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This is Pride of mind's first demo tape of two they released during their main period of activity. Released in 1994 sometime between June and August, it was priced at ¥1200, and sold out sometime in late 1994/early 1995. In a pleasant surprise to music lovers, we see on the credits sheet that keyboardist Yukino, of Ér fame, was the engineer and guest keyboardist for "Black sun". Ér vocalist Hinako would later go on to provide guest backing vocals on Pride of mind's full-length album "Systems of Romance". Unfortunately, it appears that the lyrics were never included with this demo tape.
A note on image quality: the front cover appears to have been simply a photo that was printed out and bent into the proper shape for a tape cover. The copy pictured here has sustained sun damage and faded from black to green in most areas.
The unusual "warranty" card included with this demo informs the purchaser that in the event of any noise, skips, or other imperfections on the tape, it may be returned to STUDIO POWER ARTS and exchanged for a new copy.
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Review:
Dance with moon
A piece vaguely reminiscent of the later "Salome", "Dance with moon" starts off in a mysterious, sinuous vein, with synthesized sitars, drums, and flutes. The vocals start to be interspersed with the music starting after about a minute. Midway through, the song intensifies as the singing changes to impassioned spoken vocals over a strong piano part. After a brief interlude, the mood of the piece changes to a "spooky", more operatic mood, with the vocals and lead instrument nearly in unison over a backing instrument and percussion.
Decayed
This instrumental-only piece is similar to the instrumental breaks on some of Pride of mind's later heavy songs such as "The flower bloom in future".
Angels of night
"Angels of night" is a higher-energy piece with a techno beat. The vocals are prominent over the guitar and electronic instruments; halfway through the other band members can be heard shouting in accompaniment. The melody and vocals adhere to essentially the same structure throughout, until the end where they build to a climax and then cut out abruptly, leaving only the beeping sound from the background.
Black sun
My favorite of the songs on this demo tape, "Black sun" features distorted vocals over a rapid synthesized bass lead instrument and a smoother melody instrument, as well as flourishes added on a chime-like keyboard instrument. After an ominous lead-in, the vocals are introduced in the form of sung phrases accompanied by a high-pitched unison accompaniment. The melody builds tension during these phrases and progresses between them. After a few of these phrases, the song transitions to a series of chanted phrases ending in "Black sun", which intensify to an effective climax. The remainder of the song is a slight elaboration of the music that came before, without vocals.