars and the moon, which was this magic firefly for me then. And all that left for me to do was to set on my imagination and to draw the colorful rainbow upon this wonderful background. The picture is done. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- With respect, Yuri Marichev