Mariah Carey 1988 Demo Cassette Heads to Auction Block Dec. 2

A demo tape from Mariah Carey, recorded in 1988, will go up for auction starting Dec. 2 through music marketplace Wax Poetics. The cassette comes from producer Arthur Baker's collection. It features seven tracks with unreleased recordings and early versions of songs that appeared on the singer's self-titled 1990 debut album.

Baker got the cassette at a Christmas party in New York when the then-19-year-old was working as a backup singer for Brenda K. Starr. Starr approached Baker at the party to tell him about her background singer's material. After the party, Baker brought the recording to his studio to listen.

"I stick the cassette in and the first three songs are all hits and I'm thinking holy sh*t it's Madonna meets Whitney," Baker said in a statement, according to Complex. "She writes like Madonna sounds like Whitney. This is it, I've discovered gold."

The auction opens Dec. 2 at 3 p.m. ET and runs through Dec. 11. Wax Poetics expects the item could sell for as much as $20,000.

"This tape is one of the most sought-after items we have come across," said Alex Bruh, co-owner and CEO of Wax Poetics, according to Complex. "It captures the exact moment an era-defining artist was emerging, before the world knew her name."

In her 2020 memoir, The Meaning of Mariah Carey, the singer recalled saving money and bartering studio time to put her songs on tape.

Baker has kept the cassette for almost four decades but is selling it now to fund upcoming projects: a documentary film about the song "Walking on Sunshine," a personal memoir, and a podcast.

The sale will include a verified certificate of authenticity, archival notes, and historical context from Baker's collection and the Wax Poetics archive team.