By the early 1970s Curved Air had achieved success with the release of their first three studio albums (Air Conditioning, Second Album, and Phantasmagoria). This was further supported by touring with artists such as Black Sabbath, B.B. King, Deep Purple,…
View More Curved Air – Air Cut [Reissue]
It is now 48 years since the formation of Curved Air, their debut album, Air Conditioning, being originally released on the Warner Brothers label in November 1970. This year Esoteric Recordings have put together a great 2-CD reissue Taking their…
View More Curved Air – Air Conditioning (Expanded Edition)
Heavy Horses was the first Tull album I bought after seeing their live broadcast from Madison Square Gardens in 1978. Second in the so-called ‘folk-rock trilogy’, it’s darker than Songs From The Wood but not as dark as Stormwatch, in…
View More Jethro Tull – Heavy Horses: New Shoes Edition
Esoteric Recordings have, for me, always come up with hidden treasure when it comes to discovering unearthed gems that might otherwise have been lost. Whether it’s Marsupilami, Mellow Candle, Eyes of Blue, Julian’s Treatment, or Galliard, to name a few,…
View More Osmosis – Osmosis
Überblick When purchasing a career-spanning box set of a band that you’re not overly familiar with, you have to keep an open mind and expect the unexpected. For me with Schmetterlinge, the gargantuan 15CD/1DVD box set including every studio and…
View More Novalis – Schmetterlinge
What more can one say about Colosseum? Their place in the history of jazz rock fusion is well known and deserved. Esoteric Recordings continue their re-releases of classic albums with Colosseum’s highly praised second album, Valentine Suite; re-mastering the main…
View More Colosseum – Valentyne Suite
Strange as it may seem memories are not permanent and immutable. We define ourselves by memories, which can be triggered by the seemingly most trivial or incidental of thoughts, such as smells or sounds, and yet the mundane can carry…
View More Cosmograf – When Age Has Done Its Duty (2018 Remix)
In this update we feature:- Jody Grind – One Step On Jody Grind – Far Canal Carolanne Pegg – Carolanne Gilli Smyth – Mother Chris Thompson – Jukebox: The Ultimate Collection Since 2007 when Mark Powell started Esoteric Recordings, the…
View More A Different Aspect #12: Christmas Special 2017, Pt.2 – Esoteric Recordings
I guess like many I was drawn to the music of Keith Emerson, Greg Lake and Carl Palmer in the early 1970s when I was in my youth, and especially to the Brain Salad Surgery and Pictures At An Exhibition…
View More Emerson Lake & Palmer – Black Moon / In The Hot Seat [2017 Remasters]
Suffering from a surfeit of weltschmerz recently? What you need is to give it a no-man soundtrack, then everything becomes clear, and by transposing your suffering and crushing ennui onto the surprisingly strong shoulders of the deceptively elfin-like Tim Bowness,…
View More No-Man – Returning Jesus