Behind every officially-released album, there’s always some ridiculously obscure promo album. Okay, not always, but I’ve come to find these “Not For Sale” promo items are made on a regular basis.
Take Lennus for example. Known as Paladin’s Quest in the US, Lennus was a decent turn-based RPG for Super Famicom with music from one of my favorite composers, Kouhei Tanaka (known for Sakura Taisen and Alundra). Lennus had an official album printed by Future Land in December of ’92. It had five arranged medleys, and five short drama tracks. While that album was certainly a neat one, the question remains: where can we find the original music?
Well, here it is: only on a promotional mini-CD entitled “Welcome to the Lennus World!” It’s not a complete soundtrack, no sir. It’s only got about 20 minutes of music on it. But these ten songs are the most familiar songs, the ones that are most worth listening to, especially for fans of the game. If a full OST had been printed, I think the other tracks would likely have been some bland filler music that nobody wanted to hear anyway.
Among the ten songs on here, allow me to speak about my two favorites. First, “Field Battle”, which is the standard battle theme, is a kickin’ song running in a fast 12/8 beat. Tanaka throws in the occasional harp or flute to run up a scale as quickly as possible, and a synth bass keeps the steady but pounding rhythm going. It’s a fine battle theme indeed.
My other favorite is “Theme of the Turning Time”, which I am guessing is music from the game’s ending. Regardless of its in-game origin, the song itself is a breathtaking bit of work. Listen for yourself: even gamers who haven’t played this particular game will feel that sense of nostalgia, since the SFC soundchip is just so brilliant and lovely to the ears of the 16-bit era gamer.
And, of course, if you hope to find this mini-CD, it will probably be in some used Japanese bookstore. Otherwise, it’ll be on Yahoo! Japan Auctions for at least $50. Only the most insane fan would hunt this promo item down; I’d recommend looking for the arranged CD first, since it is slightly less obscure than this CD. Either way, good luck you die-hard Lennus fans!
