Album review: KEN HENSLEY – Past And Present (Songs In Time Anthology, 1972-2021, 6 CD set)

Cherry Red [Release date: 27.02.23]

The late Ken Hensley had been steadily accumulating cultural stock since 1970. His ability to write poetic, melodic rock’n’roll is well known in the music industry worldwide.

His reputation grew exponentially as he converted that ability into many best selling successes, both with Uriah Heep and as a solo performer.

It would be impossible to reduce the man’s career to a handful of discs, so credit to Cherry Red for shoehorning so many key tracks into 6 CDs.

The label have set up this anthology as follows:

CD1: Solo (1972-1981)
CD2: A Glimpse Of Glory (1999)
CD3: Running Blind (2002)
CD4: The Last Dance (2003)
CD5: Cold Autumn Sunday (2005)
CD6: Collaborations (2011-2021)

The set is a neat construction, taking us back to the beginning, then dallying for a while in the early 2000s, then fast forwarding to the millennium’s second decade.

It was pretty clear from the outset of his career that Hensley was the consummate craftsman. CD1, Solo, confirms that he could write and record songs of emotional fragility like ‘Black Hearted Lady’ as well as the heavyweight rock of ‘Cold Autumn Sunday’. The latter, from his first solo album, gets revisited and revised on CD5.

A Glimpse Of Glory (CD2) is a strange beast. It reflects (or at least half of it reflects) Hensley’s conversion to Christianity, while living in St.Louis, Missouri. It is a brave artist who tries to sell his belief and his faith to the public. ‘Jesus Again And Again’ and ‘The Joy Of Knowing Jesus’ are real “heart on his sleeve” stuff.

As the dates might indicate, Running Blind (2002) and The Last Dance (2003) were consecutive releases.

The first assembles a lot of ideas and themes into one album, most of them… loneliness, alienation, comfort… are not untypical of Hensley, but few of them work.

‘Free Spirit’ and ‘Prelude – A Minor’ are exceptions. Both are triumphs of craft and design, if not entirely original.

‘The Last Dance’ reflects a new lease of life gained by Hensley after uprooting and emigrating to Spain. Surrounded by Spanish musicians who knew little of his reputation, he upped his game.

‘Crying’, ‘Letting Go’ and ‘The Voice Of Love’ are the soul baring, emotionally honest songs we expect from the man. Superb songs.

The anthology concludes with Collaborations (CD6), and is exactly that. An album of material recorded with his Live Fire band, spotlighting the fabulous guitarwork of Street Legal axe man, Ken Ingwersen.

The CD closes with ‘Right Here’ and ‘Cold Sacrifice’, two collaborations with Russian poet and lyricist, Vladimir Emelin. taken from My Book Of Answers, Hensley’s final album. They grew out of a chance meeting between the two when they were boarding the Moscow flight out of the EU four years ago.

Who said the language of rock music isn’t universal. ****1/2

Review by Brian McGowan

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