only released one album, 1969's , during his life but he had plenty of stray singles that accumulate over the years. Most of these found their way onto 's 2007 release , which reissued the full album, along with these 45-rpm rarities and unheard demo tapes. As was compiling that superb disc, revealed to journalist that there was a whole bunch of unheard tapes, not sitting in the vault but rather in a canvas bag in his trailer. The notoriously ornery, uncooperative eventually agreed to release these tapes but he didn't live to see the release of , a 2008 compilation of unheard songs. Unheard doesn't necessarily mean unknown, as this contains 's own versions of and songs popularized by his disciples and his friend , who also cut the title track, As to why these recordings -- all full-blown studio recordings apart from the fragile, lovely acoustic one of 's finest songs -- weren't released at the time, there are no specific reasons revealed in the liner notes, yet the succession of stories of how sold the same songs to five or six different publishers, how he demanded exorbitant fees to cut a country album, how he brawled his way through L.A. in the '60s, and how he was incessantly asking for cash after the release of leave no doubt that he was one difficult SOB. paid the price for his behavior, dropping out of sight and alienating friends (the testimonials by here are heartbreaking, although they leave little question that they had to avoid in order to preserve their own sanity). His demons drove him underground, but like many tortured artists, the art that produced was the opposite of his chaotic life: his songs flowed easily and naturally, simple in their structure yet clever in their words and melodies. That is as true to this collection of 16 songs -- all but the 1968 single previously unreleased, but that's so rare it virtually counts as unreleased -- as it was to the music on . The songs here ever so slightly emphasize his country side, surfacing primarily as the thick country-funk that distinguished but also the slick '70s shine of where falls for a Rodeo Drive cowgirl and cuts a single that could have been a soft rock hit if he had only gotten his act together. Songs like this bolster his boast that he could have delivered a hit record if the price were right, but that price was never met, so he left behind gem after gem -- at least it seems that way based on the unreleased tapes has dug up, as is every bit as excellent as . The music here is a continuation of the unreleased cuts there, right down to how this offers a slow version of a rewrite of (here spun to be a gospel tune), and a different version of called but also in how 's country blends with his soul obsessions, most wickedly so in a plea to get back to the land that's dressed up in blaxploitation funk. That's the only big, brassy funk tune on the disc; when gets soulful here, it's a bit quieter, as on the soulful and slow-burning which has a counterpoint in the dirtier, fuzz-toned funk of There are also a couple of polished roots-pop tracks here that very much sound like the end of the '60s -- -- but the heart of the new stuff is in the country, in the rocking ramble the slow-rolling tear-in-my-beer a cover of 's and, best of all, a clever ode to the bottle. Of course, that addiction is what sank personally and professionally, but somehow through that haze he left behind a wealth of remarkable music, music that only gets better the longer that you live with it, music that makes a significant argument that he's one of the great unsung country-rock songwriters of the '60s and '70s. Those talents are as easy to appreciate here, on a full-blown collection of rarities, as they were on -- and with any luck, the promise of yet another volume of tapes in the liner notes to will indeed come true somewhere down the road. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine