First things first . . . if you’ve never seen the mock rock doc This Is Spın̈al Tap, go and do so now. It’s a film every aspiring music geek should watch. Otherwise, how will you know what to do when people tell you to turn it up to 11? How will you know which is the saddest of all keys? (I’ll give you this one, it’s D minor.)

Go ahead. It’s streaming for free on Pluto TV. I can wait.

Now that you’re back, how much fun was that? Many have imitated what this film originated.

But let’s get down to business — the only slight inaccuracy about Tap is that hard rock and metal bands of the 1970’s and early 80’s basically fell into one of two camps: 1.) Dungeons & Dragons or 2.) Sex. And never the twain did meet. For example, Black Sabbath might title a song “Stonehenge,” but never “Big Bottom.” Scorpions might sing a song about a “Sex Farm,” but not about “Rock and Roll Creation.” (Having just watched it, you of course know those are all titles from the movie.) However, the group known as Spinal Tap melded these traditionally unmeldable camps together, likely because they based their fictional group on multiple real-life bands.

One of those real-life bands was Uriah Heep.

Named after a malicious character in a Charles Dickens novel, Uriah Heep formed in London in 1969. With albums titled Demons and Wizards and Return To Fantasy, the band clearly pitched their tent in the firelight of the Dungeons & Dragons camp. They possessed a bit more range both musically and in terms of production when compared to contemporaries like Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, and Deep Purple, but lyrically and vocally they could sometimes lean . . . cheesy. Like a frisson of fondue.

As a result, they provided a perfect model for the Spinal Tap writers, who borrowed the story about playing at an Air Force base dinner dance directly from a keyboard player who had toured with Heep, and Tap’s inability to keep a regular (and living) drummer likely drew inspiration from Heep’s own history of running through nearly 20 drummers and bassists over the years.

Despite solid album sales, Uriah Heep never had much luck on the the singles charts, although they did find success in Germany and Switzerland and scored a #1 in New Zealand! Their own homeland never gave them a hit, however, and only once did they sneak into the US Top 40 with “Easy Livin’,” a hard-charging, organ-driven single from 1972.

So take your place in my heart . . . with Uriah Heep.

I’ve loved Uriah Heep since I was a kid and bought their Greatest Hits thinking it contained a song I was looking for, which it did not. Right title, wrong song. But the magic had already cast its spell. Plus, who doesn’t love a rock ‘n’ roll underdog? Here’s a feel-good D&D song from ’72 about a wizard:

And here’s a beautiful and soulful piano ballad, also from ’72, which Deep Purple could never have pulled off: