A Cruel Angel's Thesis

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The Cruel Angel's Thesis (残酷な天使のテーゼ, Zankoku na Tenshi no Tēze) is the theme song of the popular anime Neon Genesis Evangelion performed by Yoko Takahashi. It is used as the introduction to every episode, and two instrumental versions of it are played in the finale episode, "Take care of yourself." These are "The Heady Feeling of Freedom" and "Good, or Don't Be", scored for violin, piano and guitar. 'The Heady Feeling of Freedom" is a somber and reflective violin piece, while "Good, or Don't Be" is played to a light piano and guitar tone. Both are considerably different in feel from the more hard driving techno-dance original. A similar, but sparser, version can also be heard during the intermission between the two parts of Evangelion: Death and Rebirth.

According to the liner notes to the album Refrain of Evangelion, director Hideaki Anno had originally wanted to use music from Borodin's Polovetsian Dances as the opening. The TV station (TV Tokyo) felt that audiences would be confused by a classical opening to an anime, and requested a change to a more typical or J-Pop & upbeat song. The production of the result, "A Cruel Angel's Thesis", was handled by Toshimichi Ōtsuki. The original song included a male chorus, which was cut at Anno's request in order to "emphasize maternal affection".^{[citation needed]}

• Performed by: Yoko Takahashi
• Lyrics: Neko Oikawa
• Music: Hidetoshi Sato

• Animetal released a heavy metal version of the song on their Animetal Marathon V album.
• There exists a version sung by the Japanese voice actors of Rei Ayanami (Megumi Hayashibara), Asuka Langley Soryu (Yuko Miyamura), and Misato Katsuragi (Kotono Mitsuishi), as well as another cover by Megumi Hayashibara on her Center Color album.
• Shoko Nakagawa also released a cover version of the song on her Falling in love with anime songs album.
• Masami Okui released a cover version in her Masami Kobushi album, and performed a live rendition of the song at Anime Friends 2004.
• Megumi Ogata, the voice of series lead Shinji Ikari, has performed live covers of the song in character during her concerts.
• Mikuni Shimokawa covered the song on her first anime cover album, Review ~Mikuni Shimokawa Seishun Anison Cover Album~.
• Chihiro Yonekura released a cover version on her Ever After, an anime cover album.
• Piano Squall released an instrumental version on his album GAME.

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