Keef Hartley came to prominence as a member of the british R&B group the artwoods before joining John Mayall's Bluesbreakers in 1967. He contributed to the album crusade before leaving in 1968 to form the first line-up of his own band. He recorded his first album, "Halfbreed" for Decca's Deram label in March 1969. Regarded as a classic of the fusion of rock, jazz and blues, Hartley went one better later in the year by changing the lineup of his band to include gifted guitarist, vocalist and writer Miller Anderson. This new band recorded the wonderful "The Battle Of North West Six" for decca later that year, around the same time they performed at the legendary Woodstock Festival. Unavailable for many years, Esoteric Recordings are pleased to reissue the album with liner notes by Keef Hartley.

One of the key albums when talking about psychedelic hard-rock and early proto-metal, originally released in 1969. Featuring the great John Cann (The Attack, Atomic Rooster, Hard Stuff…) on guitar plus Mick Hawksworth (Fuzzy Duck, Alvin Lee) on heavy bass plus the powerful drumming of Ian McLane (Neat Change, Ray Owen’s Moon). Andromeda was formed during the final days of Cann’s previous band The Attack, when he decided to go in a full heavier & proggier musical direction. Recruiting his friend/room mate Mick Hawksworth on bass plus drummer Jack McCulloch (of One In A Million, soon to be replaced by Ian McLane), the power-trio was born. After initial interest from John Peel (Dandelion) and Kit Lambert (Track Records), Cann decided to go with a major label, RCA, who offered him the chance to self-produce their first album. Recorded at Advision Studios, the impressive Andromeda debut was released in 1969, housed in a sleeve designed by John with photos by Gered Mankowitz. But despite receiving excellent reviews and the band playing lots of gigs (some of them billed above bands like Black Sabbath), RCA didn’t know what to do with such a heavy rock band.

This Nashville band featuring Mindy Dalton, Judi Griffith, Lana Napier, Pame Stephens, and Jean Williams has long been an enigma. There was even a rumour that they were a fictional band, and the material had been recorded quite recently by various American indie luminaries! This despite the original 1969 Athena Records album undoubtedly existing, and fetching astronomical figures.
In fact, The Feminine Complex were an all-girl garage band, a rarity in Nashville, to be sure. They were even heavily featured on various TV shows including the nationally-syndicated "Showcase '68" and the local "Nashville Now". The Feminine Complex made one of the few genuine girls-in-the-garage albums (all original songs too!) in a time when the 45 was king (queen?), and an extraordinary album it is too, as extraordinary indeed as the story of the band…

Audience was a London-based group that recorded their first album in 69 and had their eponymous debut pulled from the stores a few months after its release, which makes the album a major collectible (CD versions were also hard to come by until a recent reissue). They got signed by Tony Stratton-Smith of the Charisma label (Genesis, Van der Graaf Generator, The Nice and a few others) but although not a purely progressive group, they bore a lot of characteristics of the masters. Among which , a profound (and somewhat derangesome) singer whose voice reminds you a bit of Peter Hammill, a great wind players able to switch to from flutes to saxes and oboe and a bassist…

Cult underground psychedelic 60's legends from Switzerland related to Toad, Brainticket, Deaf, and Les Sauterilles . This is their one and only album from 1969, containing a wide range of psychedelic and progressive styles. With dark passions and melancholic moods "Hey Mr Holy Man" is outstanding. This issue has three bonus tracks, two from a rare compilation LP, and one from an even rarer split single from 1968.. Sinister artwork illustration is the first record cover work of H.R. Giger.

Awakening… (1969). From the legendary hard rocking South African psych rock scene, alongside such greats as Freedom’s Children, and Suck, comes The Third Eye. Awakening is the Third Eye’s debut full length, originally released in 1969, and is a masterful and complex album of late sixties South African heavy psych, featuring fuzzed out guitars, great brass arrangements and virtuosic organ work, provided by the young Dawn Selby, who, at the time of recording was all of 14 years old…

Alto Giant is an exciting live album that captured the Cannonball Adderley Quintet in Milan in 1969, two years after the group recorded 74 Miles Away. Cannonball's music in this period is marked by his enthusiastic embrace of funk and jazz rock. In addition to his brother Nat Adderley on trumpet, the quintet included Joe Zawinul on piano, Victor Gaskin on bass, and Louis Hayes on drums. In addition to the leader's hot and exciting alto playing, what stand out are Hayes's aggressive and effective drumming and Zawinul's contributions in terms of two original compositions (the odd-meter, free jazz-oriented "Scavenger" and the funky "Walk Tall") and his solo performance of "Ballads Medley." The generosity of the leader extended to Gaskin as well, who was prominently featured on "Manha De Carnaval"…

Formed in 1967 by keyboard player Vangelis, the band also featured Demis Roussos on bass and vocals and Lucas Sideras on drums. "End Of The World" (1968) features the international hit 'Rain And Tears', partially inspired by Procol Harum's 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale' . However, the album revealed a more experimental side to the band s nature with such Psychedelic gems as 'The Grass Is No Green', 'You Always Stand In My Way' and 'Day Of The Fool'. This reissue has been remastered from the original tapes and includes both sides of Aphrodite's Child's first single as bonus tracks.
Their classic second album, "It's Five O' Clock" (1969) featured the international hit from which the album took its name. The LP revealed a more experimental side to the band's nature with such Psychedelic gems as 'Funky Mary' and 'Let Me Love, Let Me Live'. This reissue has been remastered from the original tapes and includes six bonus tracks…

The Band's first album, Music from Big Pink, seemed to come out of nowhere, with its ramshackle musical blend and songs of rural tragedy. The Band, the group's second album, was a more deliberate and even more accomplished effort, partially because the players had become a more cohesive unit, and partially because guitarist Robbie Robertson had taken over the songwriting, writing or co-writing all 12 songs. Though a Canadian, Robertson focused on a series of American archetypes from the union worker in "King Harvest (Has Surely Come)" and the retired sailor in "Rockin' Chair" to, most famously, the Confederate Civil War observer Virgil Cane in "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down."

Opening slowly with the dark, swampy "Born on the Bayou," Bayou Country reveals an assured Creedence Clearwater Revival, a band that has found its voice between their first and second album. It's not just that "Born on the Bayou" announces that CCR has discovered its sound – it reveals the extent of John Fogerty's myth-making. With this song, he sketches out his persona; it makes him sound as if he crawled out of the backwoods of Louisiana instead of being a native San Franciscan. He carries this illusion throughout the record, through the ominous meanderings of "Graveyard Train" through the stoked cover of "Good Golly Miss Molly" to "Keep on Chooglin'," which rides out a southern-fried groove for nearly eight minutes.

Recorded at Rick Hall's Muscle Shoals studios, this set embodies the essence of Southern soul – a hybrid of country, R&B and the blues. This long-out-of-print set features the novelty tune "I'd Rather Be An Old Man's Sweetheart (Than A Young One's Fool)" and a killer cover of O.V. Wright's "That's How Strong My Love Is."

This is a record that even those who aren't Deep Purple fans can listen to two or three times in one sitting – but then, this wasn't much like any other album that the group ever issued. Actually, Deep Purple was highly prized for many years by fans of progressive rock, and for good reason. The group was going through a transition – original lead singer Rod Evans and bassist Nick Simper would be voted out of the lineup soon after the album was finished (although they weren't told about it until three months later), organist Jon Lord and guitarist Ritchie Blackmore having perceived limitations in their work in terms of where each wanted to take the band.

Recorded July 21, 1969 at The Aquarius Theatre in Hollywood, California, USA (early show).
Track F1 is "Jazzy Maggie M'Gill" from the soundcheck recorded the same day. This three LP Record Store Day version of this Doors' live album features the Doors' first night of a two night stand at the Aquarius Theatre on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, California. Limited to 8,500 copies. This vinyl release is an entirely new mix than ever before issued. Issued on 180 gram clear vinyl, housed in trifold jacket with classic white paper & plastic polylined inner sleeves.Runout details: everything is hand etched on each side.

Anthems in Eden is a 1969 album by Shirley and Dolly Collins, with the Early Music Consort of London, directed by David Munrow. The album originally consisted of a 28-minute set of folk songs plus seven other individual pieces performed by the same group. The musical arrangements for these eight pieces included early music instruments, such as viols, recorders, sackbuts and crumhorns. In 1976, six new songs were recorded with a different assortment of accompanists, to replace the original seven individual songs. This 1976 album consisting of the 28-minute set plus the six new songs was released by Harvest Records under the title Amaranth. Subsequent releases have combined all fourteen pieces under the original title, Anthems in Eden.

It's fair to say that Ceremony: An Electric Mass is unlike any other release by an English band normally rooted in the blues. Think of it as Spooky Tooth's version of Concerto for Group and Orchestra by Deep Purple, in which, after two or three promising blues-based rock releases, one member of the band somehow convinces the others to go for a wildly ambitious, experimental concept album. Jon Lord persuaded Deep Purple to dive into the deep end, and Gary Wright convinced Spooky Tooth to welcome acclaimed French composer and musique concrète pioneer Pierre Henry for this electronic mass. Henry's atonal arrangements don't fare too badly against Spooky Tooth's piercing guitars and bluesy wail, although Wright left the band after Ceremony (just as Lord never had the same influence on Purple again, leaving Ritchie Blackmore to lead them on to heavy metal glory).