KEN HENSLEY - The Pain In Spain...
by Martin Popoff
...falls mainly on the page. Or something like that. In any event, Spain's only resident Uriah Heep keyboardist Ken Hensley has written an autobiography called When Too Many Dreams Come True, and although some pain is exposed, look for the thing to be a little purifying as well...
"Well, I pulled punches in the first version of the book," begins Hensley, moved from St. Louis to the UK, and then to Spain, to escape the rain and the high prices of home. "Originally, I wrote the thing myself, and then really produced it myself, with the help of a printer in Poland, blah blah blah. And the first edition of the book, I didn't realize that writing a book is really a different animal altogether from writing songs. So the first edition came out more like an introduction to a book, like a long letter. But I decided I wasn't going to glorify certain people, villains, in this particular piece, by naming them. So I held off naming everybody. I mean, my ex-wives were given numbers, and our manager was referred to as The Manager, as opposed to by name. What happened with the second edition of the book - which is greatly expanded with the help of a German writer who is an old friend of mine - it's been a lot more specific with a lot more detail. But it's still not scandalized. I just didn't want to go there. There were one or two publishing deals I could've had but didn't get because I just didn't want to write Hello Magazine. And even though it's a little more direct and a little bit sharper now, I still have chosen not to be... I didn't want to make a tell-all kind of scandal-filled, gossipy type thing. I just didn't think that would serve any real purpose. But it's a very honest book, and I take responsibility for my own decisions, good and bad. And I think there's a lot of life lessons in it. I would prefer to see the life lessons be a benefit to other people, than the negative stuff, just providing food for gossip. Maybe not a popular literary choice, but then again I have no experience in writing books."
Released a month prior to the book will be a CD, also, interestingly, "autobiographical."
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