Back in the early 1980’s, I would buy just about any Heavy Metal album that had a cool or scary cover. I also would buy a Heavy Metal album just based on the bands name alone… if it was interesting enough. Usually, I was lucky with my choices, although there were those duds that I picked over the decades, (I won’t lie about that). Buying duds happens to any fan of any music genre, I would surmise. Not listening to an album before buying it was, (and still is), a risky Metal proposition, especially if you never heard the respective band before. Step in… Heaven. This Heavy Metal Band was not a dud.
Heaven, a Heavy Metal Band from Australia, released three studio albums during their brief career, (1982-1985), on a major label being RCA. I used to own one of the three Heaven albums – Where Angels Fear To Tread. I bought this album at a Caldor department store, back in 1983. Caldor had one really fine album/records department for a large retail store. Caldor went belly up years ago, it was a shame to see, especially when it was responsible for my having such an array of Heavy Metal albums back in the ’80’s. I bought this Heaven album without ever hearing a single song from it… the bands name being Heaven, along with the front cover logo and artwork was too good to pass up. Plus, the backside of this album had a very large photo of the band, looking real tough, (Heavy Metal tough). In this photo, lead singer Alan Fryer is shown holding a leash with a black panther attached to it. (That is to the best of my Metal memory when describing this back cover photo, if I am in error in any way, please feel free to comment with a correction).
Back in 1983, this was all I needed to see to make a blind Heavy Metal album purchase. I believe the only Heaven song I ever heard on mainstream radio was on WCCC or WHCN, (on the FM dial in expensive Connecticut), the song was Rock School. Quite honestly, I remember really liking this album, yet it was not the Heavy Metal thunder of a Def Leppard, Krokus, Accept or even Helix from that time period. Nonetheless, Heaven was heavy and good enough for me to even be looking back upon, in 2009. Where Angels Fear To Tread was a Heavy Metal album that fit right in during 1983, still Heaven obviously never caught on with the Metal masses… for reasons that I may never know. Let’s face it, I never bought their first album – Twilight of Mischief/In The Beginning, nor did I buy their third album – Knockin’ On Heavens Door, so my Metal loyalty to Heaven was not up to task back in the early ’80’s. What was I supposed to do? There were literally tons of Heavy Metal Bands coming from all sides back then, from Vintage and Classic Rock bands to the birth of the Thrash, Black and Death Metal genres. Heaven just fell victim to choice, when it came to my album purchasing decisions.
As I look back, I really wish I kept Where Angels Fear To Tread, however, it does not appear to be in print on CD. From scoping out the world wide web, it seems that this album is unofficially in print and is referred to as a bootleg version, with five live bonus tracks included. I would be Metal smitten to land a copy of this Heaven album, especially on vinyl once again. Getting ahold of this CD seems to be doable, regardless of any low quality from it being described as a bootleg.
This might sound a tad strange when I state that my favorite song from Where Angels Fear To Tread is the cover song Love Child. Yup, that famous Love Child song originally done by The Supremes. Metal truth be told, Heaven made this song heavy and it Rocked for me back in good ol’ 1983. Aw heck, this entire Heaven album would sound good again for my ears, 26 years after it’s release. It would be interesting to see, with the current Heavy Metal revival ongoing, if Heaven was to resurface in some shape or form. As the old Metal saying goes… you can’t hold onto everything in life, this Heaven album on vinyl is a great example of that, for me anyways.
A quick Metal note: There was another band named Heaven… this particular band goes back to the early 1970’s. From everything I have researched, this Heaven band does not have any association to the Heaven Heavy Metal Band of the early ’80’s. I have never listened to this band, they are categorized as a Rock band and have an album titled: Brass Rock 1, released back in 1971 on Esoteric Records. (See pic of album cover on the left of this paragraph). I found this other Heaven band and Brass Rock 1 album on http://www.fye.com, yup, it was out of stock. This same Brass Rock 1 album is in stock on http://www.bestbuy.com, however, Best Buy categorizes this 1971 Heaven band as “Metal”… go figure. This other Heaven band’s Brass Rock 1 CD is priced at $20.99, U.S. dollars, a bit too pricey for me to take a gamble on. Plus neither f.y.e. or Best Buy offer music samples for this other Heaven Band’s CD, Brass Rock 1.
Here is the front cover for Where Angels Fear To Tread, by the early 1980’s Heavy Metal Band – Heaven. This cover does scream early ’80’s Heavy Metal with it’s color and artwork, the Heaven logo I feel was well done. This cover is nothing too fancy, nor is it uncool, in my Metal opinion.
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