Despite their short existence and lack of hit singles outside of Europe, Aphrodite's Child is respected as a cult band, and their album 666 is often considered their masterwork in addition to being one of rock music's first concept albums.

The short story of Aphrodite's Child starts in 1967, when the Greek/Egyptian bassist and vocalist named Artemios Ventouris Roussos (Demis Roussos) and the powerful drummer Lucas Sideras were supposed to meet the multi instrumentalist Evengelio Odyssey Papathanassiou (Vangelis) who had left his first group Formynx. After a failed attempt to enter England, the band regrouped in Paris, where guitarist Anargyros Silver Koulouris was added to their line-up (although he would be forced to leave the band to perform military service, with guitar and bass both being played by Roussos during his absence). The band's first two albums, End of the World and It's Five O'Clock, combined a very '60s sounding Euro-pop-rock with Greek folk music elements. The band began to record their crowning achievement in 1970: a musical adaptation of the biblical Book of Revelations, entitled 666 - The Apocalypse of St. John. After Roussos and Sideras had already embarked on solo careers, Mercury finally agreed to release 666 two years after its completion, and it came out in 1972. After the band split, both Vangelis and Demis Roussos pursued successful solo careers, Roussos as a pop singer and Vangelis as one of the pioneers in progressive eletronic music. Kolouris worked with both on occasion. Lucas Sideras pursued a less successful solo career, releasing the single Rising Sun after the break-up.