Esoteric Recordings is pleased to announce the release of a new clamshell boxed set featuring all four of Curved Air’s classic albums recorded between 1970 and 1973. “The Albums” features newly remastered versions of “Air Conditioning”, “Second Album”, “Phantasmagoria” and “Air Cut”, along with bonus tracks ‘It Happened Today’ (single version), ‘What Happens When You Blow Yourself Up’ and ‘Sarah’s Concern’, all originally issued as singles.
Originally issued on the Warner Bros. label in November 1970, “Air Conditioning” showcased the highly innovative talents of Sonja Kristina (vocals), ex-Royal College of Music student Darryl Way (violin), former Royal Academy of Music student Francis Monkman (electric guitar, piano, mellotron, VCS3 synthesiser), Rob Martin (bass) and Florian Pilkington-Miksa (drums)…

Continuing with the same group lineup as on Rough and Ready, Jeff Beck Group was slagged off by critics for Steve Cropper's admittedly lazy production. However, several of the songs hold up masterfully, including the skronky "Ice Cream Cakes," the superlative redo of Don Nix's "Going Down," and the beautifully sad and wistful instrumental, "Definitely Maybe." Beware of early, poor-sounding versions…

Lonesome Crow is the debut album by German hard rock band Scorpions. It was recorded soon after Scorpions became a fully professional band under the production of Conny Plank, apparently in only six or seven days, and released February 1972 in West Germany as the soundtrack to the German anti-drug movie Das Kalte Paradies, and May 1973 in the United States…

To avoid any and all confusion, this is not the British mod band from the late '60's. This 1972 self-titled CD is the sole effort from the obscure 'heavy rock' five piece that is from Zweibrucken, Germany. In the summer of 1972, Action recorded three tracks for demo purposes at the Kerston studio. Only in 1997, the recordings by chance caught the attention of the small Dortmund label Very Good Records. The label released them as LP together with a live track in an edition of 500 copies on black and 100 copies on green vinyl. At the end of 2008, Action joined together once more for two professionally recorded gigs. The one from 11/22/2008 was now added to the CD as bonus. The tracks from 1972 were drawn from the master tapes, as well as the new ones.

Almost 50 years have passed since Flasket Brinner’s (The Flesh is Burning) double album "Flasket” (The Flesh) was released. It was their second and last album, but they existed as a live band for almost another ten years. During their existence they changed group members several times, but the front figure was always guitar player Bengt Dahlén.
On this album we find different musicians playing on several tracks. Some of the tracks even feature famous Swedish jazz musicians, such as Gunnar Bergsten and Bobo Stensson, whose contribution creates a unique blend of jazz and rock; Bo Hansson, already invited to participate at their debut album…

Although it ironically coincided with the compact disc format's slow but inexorable march toward likely extinction, the third millennium's first decade witnessed an incredible boom in CD reissues of obscure ‘70s hard rock bands; bands whose careers quickly floundered or never even took off due to any number of reasons, like the subject of this review, London's Steel Mill. Like many of these commercially failed entities, Steel Mill made the fatal mistake of attempting to partake in the relatively isolated worlds of both progressive and heavy rock, instead of committing to just one or the other, and so their sole LP, 1972's Green Eyed God, fell through the cracks of consumer tastes and wasn't even released in the U.K. until 1975, three years after the group's demise. Be that as it may, few heavy prog bands favored such a dramatic clash between their artier musical pretensions and more visceral instrumental instincts than this London quintet, resulting in fascinatingly schizophrenic numbers boasting as much inner city grime and bluster as they do pastoral purity and whimsy…

Led Zeppelin's fourth album, Black Sabbath's Paranoid, and Deep Purple's Machine Head have stood the test of time as the Holy Trinity of English hard rock and heavy metal, serving as the fundamental blueprints followed by virtually every heavy rock & roll band since the early '70s…

After releasing two "head" records during 1970-71, Stevie Wonder expanded his compositional palette with 1972's Talking Book to include societal ills as well as tender love songs, and so recorded the first smash album of his career…

Falling halfway between musical primitivism and art rock ambition, Roxy Music's eponymous debut remains a startling redefinition of rock's boundaries. Simultaneously embracing kitschy glamour and avant-pop, Roxy Music shimmers with seductive style and pulsates with disturbing synthetic textures…

The debut recording from Italy's favorite sons of progressive rock. The band had been appearing as special guests in support of bands such as Procol Harum, Deep Purple, and Yes, in addition to playing several festivals. Their hard work paid off, and the result is this excellent recording…