6 Songs for Bruce

Overview

The band, at the time a three-piece named Sound Garden, composed of guitarist Kim Thayil, bassist Hiro Yamamoto, and Chris Cornell on drums and vocals, recorded the demo in Jack Endino's basement four-track studio on April 24, 1985 for their friend Bruce Pavitt, hence the name of the tape. "Incessant Mace" would be later reissued on the 1986 C/Z Records limited edition cassette-only various artists compilation Pyrrhic Victory, and re-recorded in 1988 for the band's first full-length album Ultramega OK; while "Tears to Forget" would be re-recorded in late 1985 for the C/Z Records compilation album Deep Six, released in 1986, and recorded for a third time in 1987 for the band's debut EP Screaming Life. As a bonus song, the tape includes a Cornell's solo recording titled "The Storm", which would be re-recorded, again with Endino as audio engineer, in May 2014 as "Storm", for the band's rarities box set Echo of Miles: Scattered Tracks Across the Path. The side B of the cassette, humorously titled Zen Deity Speaks, contains no recordings. The demo tape was among many of the artifacts displayed at the EMP Museum's Nirvana: Taking Punk to the Masses exhibit in Seattle, Washington.

According to Kim Thayil in Greg Prato's book Grunge Is Dead: The Oral History of Seattle Rock Music, this was actually Soundgarden's second demo cassette. Their first demo, titled The First 15, was previously recorded in 1984.