Welcome to Esoteric Recordings, the home of good music. Established in 2007 and label managed by Mark Powell, Esoteric Recordings is the home of good music, with all releases finely packaged and remastered from the best possible sources to ensure the highest possible audio quality. Our releases cover both catalogue reissues and inspiring new works from artists with a fine history and heritage. Esoteric Recordings is an imprint of the Cherry Red Records group.

News
Our Aphrodite’s Child releases continue to receive praise in the monthly music magazines. September’s Record Collector warms to the sunny psych sounds of End of the World which it awards three stars and gets hot under the kaftan collar about It’s Five O’ Clock which nets four stars. “Hopefully 666 will soon get the same treatment!” Meanwhile in the September edition of Classic Rock Presents Prog: “End of the World dates from ’68 and It’s Five O’ Clock from ’69; neither has been on CD before. End Of...explores a psych-pop direction...It’s Five finds our Hellenic heroes in a more divergent mood, Wake up resembling a a folk-rock protest song and Funky Mary veering into jazz-rock territory...Next around the corner was Aphrodite’s Child’s concept album, 666. As the lead-up to this fine masterworks these two re-releases are never less than interesting.”

Meanwhile, Classic Rock mag notes “Debut End of the World flew the freak flag for psychedelic Med-rock, the band pouring their love of Procol Harum, The Beatles and The Moody Blues into songs that fluttered between byzantine balladry and Anglophile prog...Follow-up It’s Five O’ Clock was, if anything, even more rooted in English sensibility, the tunes folksier and more baroque.”

Brainticket’s two albums Psychonaut and Celestial Ocean on our Reactive imprint have taken a lot of people by surprise. Classic Rock Presents Prog hears Pyschonaut as being “reminiscent of Quintessence crossed with Hawkwind” whilst Celestial Ocean “has more of a space-rock bent.” Record Collector takes the view that they were “In line with fellow intergalactic explorers Funkadelic and Gong, Brainticket remain psychedelic in extremis, even when getting funky, ethno-jazz orientated or beyond description.”

Our High Tide re-issues also come under scrutiny in Classic Rock Presents Prog who ask: “So, where did the progressive metal genre begin? There’s a strong argument for saying that it’s with High Tide, a British band who combined an almost gothic eerieness with heavy guitars and sophisticated musicianship...the band debuted in 1969 with Sea Shanties as [guitarist Tony] Hill and [violinist Simon] House are locked in a constant noisy battle. It’s close to being space rock as interpreted by Atomic Rooster. The album works brilliantly on Death Warmed Up and Missing Out. A truly exciting, if exhausting, experience.”

Finally, the one and only eponymously titled album by Fields is reviewed on the Dutch Progressive Rock Pages website . “With a line-up consisting of a keyboard wizard who focuses on organ playing, a singing guitarist/bassist and a drummer, immediate comparisons with ELP are likely to be drawn...Fields tended to keep their numbers short but that doesn't mean they were purely interested in pop songs. Over And Over Again is the equal of many ELP numbers and album opener A Friend Of Mine is worthy of inclusion in any collection of classically-inspired keyboard rock songs.”