B-side "Overnight" Length 5:38
4:52 (stereo) | Format Single Label Warner Bros. | |
Released October 1987 (US)
November 1987 (UK) Recorded January — March 1987
Middle Ear, and Criteria Studios, Miami | ||
"E.S.P." was a single by the Bee Gees. Released in 1987, it was the follow-up to their successful single "You Win Again". The a cappella intro found on the album version was edited out for radio airplay.
Contents
Origin and recording
The original title of the song is "XTC" or "Ecstasy" before the Gibbs realized that it sounded like a drug reference so they changed it to "E.S.P." Barry handles most lead vocal duties for this song while Robin sing a few lines and edges into falsetto for the choruses.
The demo of "E.S.P." was released in 1990 on the box set Tales from the Brothers Gibb, Like "You Win Again" it has the same drum program as the demo, and the same main vocal tracks, and it was speeded up by the same amount (103.25%), raising it a little more than a quarter tone, The finished version has a new a cappella opening and reaches the start of the demo at 0:33, There are seven edits, Both times through, four beats are dropped before the second verse ("There's danger"), The last two edits are additions going into the end, around 3:20, Not long after that the finished version has different ad lib vocals into the fade, Rhett Lawrence and Robbie Kondor are again the main musicians on the track.
Single release
The second single did much less well than "You Win Again" reaching only number 13 in Germany and outside top forty elsewhere, Warner Bros. pushed "E.S.P." even more heavily with many alternate mixes on 12-inch singles and promo disks. The reprise, a piece of the a cappella opening, was used as the closing number of the album.
The B-side "Overnight" featuring lead vocals by Maurice Gibb.